#polypus

[ltwilliammowett]

The sea monster Polypus (meaning “many-footed”) was used to describe many animals, from the lobster to the centipede to the octopus. While Olaus Magnus drew a giant lobster here, his text describes an octopus, showing the true confusion about what lived in the sea.

On the Carta Marina, by Olaus Magnus (1539) Marine map and Description of the Northern Lands and of their Marvels, most carefully drawn up at Venice in the year 1539 through the generous assistance of the Most Honourable Lord Hieronymo Quirino.

[peterlorrefanpage]

Peter Lorre Comic (Mr. Moto)

This scan comes from this post, which holds no other explanation. The blog itself seems to draw its material from a real (?) British periodical...or something...named Polypus.

I'd love to see if the Mr. Moto panel above comes from a full comic, or at least a full storyline.

I found a British newspaper search site (the full periodicals sites all seem to need credentials), but after sifting through a fair few references of "Adenoids and Polypus," I have a new band name but no other information.

=======================

Adenoids & Polypus

Barely a year after Adenoids & Polypus had a sleeper hit with their first album, NAP APNEA, everyone's favorite Korean-Irish folk-fusion septet has released an EP with three new interpretations of their hit single, "Pre-Malignant Glottis." =========================

[redogekiddo]

Hi ! Little pleasure to draw this group of 5 together in their new armor.

[danzameccanica]

Dopo l’incredibile ondata di revival black metal melodico anni ’90, Nagash – uno dei contribuenti principali dell’ondata originale - forse colto da una nostalgia di mezz’età ha deciso in un sol colpo di ripristinare i Covenant (questa volta scritti senza “the K”) e i Troll. Ascoltando Trolldom è come se ci trovassimo ancora fra il 1997 e il 1998, dove le tastiere sono sì l’elemento principale di questo black metal oscuro ma bagordo, con melodie quasi danzerecce in stile officina dei goblin o caverna dei nani. Il modello è quello di Drep de Kristne anche se uno dei risultati più nuovi e sorprendenti è "Angerborda" dove i synth trance si mascherano perfettamente fra la strumentazione blackmetal. Gli ascoltatori di un certo pelo si ricorderanno subito gli Aborym ma non c’è atmosfera marziale né apocalittica nei Troll, solo una corsa sfrenata verso gli eccessi dell’alcol e della follia. "Ancient Fire" ha i synth in stile Limbonic Art che dialogano con le chitarre mentre tutto il resto dell’album fila liscio coerente a sé stesso senza particolari accelerazioni o sfrenate di violenza.

[tenth-sentence]

It is, however, natural to consider a polypus, furnished with a mouth, intestines, and other organs, as a distinct individual, whereas the individuality of a leaf-bud is not easily realized; so that the union of separate individuals in a common body is more striking in a coralline than in a tree.

"Journal of Researches into the Natural History and Geology of the Countries Visited During the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle Round the World, 1832-36" - Charles Darwin

[xpuigc-bloc]

COLOSSAL

Carl Chun, Polypus levis, from Die Cephalopoden (1910–15), color lithograph, 35 × 25 centimeters. Image from the Biodiversity Heritage Library/Contributed by MBLWHOI Library, Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Library, Massachusetts.

NNtonio Rod (Antonio Rodríguez Canto), Trachyphyllia, from Coral Colors, (2016). Image © NNtonio Rod

Despite thousands of years of research and an unending fascination with marine creatures, humans have explored only five percent of the oceans covering the majority of the earth’s surface. A forthcoming book from Phaidon dives into the planet’s notoriously vast and mysterious aquatic ecosystems, traveling across the continents and three millennia to uncover the stunning diversity of life below the surface.

Spanning 352 pages, Ocean, Exploring the Marine World brings together a broad array of images and information ranging from ancient nautical cartography to contemporary shots from photographers like Sebastião Salgado and David Doubilet. The volume presents science and history alongside art and illustration—it features biological renderings by Ernst Haekcl, Katsushika Hokusai’s woodblock prints, and works by artists like Kerry James Marshall, Vincent van Gogh, and Yayoi Kusama—in addition to texts about conservation and the threats the climate crises poses to underwater life.

Ocean will be released this October and is available for pre-order on Bookshop. You also might enjoy this volume devoted to birds.

#Carl Chun #polypus #cephalopoden

#1910-15 #lithograph #ilustration

#original art #science #art #xpuigc

[strawberryroses3929]

My life has changed ever since I learned the official Greek pluralization for octopus. No, it's not octopuses, or octopi, or even (and this is the one that surface level nerds think is correct) octopodes. ITS POLYPODES.

MULTIPLE FEET. POLYPODES.

[maimoncat]

I had an idea of making a Leshy of Order a butterfly or moth, since many (like me) make him more of a caterpillar than a worm (or maybe like a bagworm). So making him a butterfly would make him an opposite in change. You could also add a flower theme, like with Chaos!Leshy's bush theme

Making a design for the other bishops of Goat's dimension is harder than I thought

Sure they will mainly have switched main domains, like Leshy is now mainly Order than Chaos. But also it's hard to know wich animal they'll be switched to? Lamb and Goat are somewhat the same "family",Narinder I changed to be a dog, so "opposite in theme".

Some are easier like Heket I could make a Mushroom, kallamar an octop instead of squid...now... shamura and leshy.... what the hell is the opposite or similar to a fucking worm bush and spider...

And to add to that I got the idea to change their positions as oldest to youngest just to add more changes I guess....

[publicdomainreview]

It's #WorldOctopusDay! Pictured here a “Polypus levis Hoyle” from a 1910 publication on the German Deep-Sea Expedition of 1898, led by Leipzig University Professor of Zoology, Carl Chun. Buy it as a print here: https://t.co/oyBmkE9VTr

[smithsonianlibraries]

An octopus of the species Muusoctopus levis (referred to in the text by the outdated name "Polypus levis") from Carl Chun's The Cephalopoda (1975 translation of 1910-1914 volume). Full text here.

[redogekiddo]

Hi ! A great illustration to celebrate the 5th anniversary of Huntale. I take this opportunity to thank those who have been following me for 5 years now, your support helps me enormously. And for those who don't know me yet, I hope you will enjoy my content as good entertainment, as a good pastime. Thank you.

[tribbetherium]

From a single founding species descended from the stellasnoots that found a suitable home in the secluded caverns of Arcuterra, the daggoths, a clade of subterranean molrocks of distant relation to the rattiles, have since diversified over the last 25 million years in isolation. As the cave systems naturally expanded over the course of many millennia, the ecosystem too grew bigger, as it created more room for a wider and more diverse range of species to thrive.

Over millions of years, the upper chambers of the cave system became more open to the surface, resulting to not only a slight but significant influx of oxygen into the ecosystem but also nutrients from the surface, such as organic detritus and the abundant droppings of transient species such as roosting ratbats that nest in the surface chambers, washed down into the caves by rain. These fuel the abundant growth of bacteria, mocklichens and meatmoss, the cavern ecosystem's producers in the absence of plants and sunlight. With an abundance of food, space and, relatively speaking, oxygen, the life of the caves have since grown more diverse and complex than ever before.

Many of the daggoths have remained unchanged from the first forms that were the earliest colonists of the caves. The gothtles, small, mouse-sized insectivores, continue to stick to the ancestral lifestyle, as small, slow-moving ambush hunters that relied on stealth to pounce on insects. Yet the ancestral niche now comes with one drastic difference: they are no longer the apex predators of their environment. Abundant and fast-breeding, the gothtles are now the lower rung of the food chain as larger predators have since evolved from other branches of their kin.

While slower basal gothtles now rely on camouflage by scent and touch to evade enemies, numerous lineages have since evolved speed and evasiveness in order to outpace their predators. One such group are the xenomures, such as the four-plumed xenomure (Xenomuris tetradactylopluma), with long, slender legs that allow them to scurry quickly across the fungal and meatmoss mats to escape their enemies and hide among the maze-like growths to lose their enemies' trail. Two pairs of modified digits act as antennae fore and aft, giving the xenomures a vivid perception of obstacles in their surroundings while moving quickly in the pitch black darkness. These timid omnivores, in many ways, have come to be the caves' ecological parallel to "typical" rodents like furbils and duskmice on the surface, with some even harvesting and storing fruiting pods of mocklichens in burrow larders to eat later, and thus helping the mocklichens proliferate to new areas.

Other lineages of the small gothtles have also evolved more active lifestyles as dynamics of the ecosystem have changed. Some, such as the long-bodied common skitter (Longicorpomys polypus) developed slender bodies and shorter limbs to specialize in hiding in small crevices in the rock walls, well-protected from predators, where they can feed on the fungal mycelia, the buried "roots" hidden underneath the organic soil-like detritus mats covering the cave floors. Others have become small hunters of their own right, paralleling the chrews and scabbers of the surface, like the earthumb arthoid (Dactylotomys auricheirus), equipped with two front digits bearing pointed claws positioned next to its head almost like ears, that it uses to root out small prey, such as insects, nematodes and wormlike maggoths out of their burrows and out from growths of mocklichens and meatmoss.

Virtually every surface of the cavern system has offered a habitat for life, including the walls and the ceiling of the caves, with the walls and roofs forming elevated "branches" and dangling "vines" of various vegetative plant-analogues, which are fed upon by "browsers" adapted to reach high up on to access fungal growths inaccessible to other ground-dwellers.

The ceilings, in particular, are abuzz with a surprising diversity of organisms dwelling amidst the overhanging stalactites. In particular, the dangling "vines", in reality complex filamentous fungal hyphae nourished by a symbiotic relationship with chemosynthetic bacteria, produce buds that exude an odorous scent, that draws in the feelerflits: flying insects descended from dipteran flies that, with long and very sensitive antennae equipped with tactile, thermal and olfactory receptors, have secondarily regained their power of flight and are able to navigate even without sight and home in on the buds that produce nutritious carbohydrate-rich liquids in return for it spreading its spores.

One descendant of the roof stalac has since adapted to exploit this relationship. The bulbous-snouted budwight (Nasofungiosus imitator) has developed specialized bud-like growths at the end of its nasal tendrils, that sport modified sebaceous glands that excrete a scent similar to those of the vine blooms, the chemicals of which it acquires and secretes by eating the blooms themselves. Then, lying in wait, anchored onto the surface of stalactites or perched amidst the vines, it waves its tendrils in the air in anticipation of an unwary feelerflit blundering into its trap, to be ensnared by seven long and flexible tendrils and passed into the mouth to be eaten.

Curiously, despite its purpose of mimicry, the budwight's tendrils in fact look nothing at all like the vine buds, being simple enlarged growths at the ends of the knobbly nasal appendages. In a world of darkness, appearances are almost entirely insignificant, as prey and predator alike perceive their surroundings with sound, smell and touch, as well as other more remarkable senses like thermo- and electroreception. As such, mimcry revolves around these senses: not even a vaguely-similar imitation to a sighted creature, but a deception at least sufficient to trap its equally-blind prey.

Of the various small daggoths that populate the caves, however, none are as divergent and unconventional as the maggoths: a lineage of neotenic descendants of the mossmulch, a more typical-looking daggoth whose life-cycle has taken unexpected turns to produce one of the greatest regressions in complexity second only to the shroomors.

Measuring only a centimeter or less, the maggoths, such as the basal lichen maggoth (Vermimys simplisticus) are extremely simplified creatures: their respiration takes place almost entirely through their permeable skin, their skeletons, save for their ossified mandible and maxilla, are completely made of only cartilage, and they move entirely through two sets of muscles, an inner layer of longtidunal muscles and an outer layer of concentric muscles that contract and relax alternatingly to undulate them forward. This body plan arose from the mossmulch's early gestation lasting only a few days and producing barely-developed young, basically just self-sufficient and free-living early-stage embryos, adapted to feed constantly on meatmoss and mocklichens by tunneling through them, and, with an abundance of a reliable food source, some species eventually became neotenic, no longer developing limbs and nasal tendrils and ossified skeletons, and simply reproducing in a larger version of their quasi-larval state.

The simplified anatomy and reduction of surplus organs has allowed maggoths to be quite successful in the vast expanses of the subterranean caverns. In particular, their very simple bodies has reduced their development to but a few days, allowing them to shorten their generations to as little as three or four weeks: at the age of twenty-one days, maggoths are already sexually mature and can mate, bearing litters of up to a dozen or more wormlike quasi-larval young at a time once every five or six days. These 3-4 millimeter-long newborns feed off skin secretions made by the females for the first few hours of their life before departing for good, in a last remaining hint of mammalian history in a species so far removed from a typical mammal's form.

Another, unlikely advantage of their simplified anatomy is that it requires far less oxygen, which coupled by their incredibly small body sizes and their respiration through their skin, has led one lineage into a new frontier: the waters of the subterranearn rivers as well as the underground sumps that form bodies of water such as ponds and lakes. Thus arose the hampreys: the first ever aquatic lineage of hamsters on HP-02017 to evolve fully-aquatic respiration and thus be entirely independent of breathing air at the surface. Specialized vessels directly branching from the heart absorb oxygen diffused through their permeable skin, and thus their lungs have been reduced to simple sacs regulating buoyancy. Perhaps more remarkable, however, is the marked reduction of their nervous system, especially the brain: their simple lifestyle and unusual respiration had no need for such an energy-hungry organ as a complex brain, and thus in the hampreys this otherwise very vital organ, once the pride of mammals in their complexity, now has completely atrophied to basically but a brain stem, capable of little more than basic bodily functions and responses to external stimuli, moving through the water in jerky, wiggling movements toward the taste and scent of food and away from the vibrations of danger.

Some hampreys, such as the rasping hamprey (Vermicthymys micronis), are independent creatures teeming in the underground ponds and lakes, scraping off mats of chemosynthetic bacterial colonies using their jaws: an ossified mandible and maxilla bearing two pairs of gnawing incisors--basically the only remaining visual vestige of their rodent ancestry. Some, however, have specialized these remnant teeth for another purpose: the sanguine hamprey (Atrocivermimys haemophilus) has developed elongated teeth and a "lip" that allows its mouth to function as a suction--enabling it to attach to other aquatic daggoths such as tubesnouts and trogadiles and parasitically feed off their bodily fluids.

Not all daggoths are small, however. In the recent eons, as food and space became more available as the caverns grew and became more oxygenated, some of the daggoths began growing in size. While still small compared to outside surface animals, reaching only a maximum of 90 kilograms in the largest "grazers", their size is nonetheless an incredible achievement given their environment and evolutionary history.

The lineage that would give rise to their largest species eventually diversified into low-level grazers, higher-level browsers, generalist omnivores and specialized macro-predators. But most basal of these are the grummlers, with the largest species being the giant grummler (Macroabyssomys maximus). These represent the earliest lineage of daggoths that began expermenting with size, with them resembling the basic daggoth but simply larger. With their increased weight, their multiple digits became more columnar to support their bulk, their reduced metacarpals forming equivalents of shoulder blades to anchor powerful limb muscles, while their phalanges grew stronger and thicker and developed a bony heel-like protrusion on the second-to-the-last phalanx to support a fleshy "sole" pad: in essence turning the spindly fingers of the smaller daggoths into sixteen proper "legs".

The greater grummler is a large and indiscriminate omnivore, feeding on mocklichens, meatmoss, bacterial mats, arthropods, smaller daggoths and carrion. Depending on the species, the several species of grummlers either lean toward a more "grazer" side or a more "carnivore" side: a distinction that is less drastic than surface animals given that some of their "plant" equivalents are technically animals as well, making them more accurately "meat-grazer omnivores" or "carno-herbivores". This dietary ambiguity of this lineage would lead to the evolutionary split between the "grazers" such as the molepedes and the biblarodons, and the predators such as the blindmutts, with the grummlers themselves representing a more ancestral state of this divergence. Indeed, leaning more on the "grazer" side, the giant grummler itself sometimes falls prey to smaller grummler species with more carnivorous tendencies, especially targeted if sick, young or old.

As larger-scale predation began to emerge among the macro-daggoths, a trend akin to surface animals started to arise among them--an arms race between increasingly armed predators and increasingly defended "herbivores", with hunters specializing to take down prey larger than themselves, and large prey developing weapons to better fend off would-be assailants.

One of the most notable examples of this would be the molepedes: a clade of macro-daggoths that developed elongated bodies and short limbs that allowed them to graze closer to the ground, feeding on filamentous, low-growing mocklichens that, in a loose sense, could be considered an analogue of "grass". These slow-moving creatures were afforded ample protection by their size alone in the earlier days, but as predators too began to grow, the molepedes gradually found themselves becoming outmatched. Over time, the ancestral soft-bodied molepedes disappeared entirely, too vulnerable to the new predators, but from it emerged two lineages: the thorny molepedes and the armored molepedes.

The common thorny molepede (Echinopolypodomys spinosus) repurposed many of the sensory bristle hairs of its body into defensive spines, covering its back, its flanks and even its nasal tendrils. These spines, barbed and loose like porcupine quills, embed painfully into a would-be predator's skin and remain stuck in the flesh as they break off. As a warning, they exude a distinctive scent from specialized anal glands that previously-quilled predators quickly associate with a painful experience.

However, while an effective means of self defense, the thorny molepede's defensive spines pose a significant challenge to its other routine activities: specifically, when it comes to mating. Thorny molepede courtship is an awkward affair, with both partners releasing odorous pheromones to communicate their amorous and non-hostile intentions. Once they reach a mutual agreement, they then very slowly and gingerly back into each other, until their rearmost quills barely touch, and the male, fortunately endowed with elongated reproductive equipment, is able to complete his job from a safe distance.

A less socially-challenged relative of the thorny molepede is the armored molepede (Armopolypodomys edurus), which is a far more gregarious creature than its spiny cousin and gathers in small groups of up to ten to twenty individuals at a time. Rather than spines, the armored molepede instead has fused its hypertrophied, hardened bristles into tough keratinous scutes, which form a coat of plated armor nigh-impenetrable to the claws and teeth of its enemies. When threatened, groups of then huddle together and press themselves down, concealing their vulnerable limbs and nasal tendrils and exposing only their armored backs. Their strategy is one of persistence: eventually, after hours of clawing and biting to no avail, most predators simply give up the hunt and leave to find easier food elsewhere, and once danger has passed, the armored molepedes once more unfurl and carry on their usual grazing.

Both types of molepede tend their young with a significant amount of care until their defenses grow in, even if only passively, with their numerous litters of up to twenty young at once huddling between the adults' legs, afforded protection by their armored or spiny backs. They are, however, quite precocial, grazing and moving on their own shortly after birth, and, once sufficiently developed and defended at the age of five or six months, gradually disperse from their parent to lead an independent life.

Such defenses have become a necessity for the great grazer daggoths, as predation became more of a significant threat with the evolution of the cavern system's first proper apex predators, the blindmutts. Earlier forms simply preyed upon smaller daggoths such gothtles and xenomures, but, as prey species increased in size, so did some predators, leading to the development of some advanced blindmutts able to tackle large prey such as molepedes, biblarodons and grummlers as well.

The mandibled tendriltooth (Abyssatrox xenoailuroides) is, in the Middle Temperocene, the caverns' undisputed apex predator: even if it grows only to the size of a large house cat. Its most notable adaptation is the development of sharp, hooked keratinous spines on six of its seven nasal tendrils, which have become thick and muscular and adapted for gripping: in essence becoming six additional jaws with false "teeth". Two of its foremost digits, its central nasal tendril, and its two rear digits act as sensory feelers able to navigate its surroundings with a delicate sense of touch, while it homes in on prey with a powerful sense of smell and hearing. Once it locates its prey, it tries to grapple it with an ambushing pounce before using its six main limbs to anchor itself with its claws, and using its toothed tendril-jaws to secure a firm grip on the prey's neck before using its true teeth, sharp dagger-like incisors, to inflict a fatal bite to the prey's neck. As it targets prey larger than itself, the tendriltooth may take several days to eat its fill, and will camp out next to the carcass over the following days, fending off rivals and scavengers that may come to steal its prize. As its prolonged feeding lasts for a duration long enough for putrefaction to set in, the tendriltooth has evolved an extremely powerful set of digestive juices that allow it to continue feeding on even decomposing meat. Eventually, however, once it has sated its fill, the rotting carcass is then abandoned, and now unguarded, a buffet of scavengers then descend on the carcass, ranging from insects and worms to maggoths and xenomures to even rumptusks, vulpemousers and grummlers, all clearing up the residues the tendriltooth leaves in its wake.

Tendriltooths may reign as top carnivore, devoid of any predators of their own, yet their existence is still a precarious one, as they are few and far between given their placement on the food web. Throughout the entire cavern ecosystem, filled with millions of daggoths of different species, there are never more than a few hundred adult tendriltooths at any one time, being solitary and territorial, as they need plenty of space to sustain themselves. Tendriltooths are fairly prolific, with litters of up to twenty to thrirty tiny offspring at a time, but these small but precocial offspring, independent after only a few weeks, have a rather high mortality rate: during their early youth, where they prey primarily on insects, they are indiscriminately themselves prey for various medium-sized carnivores such as vulpemousers and smaller blindmutts, and, once they themselves graduate to medium-sized carnivore status hunting larger prey like xenomures, now have to contend with adult tendriltooths who will target the subadults to get rid of potential competition. However, should a lucky tendriltooth survive its precarious first two years, a feat accomplished by less than five percent of all juveniles, it is assured a niche of apex predator, unbothered by any other creature and with only another adult tendriltooth to fear.

------

[clockworkstarlight]

would you guys forgive me if i was back on my homestuck era <\3

anyways! meet some of my new ocs, forgot to post them here but i wanted you guys to meet em! also featuring some i made in xamags troll maker this time :3

In order:

Rileyi Tences, Prince of Light

Kiki Quincey, Maid of Light

Opthas Polypu, Witch of Heart

Evalyn Bablon, Sylph of Blood

Anasta Pivosi, Witch of Time

Vann (from Giovanna) Pottew, Maid of Space

and last but not least..

Endaul Agrumg, Rogue of Doom!

hope u guys like these gals the same way i do!! ^_^

[semi-precious-stoner]

Hahhahahaah penis hahahahahaha

The kraken (/ˈkrɑːkən/) is a legendary sea monster of enormous size, per its etymology something akin to a cephalopod, said to appear in the sea between Norway and Iceland. It is believed that the legend of the Kraken may have originated from sightings of giant squid, which may grow to 12–15 m (40–50 feet) in length.

The kraken, as a 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 Danish 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 (Octupi).

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 monstrum marinum as "krakens".That said, the claim that Linnaeus used the word "kraken" in the margin of a later edition of Systema Naturae has not been confirmed.

[quillpokebiology]

Jellicent Facts

(Art by celestial080 on Deviantart)

-The scientific name for Jellicent is "spiritus regius polypus" which translates to "Royal spirit octopus"

-Jellicent are cnidaria, making them relatives of Pokemon like Tentacruel and (surprisingly), Corsola

-Jellicent are rare to find in the wild since they spend so much of their time in the deepest parts of the ocean

-While a lot of people are afraid of Jellicent's way of eating, Jellicent rarely view people as food and mostly hunt other water types

-That being said, they have been known to hover around cruise ships. They are rarely actively hostile to the people on board however, and it could just be them watching humans around their territory

-Jelicent will make homes with other members of its colony around a bunch of sunken ships

-Jellicent form hierarchies under the water. A dominant leader will rule over the others of its colony, usually living in the biggest sunken ship. You can tell who the leader is by how big the crown is; the ones who eat the most souls are the most powerful

-Unlike a lot of other species with sexuak dimirphism, both the males and the females evolved to show off the the other sex; not just the males showing off to females

-Female Jellicent don't actually have mouths; they're markings that they use to distract prey. They can make them move using illusions (headcanon from @adobe-outdesign )

-The Pringles company uses a yellow male Jellicent as their mascot

-In old Galar, Frillish and Jellicent were often owned by royalty to show wealth

-Speaking of the Royalty symbolism, there is actually an old Southern Galarian myth of a wealthy frillish lady being courted by a poor skrelp. The myth is referred to as "Dúlamán" and they use seaweed as a metaphor to tell a story

-Researchers suspect a deep sea variant that is a lot bigger, thinner, and more sinister looking

-Like most ghost types, Jellicent have a long lifespan

(By Pokemonsketchartist on Deviantart)

[legend-collection]

Kraken

The kraken is a legendary sea monster of enormous size said to appear off the coasts of Norway.

Kraken, the subject of sailors' superstitions and mythos, was first described in the modern age at the turn of the 18th century, 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, 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.

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.

The legend of the Kraken may have originated from sightings of giant squid, which may grow to 12–15 m (40–50 feet) in length.

The English word "kraken" (in the sense of sea monster) derives from Norwegian kraken or krakjen, which are the definite forms of krake.

According to a Norwegian dictionary, krake, in the sense of "malformed or crooked tree" originates from Old Norse kraki, meaning "pole, stake". And krake in the sense of "sea monster" or "octopus" may share the same etymology. Swedish krake for "sea monster" is also traced to krake meaning "pole".

However, Finnur Jónsson remarked that the krake also signified a grapnel (dregg) or anchor, which readily conjured up the image of a cephalopod. He also explained the synonym of krake, namely horv was an alternate form of harv 'harrow' and conjectured that this name was suggested by the inkfish's action of seeming to plow the sea.

Shetlandic krekin for "whale", a taboo word, is listed as etymologically related.

Some of the synonyms of krake given by Erik Pontoppidan were, in Danish: søe-krake, kraxe, horv, krabbe, søe-horv, anker-trold.

The form krabbe also suggests an etymological root cognate with the German verb krabbeln 'to crawl".

The first description of the krake as "sciu-crak" was given by Italian writer Negri in Viaggio settentrionale (Padua, 1700), a travelogue about Scandinavia. The book describes the sciu-crak as a massive "fish" which was many-horned or many-armed. The author also distinguished this from a sea-serpent.

The kraken was described as a many-headed and clawed creature by Egede (1741), who stated it was equivalent to the Icelanders' hafgufa, but the latter is commonly treated as a fabulous whale. 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). Still, the bishop is considered to have been instrumental in sparking interest for the kraken in the English-speaking world, as well as becoming regarded as the authority on sea-serpents and krakens.

Although it has been stated that the kraken (Norwegian: krake) was "described for the first time by that name" in the writings of Erik Pontoppidan, bishop of Bergen, in his Det første Forsøg paa Norges naturlige Historie "The First Attempt atNatural History of Norway" (1752–53), a German source qualified Pontoppidan to be the first source on kraken available to be read in the German language. A description of the kraken had been anticipated by Hans Egede.

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. Finnur Jónsson (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 Grønlands nye perlustration (1729; Ger. t. 1730; tr. Description of Greenland , 1745), drawing from the "fables" of his native region, the Nordlandene len of Norway, then under Danish rule.

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.

Egede conjectured that the krake was equitable to the monster that the Icelanders call hafgufa, but as he has not obtained anything related to him through an informant, he had difficuty describing the latter.

According to the lore of Norwegian fishermen, they can 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. Egede also wrote that the krake fell under the general category of "sea spectre" (Danish: søe-trold og [søe]-spøgelse), adding that "the Draw" (Danish: Drauen, definite form) was another being within that sea spectre classification.

Pontoppidan wrote of a possible specimen of the krake, "perhaps a young and careless one", which washed ashore and died at Alstahaug in 1680.[70][68] He observed that it had long "arms", and guessed that it must have been crawling like a snail/slug with the use of these "arms", but got lodged in the landscape during the process. 20th century malacologist Paul Bartsch conjectured this to have been a giant squid, as did literary scholar Finnur Jónsson.

However, what Pontoppidan actually stated regarding what creatures he regarded as candidates for the kraken is quite complicated.

Pontoppidan did tentatively identify the kraken to be a sort of giant crab, stating that the alias krabben best describes its characteristics.

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, complicated by the fact that Pontoppidan adds another of Pliny's creature called rota with eight arms, and conflates them into one organism. Pontoppidan is suggesting this is an ancient example of kraken, as a modern commentator analyzes.

Pontoppidan then declared the kraken to be a type of polypus (octopus) or "starfish", particularly the kind Gesner called Stella Arborescens, later identifiable as one of the northerly ophiurids 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).

This ancient arbor (admixed rota and thus made eight-armed) seems an octopus at first blush but with additional data, the ophiurid starfish now appears bishop's preferential choice.

The ophiurid starfish seems further fortified when he notes that "starfish" called "Medusa's heads" (caput medusæ; pl. capita medusæ) 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. Pontopiddan was satisfied that "Medusa's heads" was the same as the foregoing starfish (Stella arborensis of old), 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). The "Medusa's heads" appear to be a Gorgonocephalid, with Gorgonocephalus spp. being tentatively suggested.

In the end though, Pontoppidan again appears ambivalent, stating "Polype, or Star-fish [belongs to] the whole genus of Kors-Trold ['cross troll'], .. some that are much larger, .. even the very largest.. of the ocean", and concluding that "this Krake must be of the Polypus kind". By "this Krake" here, he apparently meant in particular the giant polypus octopus of Carteia from Pliny, Book IX, Ch. 30 (though he only used the general nickname "ozaena" 'stinkard' for the octopus kind).

In 1802, the French malacologist Pierre Denys-Montfort recognized the existence of two "species" of giant octopuses in Histoire Naturelle Générale et Particulière des Mollusques, an encyclopedic description of mollusks.

The "colossal giant" was supposedly the same as Pliny's "monstrous polypus", which was a man-killer which ripped apart (Latin: distrahit) shipwrecked people and divers. Montfort accompanied his publication with an engraving representing the giant octopus poised to destroy a three-masted ship.

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

Montfort also listed additional wondrous fauna as identifiable with the kraken. There was Paullini's monstrum marinum glossed as a sea crab (German: Seekrabbe), which a later biologist has suggested to be one of the Hyas spp. It was also described as resembling Gesner's Cancer heracleoticus crab alleged to appear off the Finnish coast. 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.

It is in his chapter on the "colossal octopus" that Montfort provides the contemporary eyewitness example of a group of sailors who encounter the giant off the coast of Angola, who afterwards deposited a pictorial commemoration of the event as a votive offering at St. Thomas's chapel in Saint-Malo, France. Based on that picture, Montfort drew a "colossal octopus" attacking a ship, and included the engraving in his book. However, an English author recapitulating Montfort's account of it attaches an illustration of it, which was captioned: "The Kraken supposed a sepia or cuttlefish", while attributing Montfort.

Hamilton's book was not alone in recontextualizing Montfort's ship-assaulting colossal octopus as a kraken, for instance, the piece on the "kraken" by American zoologist Packard.

The Frenchman Montfort used the obsolete scientific name Sepia octopodia but called it a pouple, which means "octopus" to this day; meanwhile the English-speaking naturalists had developed the convention of calling the octopus "eight-armed cuttle-fish", as did Packard and Hamilton, even though modern-day speakers are probably unfamiliar with that name.

Having accepting as fact that a colossal octopus was capable of dragging a ship down, Montfort made a more daring hypothesis. He attempted to blame colossal octopuses for the loss of ten warships under British control in 1782, including six captured French men-of-war. The disaster began with the distress signal fired by the captured ship of the line Ville de Paris which was then swallowed up by parting waves, and the other ships coming to aid shared the same fate. He proposed, by process of elimination, that such an event could only be accounted for as the work of many octopuses. But it has been pointed out the sinkings have simply been explained by the presence of a storm, and Montfort's involving octopuses as complicit has been characterized as "reckless falsity".

The Niagara sighting. 60-metre (200 ft) creature allegedly seen afloat in 1813, depicted as octopus by a naturalist

It has also been noted that Montfort once quipped to a friend, DeFrance: "If my entangled ship is accepted, I will make my 'colossal poulpe' overthrow a whole fleet".

The ship Niagara on course from Lisbon to New York in 1813 logged a sighting of a marine animal spotted afloat at sea. It was claimed to be 60 m (200 feet) in length, covered in shells, and had many birds alighted upon it.

Samuel Latham Mitchill reported this, and referencing Montfort's kraken, reproduced an illustration of it as an octopus.

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, and commentators are found characterizing the ship attack representing the "kraken octopod".

And after Denys-Monfort's illustration, various publishers produced similar illustrations depicting the kraken attacking a ship.

Whereas the kraken was described by Egede as having "many Heads and a Number of Claws", the creature is also depicted to have spikes or horns, at least in illustrations of creatures which commentators have conjectured to be krakens. The "bearded whale" shown on an early map is conjectured to be a kraken perhaps. Also, there was an alleged two-headed and horned monster that beached ashore in Dingle, Co. Kerry, Ireland, thought to be a giant cephalopod, of which there was a picture/painting made by the discoverer. He made a travelling show of his work on canvas, as introduced in a book on the kraken.

While Swedish writer Olaus Magnus did not use the term kraken, various sea-monsters were illustrated on his famous map, the Carta marina (1539). Modern writers have since tried to interpret various sea creatures illustrated as a portrayal of the kraken.

Olaus gives description of a whale with two elongated teeth ("like a boar's or elephant's tusk") to protect its huge eyes, which "sprouts horns", and although these are as hard as horn, they can be made supple also. But the tusked form was named "swine-whale", and the horned form "bearded whale" by Swiss naturalist Gesner, who observed it possessed a "starry beard" around the upper and lower jaws. At least one writer has suggested this might represent the kraken of Norwegian lore.

Another work commented less discerningly that Olaus's map is "replete with imagery of krakens and other monsters".

Ashton's Curious Creatures (1890) drew significantly from Olaus's work and even quoted the Swede's description of the horned whale. But he identified the kraken as a cephalopod and devoted much space on Pliny's and Olaus's descriptions of the giant "polypus", noting that Olaus had represented the kraken-polypus as a crayfish or lobster in his illustrations, and reproducing the images from both Olaus's book and his map. In Olaus book, the giant lobster illustration is uncaptioned, but appears right above the words "De Polypis (on the octopus)", which is the chapter heading. Hery Lee was also of the opinion that the multi-legged lobster was a misrepresentation of a reported cephalopod attack on a ship.

The legend in Olaus's map fails to clarify on the lobster-like monster "M", depicted off the island of Iona. However, the associated writing called the Auslegung adds that this section of the map extends from Ireland to the "Insula Fortunata". This "Fortunate Island" was a destination on St. Brendan's Voyage, one of whose adventures was the landing of the crew on an island-sized monstrous, as depicted in a 17th century engraving; and this monstrous fish, according to Bartholin was the aforementioned hafgufa, which has already been discussed above as one of the creatures of lore equated with kraken.

The piece of squid recovered by the French ship Alecton in 1861, discussed by Henry Lee in his chapter on the "Kraken", would later be identified as a giant squid, Architeuthis by A. E. Verrill.

After a specimen of the giant squid, Architeuthis, was discovered by Rev. Moses Harvey and published in science by Professor A. E. Verrill, commentators have remarked on this cephalopod as possibly explaining the legendary kraken.

An ancient, giant cephalopod resembling the legendary kraken has been proposed as responsible for the deaths of ichthyosaurs during the Triassic Period. This theory has met with severe criticism.