PS: Giant sea monsters have also appeared in the sea near Hong Kong. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

Since ancient times, there have been stories of terrifying sea monsters among fishermen and sailors from all over the world. According to legend, these sea monsters tend to be huge and strangely shaped, even with seven or nine heads. The most famous of these is the "Norwegian Sea Monster" described by Bishop Pombidan of Bergen in his Norwegian Naturalism in 1752, and it is said that "its back, or rather the upper part of its body, appears to be about a mile and a half around it, like an island." …… Later several shiny tips or horns appeared, sticking out of the water, stretching higher and higher, some as tall as the masts of medium-sized ships, these things were probably the arms of monsters, and were said to pull the largest warships to the bottom of the sea.

Giant sea monsters have also appeared in the sea near Hong Kong.

Since ancient times, there have been stories of terrifying sea monsters among fishermen and sailors from all over the world. According to legend, these sea monsters tend to be huge and strangely shaped, even with seven or nine heads. The most famous of these is the "Norwegian Sea Monster" described by Bishop Pombidan of Bergen in his Norwegian Naturalism in 1752, and it is said that "its back, or rather the upper part of its body, appears to be about a mile and a half around it, like an island." …… Later several shiny tips or horns appeared, sticking out of the water, stretching higher and higher, some as tall as the masts of medium-sized ships, these things were probably the arms of monsters, and were said to pull the largest warships to the bottom of the sea.

If the octopus is not so ferocious and terrifying, why are there so many legends? Since ancient times, it has been believed that there are yokai with many hands in the sea. They are neither like whales. Nor like a fish, the legend has it that it resembles a giant squid or an octopus: very large eyes, and a venomous snake-like wrist on its head.

Some scholars are interested in the origin of the legend of the sea monster. They are almost completely unanimous in their opinion that the immortal ancient Greek poet Homer was the first to write about the octopus in literature, describing it as "Syrah". In the work of another poet, Gaisiod, some of the characteristics of the octopus are described under the name "Midusa". It has wrists on its head, and these hands give the impression that they become snakes.

As for the origin of "Medusa", Gésiod also leaves us with a myth: Virgin, the god of the sea, had three daughters, whose names were Steno, Everier and Midusa. They live in the far West. There, the waves of the Atlantic Ocean wash the coast of Spain. Midusa was one of the few beauties in the world, and the goddess of the sea, Bassetton (the Romans are said to have called him Neptune), fell in love with her at first sight. Gradually, the two ignited a fire-like love. They were entangled, flouted the rules of etiquette, and agreed to meet in the temple, thus offending Athena, the Greek goddess of war and victory. This "shaker of the sea" could not frighten the daughter of Zeus, the god of thunder, with his rage. Athena, however, turns Bassetton's lover into an ugly monster. Hair by hair turned into poisonous snakes. Midusa's countenance was so terrible that whoever looked at her would have his blood freeze in his veins and turn him to stone.

There are also two legends.

One said: Medusa is a banshee in ancient Greek mythology, she was originally a young and beautiful girl, but it was because of her beauty that Poseidon was tempted. When Poseidon went to look for her, Medusa ran to Athena's temple. It was thought that the goddess would be able to protect her, but Athena did not protect her. So Poseidon took possession of the Medusa on the icy floor. She cried to Athena and prayed for comfort. But she is responded to indifferently, with hatred in her heart, and her eyes will petrify that person when she looks at someone (but because Athena still gives her a little comfort, Medusa will never hurt a woman). In the end, Perseus had his head removed.

Another said: Medusa turned out to be a very beautiful maiden with long shawl hair. But she boasted that she was more beautiful than Athena, the goddess of wisdom. Enraged, Athena took away Medusa's beauty and turned her hair into countless poisonous snakes. What's even more terrifying is that her eyes shine with a terrifying light, and anyone who looks at her will immediately turn to stone.

Later, King Polyx gave Persius the warrior a difficult errand and ordered him to kill Midusa. The clever Athena did Perseus a great favor, and it seems that she was determined to get rid of Midusa. The goddess gave the warrior a bright bronze mirror and flying shoes borrowed from Hermes. A bronze mirror can shine on a person, and when a bronze mirror shines on it, Midusa's countenance loses its magic power to turn a person into stone. Perseus put on winged flying shoes and hurried to dodge Midusa's two angry sisters. Because he couldn't fight Stena and Everier, it turned out that their mother had bathed them in holy water from the river of Styx's Hell, making them immortal. But Pertheus, under the protection of the "goddess of the earth", also made these two sisters helpless.

Perseus listened to Athena's idea and finally cut off Medusa's head. It is said that since Perseus punished Midusa, the Greeks began to paint the U-turn Midusa on various utensils and weapons, such as shields, vases, doorknobs, and coins.

According to a scholar of legends, Ly, the early portrait of Midusa did not resemble a peerless beauty with snake-like hair at all, but rather a simulated octopus: a round face, but not a human face, large eyes, a forked tongue outside the open mouth, and coiled strands of hair (presumably wrists) around the face.

In another ancient myth, the story of Zeus's son Herkes who killed the Lena Swamp hydragus, the monster in the story shows the characteristics of an octopus more accurately than Medusa. In some of the paintings of the Greco-Roman period, especially the one preserved on a Vatican marble slate, we can see Herkes beating an octopus (or a spear squid) with a stick. In addition to a real head, there is a snake head at the end of each wrist.

Since the nineteenth century, with the development of modern zoology, the overly absurd legend of the sea monster has gradually disappeared. However, there are still some reports that deserve our attention: On November 20, 1861, the French ship "Aliton" was on its way from Cádiz in Spain to the island of Tennalife when it encountered a sea monster that was only five to six meters long and had tentacles two meters long. Captain Sheyer later wrote: "I think it's the big octopus that has caused a lot of controversy and many people think is fictional." Sheyer and the crew forked it with harpoons and ropes around its tail. But the monster frantically danced its horn hands and broke the harpoon and fled. Only a piece of meat weighing about 40 pounds was left on the rope.

An interesting report published in the December 1946 issue provides the speed at which the king squid swims: the 150-metre-long and 15,000-ton oil tanker Brunswick was attacked by the king squid between the islands of Hawaii and Samoa. The king squid, which was more than 20 meters long, suddenly burst out of the deep water and quickly caught up with the oil tanker at a speed of 19 kilometers per hour. When it had swam alongside the ship for a while, it made a semicircle like lightning, went around the ship from the front to the right, rushed towards the ship, climbed the side of the ship, and slammed the hull plate with great force, apparently the king squid was trying to grasp the metal surface of the smooth hull. Unfortunately, it kept sliding towards the stern of the boat, and finally hit the propeller and received a fatal blow.

On November 2, 1978, three fishermen in Newfoundland, Canada, found a huge marine animal stranded on the beach due to low tide, and the fishermen said that it was seven meters long, and some tentacles were more than 11 meters long, and the suckers on the tentacles were as large as 10 centimeters in diameter, and its eyes were as big as faces. The fishermen hooked it with hooks, and the monster struggled for a while and soon died.

On January 18, 2003, the king squid appeared in the waters off the coast of Portugal and was entangled in the Jules. The race boats of the Fern Ocean Grand Prix really terrified the French crew on board. However, there was no danger, and the king squid automatically retreated, letting the crew live.

The Belgian zoologist Hefelmans collected and analysed a total of 587 reports of sea monster sightings in the 300 years from 1639 to 1966, excluding those that might have been misunderstood, deliberately deceitful, and unclearly written, and found 358 to be credible.

He fed all the details of these reports into a computer and analyzed them and came up with nine different sea monsters. While there are still exaggerations in these reports, at least one of them, which was previously thought to be "impossible", is confirmed by the giant squid.

In the seventies of the nineteenth century, there were several instances of the remains of the king squid washed ashore on the coast of Canada, at least one of which was still alive, and with the help of these entities, people finally learned something about the king squid.

Natural predator species

The king squid's greatest natural predator is the sperm whale. The sperm whale is very suitable for diving, and it eats huge cephalopods, most of them inhabit the deep sea, and the sperm whale often hunts giant squid and "holds its breath for 1.5 hours" and can dive to a depth of 2,200 meters, so it is the diving champion among mammals.

Sperm whales often engage in a battle with the most invertebrate squid, the largest of which is 18 meters tall and weighs 1.5 tons (this is still unconfirmed due to its age). So it's not credible, and the largest one found now is still a few meters away from it). Some people have seen the fierce scene of sperm whales fighting with giant squid in the tropical ocean, they fight from the deep sea to the shallow sea, either the sperm whale eats the king squid, or the king squid uses its tentacles to cover the whale's water vents to death and suffocates the giant whale, so that the sperm whale becomes the "good meal" of the king squid. However, it is mostly sperm whales that win. (To be continued.) )

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