Mermaid
A mermaid is a legendary aquatic creature with the upper body of a woman and the tail of a fish.[1] Mermaids appear in the folklore of many cultures worldwide, including the Near East, Europe, China, and India. The first stories appeared in ancient Assyria, in which the goddess Atargatis transforms herself into a mermaid out of shame for accidentally killing her human lover. Mermaids are sometimes depicted as perilous creatures associated with floods, storms, shipwrecks, and drowning. In other folk traditions (or sometimes within the same tradition) they can be benevolent, bestowing boons or falling in love with humans.Mermaids are associated with the Sirens of Greek mythology and with the Sirenia, a biological order which comprises dugongs and manatees. Historical sightings by sailors may have been the result of misunderstood encounters with these aquatic mammals. Christopher Columbus reported seeing mermaids while exploring the Caribbean, and sightings have been reported in the 20th and 21st centuries in Canada, Israel, and Zimbabwe. The US National Ocean Service stated in 2012 that no evidence of mermaids has ever been found.
Mermaids have been a popular subject of art and literature in recent centuries. Danish author Hans Christian Andersen wrote his popular fairy tale "The Little Mermaid" in 1836. They have subsequently been depicted in opera, paintings, books, films, and comics
Sirenia
Sirenia is an order of fully aquatic, herbivorous mammals that inhabit rivers, estuaries, coastal marine waters, swamps, and marine wetlands. Sirenians, including manatees and the dugong, have major aquatic adaptations: arms used for steering, a paddle used for propulsion, hind limbs (legs) are two small bones floating deep in the muscle. They appear fat, but are fusiform, hydrodynamic, and highly muscular. Prior to the mid 19th century, mariners referred to these animals as mermaids.[4]Sirenomelia
Sirenomelia, also called "mermaid syndrome", is a rare congenital disorder in which a child is born with his or her legs fused together and reduced genitalia. This condition is about as rare as conjoined twins, affecting one out of every 100,000 live births[5] and is usually fatal within a day or two of birth because of kidney and bladder complications. Four survivors were known to be alive as of July 2003.[6]Folklore
Ancient Near East
The first known mermaid stories appeared in Assyria, ca. 1000 BC. The goddess Atargatis, mother of Assyrian queen Semiramis, loved a mortal shepherd and unintentionally killed him. Ashamed, she jumped into a lake to take the form of a fish, but the waters would not conceal her divine beauty. Thereafter, she took the form of a mermaid—human above the waist, fish below—though the earliest representations of Atargatis showed her as a fish with a human head and arm, similar to the Babylonian god Ea. The Greeks recognized Atargatis under the name Derketo. Prior to 546 BC, the Milesian philosopher Anaximander proposed that mankind had sprung from an aquatic species of animal. He thought that humans, with their extended infancy, could not have survived otherwise.
Lucian of Samosata in Syria (2nd century AD) in De Dea Syria (Concerning the Syrian Goddess) wrote of the Syrian temples he had visited:
- "Among them – Now that is the traditional story among them concerning the temple. But other men swear that Semiramis of Babylonia, whose deeds are many in Asia, also founded this site, and not for Hera Atargatis but for her own Mother, whose name was Derketo"
- "I saw the likeness of Derketo in Phoenicia, a strange marvel. It is woman for half its length, but the other half, from thighs to feet, stretched out in a fish's tail. But the image in the Holy City is entirely a woman, and the grounds for their account are not very clear. They consider fish to be sacred, and they never eat them; and though they eat all other fowls, they do not eat the dove, for she is holy so they believe. And these things are done, they believe, because of Derketo and Semiramis, the first because Derketo has the shape of a fish, and the other because ultimately Semiramis turned into a dove. Well, I may grant that the temple was a work of Semiramis perhaps; but that it belongs to Derketo I do not believe in any way. For among the Egyptians, some people do not eat fish, and that is not done to honor Derketo."[10]
One Thousand and One Nights
The One Thousand and One Nights collection includes several tales featuring "sea people", such as "Djullanar the Sea-girl". Unlike depictions of mermaids in other mythologies, these are anatomically identical to land-bound humans, differing only in their ability to breathe and live underwater. They can (and do) interbreed with land humans, and the children of such unions have the ability to live underwater.In another Nights tale, "Abdullah the Fisherman and Abdullah the Merman", the protagonist Abdullah the Fisherman gains the ability to breathe underwater and discovers an underwater society that is portrayed as an inverted reflection of society on land. The underwater society follows a form of primitive communism where concepts like money and clothing do not exist.
In "The Adventures of Bulukiya", the protagonist Bulukiya's quest for the herb of immortality leads him to explore the seas, where he encounters societies of mermaids.[11] "Julnar the Sea-Born and Her Son King Badr Basim of Persia" is another tale about mermaids. Other Nights tales deal with lost ancient technologies, advanced ancient civilizations that went astray, and catastrophes which overwhelmed them.[12]
British Isles
Mermaids appear in British folklore as unlucky omens—both foretelling disaster and provoking it.[15] Several variants of the ballad Sir Patrick Spens depict a mermaid speaking to the doomed ships. In some versions, she tells them they will never see land again; in others, she claims they are near shore, which they are wise enough to know means the same thing. Mermaids can also be a sign of approaching rough weather,[16] and some have been described as monstrous in size, up to 2,000 feet (610 m).[15]
Mermaids have also been described as being able to swim up rivers to freshwater lakes. In one story, the Laird of Lorntie went to aid a woman he thought was drowning in a lake near his house; a servant of his pulled him back, warning that it was a mermaid, and the mermaid screamed after that she would have killed him if it were not for his servant.[17] On occasion, mermaids could be more beneficent, teaching humans cures for disease.[18] Mermen have been described as wilder and uglier than mermaids, with little interest in humans.[19]
According to legend, a mermaid came to the Cornish village of Zennor where she used to listen to the singing of a chorister, Matthew Trewhella. The two fell in love, and Matthew went with the mermaid to her home at Pendour Cove. On summer nights, the lovers can be heard singing together. At the Church of Saint Senara in Zennor, there is a famous chair bearing a carving of a mermaid, which is probably six hundred years old.[20]
Some tales raised the question of whether mermaids had immortal souls, answering in the negative.[21] The figure of Lí Ban appears as a sanctified mermaid, but she was a human being transformed into a mermaid. After three centuries, when Christianity had come to Ireland, she was baptized.[22] In Scottish mythology, there is a mermaid called the ceasg or "maid of the wave",[23] as well as the Merrow of Ireland and Scotland.
Eastern Europe
Rusalkas are the Slavic counterpart of the Greek sirens and naiads.[24] Although the Russian word rusalka is commonly translated as mermaid, they do not have a fish-like tail. The nature of rusalkas varies among folk traditions, but according to ethnologist D.K. Zelenin they all share a common element: rusalkas are the restless spirits of the unclean dead.[24] They are usually the ghosts of young women who died a violent or untimely death, perhaps murder or suicide, and especially by drowning. Rusalkas are said to inhabit lakes and rivers. They appear as beautiful young women with long green hair and pale skin, suggesting a connection with floating weeds and days spent underwater in faint sunlight. They can be seen after dark, dancing together under the moon and calling out to young men by name, luring them to the water and drowning them. The characterization of rusalkas as both desirable and treacherous is prevalent in southern Russia, the Ukraine, and Belarus and was emphasized by 19th century Russian authors.[25][26][27]China
A 15th-century compilation of quotations tells of a mermaid who "wept tears which became pearls".[28] An early 19th-century book entitled Jottings on the South of China contains two stories about mermaids. In the first, a man captures a mermaid on the shore of Namtao island. She looks human in every respect, except that her body is covered with fine hair of many colors. She is unable to speak, but the man takes her home and marries her. Upon his death, the mermaid returns to the sea where she had been found. In the second story, a man sees a woman laying on the beach while his ship was anchored offshore. Upon closer inspection, the woman appears to have webbed feet and hands. She is carried to the water and expresses her gratitude toward the sailors before swimming away.[29]Hinduism
Suvannamaccha (lit. golden mermaid) is a daughter of Ravana that appears in the Cambodian and Thai versions of the Indian Ramayana. She is a mermaid princess who tries to spoil Hanuman's plans to build a bridge to Lanka but falls in love with him instead.[30]In Indian mythology, Matsya Avatar is the first incarnation of Vishnu, in which he takes the form of a fish. Matsya appears in the Matsya Purana and the Bhagavata Purana as part of a deluge myth which has symbolic connections to the Greek Heracles (Hercules in Roman mythology), the biblical Jonah and Noah, and the Irish Clonfert. In the Puranas, the Vedas are stolen from Brahma by a demon. This act precipitates a great flood which will ultimately destroy the universe. Vishnu responds to this injustice and appears before a devout monarch, Satyavrata, as a small fish in order to test his character. Satyavrata is kind and compassionate to the fish and cares for it until it grows to immense size. Vishnu reveals himself to the king, warns him of the impending flood, and commands him to build an ark and fill it with seeds and pairs of animals. The flood comes, the universe is destroyed, the righteous are spared, and Vishnu recovers the Vedas. Vishnu's fish form is sometimes referred to as Matsya-nari—the "Indian mermaid".[31] He is depicted as a man issuing from the mouth of a fish. He wears a crown and holds in his four hands the lost veda, the chukra, a shell, and a sword.[32][33]
Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale "The Little Mermaid" was published in 1837. The story was turned into a film by Disney, and the story was changed somewhat to cut out anything too grim or scary. In the original version, The Little Mermaid is the youngest daughter of a Sea King who lives at the bottom of the sea. Mermaids live around 300 years, cannot cry, have no immortal soul and can only obtain one with the marriage and love of a human.
She is soon found by the Prince on the beach and, being a kind person, he takes her in regardless of her muteness. She reminds him of the person who saved him, a person he believes belongs to the Holy Temple and can never be with him. The Prince begins to love her but doesn't consider marrying her. Soon he is told he must marry, so he takes the Little Mermaid with him to visit a prospective bride with whom he falls instantly in love.
The Prince marries his new bride and that night, and the Little Mermaid looks out to the sea and sees her sisters rise to the surface. They have given their hair to the sea witch in return for a means for their sister to rejoin them in the ocean. In exchange for their hair, they were given a sharp knife which she must plunge into the prince's heart before sunrise. That night, the Little Mermaid goes to the Prince who is in bed with his new bride but she cannot bring herself to harm someone she loves so much. She kisses him tenderly and flings herself into the ocean to become foam and die. Instead of becoming foam, she rises up and sees ethereal beings around her who explain that mermaids who do good deeds become Daughters of the Air, and after 300 years of good service they can obtain a human soul.[34]
Warsaw mermaid
Other
Among the Neo-Taíno nations of the Caribbean, the mermaid is called Aycayia.[38][39] Her attributes relate to the goddess Jagua and the hibiscus flower of the majagua tree Hibiscus tiliaceus.[40] In modern Caribbean culture, the mermaid is found as the Haitian Vodou Loa La Sirene (lit. "the mermaid") who is the loa of wealth and beauty and the orisha Yemaya.Examples from other cultures are the Jengu of Cameroon, the Iara from Brazil, and the Greek Oceanids, Nereids, and Naiads. The ningyo is a fish-like creature from Japanese folklore whose flesh grants amazing longevity. Mermaids and mermen are also characters of Philippine folklore, where they are locally known as sirena and siyokoy, respectively.[41] The Javanese people believe that the southern beach in Java is a home of Javanese mermaid queen Nyi Roro Kidul.[42] One freshwater mermaid-like creature from European folklore is Melusine, who is sometimes depicted with two fish tails, or with the lower body of a serpent.
In Sadko (Russian: Садко), a Russian medieval epic, the title character—an adventurer, merchant and gusli musician from Novgorod—lives for some time in the underwater court of the "Sea Tsar" and marries his daughter before finally returning home. The tale inspired such works as the poem "Sadko"[43] by Alexei Tolstoy (1871–1872), the opera Sadko composed by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and the painting by Ilya Repin.
Sightings
In August 2009, after dozens of people reported seeing a mermaid leaping out of the water and doing aerial tricks, the Israeli coastal town of Kiryat Yam offered a $1 million award for proof of the mermaid.[49] The Mermaid Medical Association, an American mermaid advocacy group, threatened to take legal action against the town in response to their offer, which "badly and outrageously damages the legendary mermaid legacy."[50] In February 2012, work on two reservoirs near Gokwe and Mutare in Zimbabwe stopped when workers refused to continue, stating that mermaids had hounded them away from the sites. It was reported by Samuel Sipepa Nkomo, the water resources minister.[51]
Hoaxes
In the middle of the 17th century, John Tradescant the elder created a wunderkammer (called Tradescant's Ark) in which he displayed, among other things, a "mermaid's hand".[52] In the 19th century, P. T. Barnum displayed a taxidermal hoax called the Fiji mermaid in his museum. Others have perpetrated similar hoaxes, which are usually papier-mâché fabrications or parts of deceased creatures, usually monkeys and fish, stitched together for the appearance of a grotesque mermaid. In the wake of the 2004 tsunami, pictures of Fiji "mermaids" circulated on the Internet as supposed examples of items that had washed up amid the devastation, though they were no more real than Barnum's exhibit.[53]US government statement
In Jul2012, the National Ocean Service (a branch of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) stated that "no evidence of aquatic humanoids has ever been found".[54] The statement was a response to public inquiries following Mermaids: The Body Found, a docufiction which aired in May on Animal Planet which some had mistaken for a factual documentary.[55][56]
Symbolism
According to Dorothy Dinnerstein’s book The Mermaid and the Minotaur, human-animal hybrids such as mermaids and minotaurs convey the emergent understanding of the ancients that human beings were both one with and different from animals:"[Human] nature is internally inconsistent, that our continuities with, and our differences from, the earth's other animals are mysterious and profound; and in these continuities, and these differences, lie both a sense of strangeness on earth and the possible key to a way of feeling at home here."[57]
Art and literature
See also: Mermaids in popular culture
Musical depictions of mermaids include those by Felix Mendelssohn in his Fair Melusina overture and the three "Rhine daughters" in Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen. Lorelei, the name of one of the Rhine mermaids, has become a synonym for a siren. The Weeping Mermaid is an orchestral piece by Taiwanese composer Fan-Long Ko.[61]
An influential image was created by John William Waterhouse, from 1895 to 1905, entitled A Mermaid. An example of late British Academy style artwork, the piece debuted to considerable acclaim (and secured Waterhouse's place as a member of the Royal Academy), but disappeared into a private collection and did not resurface until the 1970s. It is currently once again in the collection of the Royal Academy.[62] Mermaids were a favourite subject of John Reinhard Weguelin, a contemporary of Waterhouse. He painted an image of the mermaid of Zennor as well as several other depictions of mermaids in watercolour.
In heraldry, the charge of a mermaid is commonly represented with a comb and a mirror,[63] and blazoned as a "m
rmaid in her vanity".[64] In addition to vanity, mermaids are also a symbol of eloquence.[65] A shield and sword-wielding mermaid (Syrenka) is on the official Coat of arms of Warsaw. The city of Norfolk, Virginia also uses a mermaid as a symbol. The personal coat of arms of Michaëlle Jean, a former Governor General of Canada, features two mermaids as supporters.[66]
Human divers
The Ama are Japanese skin divers, predominantly women, who traditionally dive for shellfish and seaweed wearingonly a loincloth. The Ama have existed for at least 2000 years,[67] but since the 20th century they have increasingly been regarded as a tourist attraction.[68] They operate off reefs near the shore, and some perform for sightseers instead of diving to collect a harvest. They have been romanticized as mermaids.[69]Professional female divers have performed as mermaids at Florida's Weeki Wachee Springs since 1947. The state park calls itself "The Only City of Live Mermaids"[70] and was extremely popular in the 1960s, drawing almost one million tourists per year.[71] Most of the current performers work part time while attending college, and all are certified SCUBA divers. They wear fabric tails and perform aquatic ballet (while holding their breath) for an audience in an underwater stage with a glass fourth wall. Children often ask if the "mermaids" are real. The park's PR director says "Just like with Santa Claus or any other mythical character, we always say yes. We're not going to tell them they're not real".[72]
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