Today in 1493 Christopher Columbus, sailing near the Dominican Republic, saw three mermaids, and said they were “not half as beautiful as they are painted.” Of course, they weren’t mermaids, but manatees, also known as sea cows.
Mermaids, mythical creatures that are half-female, half-fish, have been known in seafaring cultures since the time of the Greeks. They are normally described as having a woman’s head and torso, and a fishtail instead of legs. Mermaids live in the ocean and can put on a human shape and human mortal men. They are also related to sirens, another creature known to seafarers who was part-woman, part-bird, who lived on islands and sang songs to lure sailors to their deaths. If this sounds familiar, Disney’s The Little Mermaid combines these two creatures into Ariel.
Mermaid sightings by sailors, when they weren’t made up, were most likely manatees. Manatees are slow-moving aquatic mammals with human-like eyes, bulbous faces and paddle-like tails. It is likely that manatees evolved from an ancestor they share with the elephant. Mermaids were one of the many sea creatures that both frightened and entranced sailors at this time period.
That’s your Tudor Minute for today. Remember you can dive deeper into life in 16th-century England through the Renaissance English History Podcast at englandcast.com.
Suggested links:
Columbus reports on his first voyage, 1493
Episode 31: Trade and Exploration in the 16th century
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Heather Teysko is the creator, writer, and producer of The Renaissance English History Podcast, the original Tudor history podcast, started in 2009. She's been writing about history online for over 25 years, since her first site on Colonial American history became number one in history on Yahoo in 1998. In 2019 she created Tudorcon, which is now a yearly event, in addition to writing books, and running TudorFair.com - a whimsical Tudor Merch shop. She has been passionate about Tudor England since she first read Alison Weir's The Six Wives of Henry VIII 20 years ago, and subsequently moved to London after college to spend her time immersed in Tudor history.