Kraken

Kraken, the subject of sailors' superstitions and mythos, was first described in the modern era in a travelogue by Francesco Negri in 1700. This description was followed in 1734 by an account from Dano-Norwegian missionary and explorer Hans Egede, who described the kraken in detail and equated it with the hafgufa of medieval lore.

However, the first description of the creature is usually credited to the Norwegian bishop Pontoppidan (1753). Pontoppidan was the first to describe the kraken as an octopus (polypus) of tremendous size,[b] and wrote that it had a reputation for pulling down ships. The French malacologist Denys-Montfort, of the 19th century, is also known for his pioneering inquiries into the existence of gigantic octopuses.

Kraken

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The great man-killing octopus entered French fiction when novelist Victor Hugo (1866) introduced the pieuvre octopus of Guernsey lore, which he identified with the kraken of legend. This led to Jules Verne's depiction of the kraken, although Verne did not distinguish between squid and octopus.

Linnaeus may have indirectly written about the kraken. Linnaeus wrote about the Microcosmus genus (an animal with various other organisms or growths attached to it, comprising a colony). Subsequent authors have referred to Linnaeus's writing, and the writings of Bartholin's cetus called hafgufa, and Paullini's monstrous marinum as "krakens".[c]

It is thought that krake in the sense of a "multi-armed sea monster" or "octopus" is derived from the meaning "crooked tree", as trunks with crooked branches or outgrowths, as well as drags, wooden or not, readily conjure up the image of a cephalopod, making it a descriptive name initially.[14][15][9][8] This idea seems to first have been notably remarked by Icelandic philologist Finnur Jnsson in 1920.[16] A synonym for kraken has also been krabbe (see below), which further indicates a name-theme referencing drags.

Since the 19th century, the word krake have, beyond the monster, given name to the cephalopod order Octopoda in Swedish (krakar)[h] and German (Kraken), resulting in many octopi species partly named such, such as the common octopus (Octopus vulgaris), which is named jttekrake ("giant kraken") in Swedish and Gewhnlicher Krake ("common kraken") in German. The family Octopodidae is also known as Echte Kraken ("true krakens") in German. In Icelandic, octopoda is instead named kolkrabbar ("coal crabs") after the crab nickname, the common octopus simply named kolkrabbi.

The kraken was described as a many-headed and clawed creature by Egede (1741)[1729], who stated it was equivalent to the Icelanders' hafgufa,[42] but the latter is commonly treated as a fabulous whale.[43] Erik Pontoppidan (1753), who popularized the kraken to the world, noted that it was multiple-armed according to lore, and conjectured it to be a giant sea-crab, starfish or a polypus (octopus).[44] Still, the bishop is considered to have been instrumental in sparking interest for the kraken in the English-speaking world,[45] as well as becoming regarded as the authority on sea-serpents and krakens.[46]

Denys-Montfort (1801) published on two giants, the "colossal octopus" with the enduring image of it attacking a ship, and the "kraken octopod", deemed to be the largest organism in zoology. Denys-Montfort matched his "colossal" with Pliny's tale of the giant polypus that attacked ships-wrecked people, while making correspondence between his kraken and Pliny's monster called the arbor marina.[k] Finnur Jnsson (1920) also favored identifying the kraken as an inkfish (squid/octopus) on etymological grounds.

The krake (English: kraken) was described by Hans Egede in his Det gamle Grnlands nye perlustration (1729; Ger. t. 1730; tr. Description of Greenland, 1745),[50] drawing from the fables of his native region, the Nordlandene len [no] of Norway, then under Danish rule.[52][53]

According to his Norwegian informants, the kraken's body measured many miles in length, and when it surfaced it seemed to cover the whole sea, and "having many heads and a number of claws". With its claws it captured its prey, which included ships, men, fish, and animals, carrying its victims back into the depths.[53]

According to the lore of Norwegian fishermen, they could mount upon the fish-attracting kraken as if it were a sand-bank (Fiske-Grund 'fishing shoal'), but if they ever had the misfortune to capture the kraken, getting it entangled on their hooks, the only way to avoid destruction was to pronounce its name to make it go back to its depths.[55][56] Egede also wrote that the krake fell under the general category of "sea spectre" (Danish: se-trold og [se]-spgelse),[58] adding that "the Draw" (Danish: Drauen, definite form) was another being within that sea spectre classification.[24][56][m]

The hafgufa (described as the largest of the sea monsters, inhabiting the Greenland Sea) from the King's Mirror[66][67][o] continues to be identified with the kraken in some scholarly writings,[69][20] and if this equivalence were allowed, the kraken-hafgufa's range would extend, at least legendarily, to waters approaching Helluland (Baffin Island, Canada), as described in rvar-Odds saga.[70][p]

Finnur Jnsson (1920) having arrived at the opinion that the kraken probably represented an inkfish (squid/octopus), as discussed earlier, expressed his skepticism towards the standing notion that the kraken originated from the hafgufa.[16]

Erik Pontoppidan's Det frste Forsg paa Norges naturlige Historie (1752, actually volume 2, 1753)[72] made several claims regarding kraken, including the notion that the creature was sometimes mistaken for a group of small islands with fish swimming in-between,[73] Norwegian fishermen often took the risk of trying to fish over kraken, since the catch was so plentiful[74] (hence the saying "You must have fished on Kraken"[75]).

However, further down in his writing, compares the creature to some creature(s) from Pliny, Book IX, Ch. 4: the sea-monster called arbor, with tree-branch like multiple arms,[r] complicated by the fact that Pontoppidan adds another of Pliny's creature called rota with eight arms, and conflates them into one organism.[96][97] Pontoppidan is suggesting this is an ancient example of kraken, as a modern commentator analyzes.[98]

Pontoppidan then declared the kraken to be a type of polypus (=octopus)[101] or "starfish", particularly the kind Gesner called Stella Arborescens, later identifiable as one of the northerly ophiurids[102] or possibly more specifically as one of the Gorgonocephalids or even the genus Gorgonocephalus (though no longer regarded as family/genus under order Ophiurida, but under Phrynophiurida in current taxonomy).[106][109]

The ophiurid starfish seems further fortified when he notes that "starfish" called "Medusa's heads" (caput medus; pl. capita medus) are considered to be "the young of the great sea-krake" by local lore. Pontoppidan ventured the 'young krakens' may rather be the eggs (ova) of the starfish.[112] Pontopiddan was satisfied that "Medusa's heads" was the same as the foregoing starfish (Stella arborensis of old),[113] but "Medusa's heads" were something found ashore aplenty across Norway according to von Bergen, who thought it absurd these could be young "Kraken" since that would mean the seas would be full of (the adults).[114][115] The "Medusa's heads" appear to be a Gorgonocephalid, with Gorgonocephalus spp. being tentatively suggested.[116][s]

Whereas the "kraken octopus", was the most gigantic animal on the planet in the writer's estimation, dwarfing Pliny's "colossal octopus"/"monstrous polypus",[132][133] and identified here as the aforementioned Pliny's monster, called the arbor marinus.[134]

Montfort also listed additional wondrous fauna as identifiable with the kraken.[135][136] There was Paullini's monstrum marinum glossed as a sea crab (German: Seekrabbe),[137] which a later biologist has suggested to be one of the Hyas spp.[138] It was also described as resembling Gesner's Cancer heracleoticus crab alleged to appear off the Finnish coast.[137][133] von Bergen's "bellua marina omnium vastissima" (meaning 'vastest-of-all sea-beast'), namely the trolwal ('ogre whale', 'troll whale') of Northern Europe, and the Teufelwal ('devil whale') of the Germans follow in the list.[139][136]

According to the Swedish zoologist Lovn, the common name kraken was added to the 6th edition of Systema Naturae (1748),[138] which was a Latin version augmented with Swedish names[158] (in blackletter), but such Swedish text is wanting on this particular entry, e.g. in the copy held by NCSU.[152] It is true that the 7th edition of 1748, which adds German vernacular names,[158] identifies the Microcosmus as "sea-grape" (German: Meertrauben), referring to a cluster of cephalopod eggs.[159][160][w][x]

Also, the Frenchman Louis Figuier in 1860 misstated that Linnaeus included in his classification a cephalopod called "Sepia microcosmus"[y] in his first edition of Systema Naturae (1735).[164] Figuier's mistake has been pointed out, and Linnaeus never represented the kraken as such a cephalopod.[165] Nevertheless, the error has been perpetuated by even modern-day writers.[167]

The trail stemming from Linnaeus, eventually leading to such pieces on the kraken written in English by the naturalist James Wilson for the Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine in 1818 sparked an awareness of the kraken among 19th century English, hence Tennyson's poem, "The Kraken".[69]

As to the iconography, Denys-Montfort's engraving of the "colossal octopus" is often shown, though this differs from the kraken according to the French malacologist,[5] and commentators are found characterizing the ship attack representing the "kraken octopod".[2][170] 2351a5e196