Categories: History

A History of Mermaids

For centuries now mermaid myths have been around. Numerous water spirits were said to have lived in West Africa according to the Igbo people as well as others. Not all were of the appearance of a half-fish, half-human, but some were have said to look like alligators and snakes. In the 1500’s Europeans were carving mermaids on their ships. After some time the European mermaid legends began to blend with Africa’s stories. The most powerful well known water spirit in Africa is called “Mami Wata”; which is spoken about in the American Museum of Natural History.

Mermaids sightings have been reported all over Europe, and the world. They have many different names all over the world, Rusalkas according to the Russians, Meerfraus from the Germans, Merrows in Ireland, and more. Reported sightings of Mermaids go back to ancient Greek times and continue right up to present time. However in today it is extremely rare someone will claim they saw one. The classic tale of a mermaid would be a beautiful woman with a fish’s tale, not many have claimed to have seen many mermen, which if the myth were true there should be just as many sightings claimed of mermen as mermaids. One myth also was told that mermaids had two tails, resembling legs. William Bond wrote “The Secret History of Mermaids” with facts and myths that may make you wonder about these underwater women, and how nude women divers were mistaken for mermaids at times.

One explanation behind the mermaid myth is that sailors would see sea creatures such as manatees, seals, or walruses and claim they saw a mermaid, a woman with a fish’s tail. However to mistake that one would assume they were drunk, or at sea too long. Even famous explorers such as Christopher Columbus, John Smith, and Henry Hudson have claimed to have seen mermaid sightings. Christopher Columbus claimed to have seen three mermaids near Haiti in 1493, however he spoke of them as not as attractive as he expected, he also says they resembled men in their faces. However John Smith claimed in 1614 he sighted a mermaid and spoke of her as “Beautiful with long green hair”.

Mermaids are also knows as sirens, in Greek mythology a siren was a seductive woman who called out the the sailors in the sea only to lure them to smash their ships on the rocks and face certain death. Dangerous, seductive, and alluring; that is how they were perceived by many people years ago. Even in Ireland there has been as recent sightings as 1910, and some claimed that the mermaids were a “bad omen”.

The Little Mermaid” was a story written by Hans Christian Andersen in 1836 about a tragic tale of a young mermaid who gives up her voice so that she may walk on land. There was also a statue built in 1913 in Denmark to honor the story. Of course we all are familiar with the classic cartoon tale of “The Little Mermaid. So children and adults of today see these creatures as beautiful, friendly women of the sea. Many years ago a lot still believed that, but some also believed that they were bad luck, or just plain evil. However they are perceived, with so many sightings, even from our famous well respected travelers that we hold in our history books today; is there a chance they do or at least at one time did exist? No one knows that answer for certain, probably not, but we can have an imagination as well if we want. .