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2024.06.11
カテゴリ：facts
Amazing Facts About MermaidsMermaids are mythological beings known as hybrids. Hybrids have bodies partly like humans, and partly as one or more animals. Other famous hybrids are the Sphinx (head of a woman, wings of an eagle, the body and paws of a lion, a tail by serpent), Minotaur (a head of a bull, the rest of the body by a man), centaurs (upper bodies of humans, lower body with legs by horses), satyrs (males with ears and tail by horses who were later transformed into hybrids with characteristics of goats), ... While we can easily put mermaids among them as hybrids with the upper bodies of women and lower bodies of fish, their looks and history are actually a bit more complicated. This is why we collected a list of interesting facts about mermaids! The oldest predecessor of today's perception of mermaids is the old Syrian goddess Atargatis, the goddess of fertility, water, and the moon. She was a protector of Hierapolis (today Manbij), worshipped about three to four thousand years ago. She was portrayed with a woman's face and body of a fish but also anthropomorphized - looking like a woman (including body and legs) but with a fishtail.  Scylla by John Flaxman Even closer is maybe Scylla, an Etruscan sea goddess, worshipped at the height of their civilization which lasted from the ninth century BC to the one century BC. She has the upper part like a woman, lower like a fish (with two tails), and two or three dogs (!) protruding from her waist covered by scales. The most famous description of Scylla is by Homer in Odyssey, where she has more heads and eats six of his sailors when the ship passes between Scylla and Charybdis. Homer also writes about sirens. A siren is another hybrid creature: a woman with the wings and legs of the bird. Their song lures seamen into water and death. A loud noise-making device, invented in the 19th century is called a siren after mythological sirens. Both connect sound and danger. Painters portrayed sirens as hybrids of women and birds for centuries but around the 9th century more and more replaced bird parts with fish parts and today most people use the terms mermaids and sirens interchangeably. Virtually every nation has some kind of diet related to mermaids. These are mainly water spirits, sometimes looking like women but able to live underwater, sometimes inviting passengers or kidnapping kids playing too close to water. We can mention nixes from Central Europe, haffrue from Scandinavia, nereids from Greece, and rusalki from Slavic mythology. Great Britain knows selkie (still half woman but the lower part is closer to the seals. Some of such merwomen became water spirits when a mother committed suicide in the water or drowned her unwonted newborn. In many cases, merwomen have male partners (mermen), but, in general, they don't play as important roles in myths. Asia and Africa are homes of similar mermaids as well. In some cases they are very favorable to people, warning the sailors of bad weather or helping fishermen.  Rhinemaidens by Arthur Rackahm There are several famous mermaids in world art: The Rhinemaidens live in the Rhein, German river, and are protectors of gold treasure. Richard Wagner made them famous in his Ring of Nibelung series. Melusine is a water spirit from France. She was cursed because she killed her father. She spent part of her life as a woman but on Saturdays, her lower part transferred into a snake's tail. Undine was a water spirit that became famous for Friedrich de la Motte Fouque's novella at the beginning of the 19th century. She fell in love with a man and doomed him when she found out about his infidelity.  The Little Mermaid by Edmund Dulac The Little Mermaid is one of Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales, based on Undine with the author's autobiographical details. Disney changed her tragic character into a rebellious teenager. Mermaids have gone through many changes throughout their history and people's perceptions of them have changed. They are still immensely popular and there's even an international holiday dedicated to them. Every March 29th thousands of people gather in different places all over the world and throw mermaid-themed parties.  Mermaid coloring page Whenever you see one, you'll always be enchanted! お気に入りの記事を「いいね！」で応援しよう
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2024.06.11 08:15:48
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