The Greek mermaids had the bird body. From Oannes, deity Sumerian half man, half fish, until Christopher Columbus story, the mermaids have been present in the legends of the western culture. Starting from the Half Age it is represented the mermaids with fish line. They are magic beings, as a rule of feminine, traditionally beautiful sex and sometimes given to the perversion and to find rejoicing in the misfortune of the men. Among the most modern stories in a mermaid's avistamientos we have that of 1608 that counts the discovery of a mermaid on the part of two seafaring members of Henry's crew Hudson; as they counted it was: "of the size of a man, their skin was very white and have more than enough its back long hair black color, the line it floated it was as of dolphin, but spotted as a mackerel." (Rodrigo of Alba). Also in Antártida in 1823 and another in Bahamas in 1869. The first one had the green hair, the second, blue. Without going farther, in Liérganes, Spanish municipality, a man-fish existed, and another being's of these characteristics rumors circulate in the river Ebro.  
In recent times they have become trained in fairs and theaters mermaids that were but unhappy women with the feet put in a case or attacked of some of those illnesses (cretinism) in those that the skin rises in form of flakes. To this category they belong those that were exhibited in the fair of San Germán, in Paris, in 1758, and in London, in 1775. The drawings that were made of them were the painter's mere whim, without another end that to increase the merit of the sought phenomenon.
The key of the enigma that so famous monsters suppose gives it to us, unconsciously, Johnston in its work "Historioe naturalis of Piscibus et Cetis libri V", printed in Amsterdan the year 1657. Háblase in this book that in the Islands Visayas ("sub Hispanorum domain") a fish anthropomorphous, called "fish-woman" was caught by the Spaniards and "duyon" by the natives, and it is given of him a detailed description and a figure that we reproduce here. Let us see as the myths they are born of the imagination of the illustrators and of the confusion of the authors when describing the studied species. 
The drawing is of pure fantasy, but leaving it to a side and only noticing the text, we are with which the characters in him enumerated they suit a mammal pisciforme perfectly, something between seal and cetacean that in the Indian ocean and it leaves from Pacific she is and that she receives from the natives the dugong" name or "duyon", that is to say, the one that you/they gave to the monster described by Johnston. She has the "dugong" round head, arms in form of fins and line similar to that of the fish, and with this, with being the provided female of swollen you suckle, and with the prone ones that they were the "old" ones to see marvels for all part, coarse and it has more than enough for cases a legend.
 
 Mermaids in the antiquity
The first testimony about the appearance of mermaids goes back to The Odyssey of Homero that relates the Greek hero's tumultuous adventures Ulises, during its long return trip to Itaca, after the war of Troya: the mermaids of the time are not those beings half woman, half fish that the most modern legends retained, but some birds with head and woman's chest.

The mermaids of the Homeric time are three sisters, daughters of the god laugh Aquelaos and of the muse of the poetry Calíope. Lidia plays the flute, Partenopea the lira and Leucosea she reads the texts and the songs.

Antigua partners of Perséfone, daughter of Zeus and of Deméter, abducted by Hades, the god of the Hells, they requested to the gods that granted them wings to be able to save the youth and to bring it of turn on the Earth.
According to another version, they owe their appearance to Deméter that wanted to punish them to have been negligent in their daughter's care.
Their name comes from the term Latin siren that in turn comes of the Greek seirên, of the word seira, knot, rope, remembering without doubts the "captivating" power of the mermaids.
The mermaids were specially abundant in the vicinities of Sicily. In some part of that sea she was the island of the Mermaids. With their sweet songs they attracted the incautious marines, making that their ships you breaks against the rocks and reefs. That that she heard their voices forgot their homeland forever, home, woman and children, and she hurtled to the sea after them. Ulises was liberated of them making you to tie to the mast of its craft and to cork the hearings of its partners with wax. 

 

The harpies had enormous wings. They were the divinities of the tempests and of the death. Cuandos the tired sailors prepared to rest in a coast populated by Harpies, these they fell on them, being taken their provisions with the bird claws.     
In the first times of the Christian Era, as Plinio refers the inhabitants from Lisbon they sent a message to the Emperor Tiberio to be notified the presence of a mermaid in a cavern of the coast, and the same naturist counts that Roman many patricians declared to have seen nereidas in the bay of Cádiz.

The medieval mermaids.
Reigning in Constantinople the Emperor Mauricio, at the end of the century VI, a governor of the First floor Egypt sent the Sovereign a story, signed by numerous witness, of its encounter with two mermaids in the delta of Nile. In this case they didn't have both monsters aspects of women, but rather they were male and female. The first one had a ferocious air and she adorned their head a reddish mane; the female was distinguished for her abundant hair.

In the beginnings of the Modern Age we are with which they were not only frequent monsters of this gender, but rather in many cases they were fished and conserved in captivity. Conrado Gessner, the one celebrates German naturist of the XVI century, she has left us several descriptions and these beings' figures, among them a marine" "bishop, ("episcopus marinus") caught in the Baltic one and correspondent as curiosity (and there is not doubt that it was it) to the King from Poland the year 1531. she had this monster the pointed head as a miter, to what owed their name. Certain day that their guardians were neglected while they walked him/her through the beach, they were escaped to the sea and she no longer saw again. Same Gessner speaks of a marine" "friar that was fished in the coast of Norway, with its hood and everything. Aldrovando, in its book "Of Monstri", copies all these stories and some of the figures that illustrate it. As for the bishops, friars and marine other clergymen of the seas of the North, there are species of seals with cutaneous appendixes in the head that to the eyes of the masse well can seem miters and cowls. 
 The medieval mermaids are no longer the birds of prey of the Greeks. GERARDO the moralized" creatures' LYON "Dialogue the (Geneva, 1481) it describes with half woman body and a fish line. in "Bestiario of RICARDO'S (1250) Love" DE FOURNIVEL still remembered to the Greek mermaid with body "half muje and half of bird." 
 Modern mermaid's conception starts up in this time. They are the English mermaid, the lady of the lake of Scotland, the German meerfrau, the mor-greg Breton, it donates it Catalan d'aigua and the Slavic rusalka.
They could have as antecedent the Roman confusion among the ondinas that already in the century IV to.C. the Greek philosopher mentioned Teofrasto, and the mermaids. They are the personifications of the foggy soul of the rivers, as Lorelei of Rhine or the fata Morgana (mor-greg Breton), the king's of Is daughter, the Breton city that she submerged under the waters according to the legend. The ondinas is beings of the salted water, of the ocean, and it represents them to him going out of the water with their long caballera floating around them. With their beautiful voice they seduced the sailors.
Until well entered the XVIII century was believed in its existence. This way the Danish bishop ERIK PONTOPPIDAN "History of Norway" believed (1752) to facilitate numerous tests of its existence. In fact, it is even nowadays marketed with falsifications carried out with a trunk of a lemúrido and fish line, in the costs of the Indian ocean.
 
 

 

The manatee and the Spanish conquerors.
 
   At the end of the XV century and principles of the XVI one the conquerors, when contemplating both suckle of the manatee, they believed to see authentic mermaids. The manatís and the dugongos were good to shoot the imagination of the old ones and to maintain the myth of the mermaids.
Three months after Columbus discovered the New World, January of 1493, 9 the registration Nº 146 of the binnacle book registered: "The previous day, when the Admiral went to the River of the Gold, three mermaids that appeared in the surface of the sea saw; these they were not beautiful as they put on makeup, although they have something in the face of human."
The most probable thing is that, so much to Greek as to conquerors, the presence of the dugongos of the Red sea and Indian ocean, the manatees of the orínoco and Guinéa, the seals that were plentiful in Mediterranean, made think those prodigious beings, men's medley and fish, Antonio Riverside affirms.

 

The Spanish navigators that made frequent expeditions to America in those times, were not able to less than meeting with these marine beings. In 1553, in the month of November, Diego Becersa and Hernando of Grijalva, saw next to the coast of Mexico a monster so strange sireniforme that not believing enough to paint it once, they made two figures of him. The distance to that it was didn't allow them to distinguish its sex, but if they saw that she had very robust arms.
Seven years later, as she refers the Universal" "Dictionary, of Trevoux, some fishermen caught seven marine men and nine women near Ceylon. Some Spanish missionaries and Dimas Forest, of Valencia, I prescribe of the viceroy of Goa, they were witness of the fact, and the last one made the atomic exam of one of the monsters, being convinced of the likeness of their organism with that of the man.

The inhabitants of the waters

- The nereidas
They are mermaids of the sea. Daughters of Nereo, a marine divinity, they have fish form from the waist down. Van in the retinue of Poseidón / Neptune. Anfítrite belongs one to them. They are the Mermaids, such and as we understand them from the Half Age. Their equivalent ones masculine (man-fish or newts) they are Ensines. Nereo lived with its fifty charming daughters - nereidas - under the waters, in a radiant cavern. They used to ascend to the surface and she used to see them sittings on the rocks or seated in the sands of the beach, drying their green long hair, or riding on dolphins, or playing with the Newts; their bodies finish in green fish lines. They are famous Anfítrite; Tetis, mother of Achilles, and Galatea, to who loved the cyclops Polifemo. Them desgusta in end being observed while they play or they take the sun. The nereydas, is beings of the salted waters. 
 
- The ondinas
They are mermaids of the rivers, sources and lakes. They are a lot but beautiful that the nereidas with hair blond and beautiful lines of a thousand colors. Their equivalent one masculine they are Wallanos that possess a supreme beauty. The ondinas has commended the task of guiding the water of the rivers for their natural bed until their exit to the sea.
 
- The nayades
Inhabitants of waters candies are the naiads protectors of the rivers, lakes and sources. First Homero named them, saying that they were daughters of Zeus and the mothers of Silenos and the Satyrs. They are much more beautiful beings that the inhabitants of the ocean, although of low stature, and they feel weakness for the human being, because they love to contemplate them.
They have healing abilities and they are you endow for the song. The naiads don't have anything to do with the mermaids, although they can submerge and to swim perfectly low the water. Nymphs, divinities feminine daughters of Zeus / Jupiter are usually called also. They are the different parts of the Nature. With naked beautiful girls' form, they dance and they sing. They are Dríades those of the trees, Naiads those of the terrestrial (sources, rivers and lakes) waters, Oceanides those of the sea, etc. They live 9.720 years. Van in the court of the gods and they run graceful before the Satyrs. They are famous Dafne, Echo, Estige...
 
 - Newts
Gentlemen of the ocean, they are the masculine variety of the mermaids. The newts are deeply ingrained in the tradition of sailors and lovers of the sea. Many have enthused and they have been taken to their perdition by newts, and the histories of people that are saved by dolphins they are also product of this lineage.
 All the newts are extremely prone to strong emotions. His is the deep mystery of the ocean, and the terrible fury of their storms. Once inflamed, a newt is a terrible enemy, since they will harbor resentment during incredibly long times.
 The newts live throughout the rocky costs of oceans and seas. They very rarely abandon the water to venture inland, but from time to time, one will abandon their native atmosphere and she will unite to the terrestrial society. A newt that she dies or succumb to the in earth she dries off it will reincarnate as an earth walker that is a worse destination that the death for most of them.
 The Infantile newts have a good time and they play with dolphins and seals. They would prefer to swim and to play before anything.
 The young newts love to ridicule of the humans and earth walkers. They are car-indulgent and very obstinate.
 The voice of a newt is able to enthrall to the strongest or even willful in the humans.
The newts of salted water are denominated Ensines (already noted previously) and those that inhabit the sweet waters Wallanos (also noted) are called.
 
- Ictiocentauros
The ictiocentauros is denominated half centaur half fish. they live in their own colonies or they also live in the colonies of mermaids and newts. They can get married so much so much with beings of their same species with mermaids or newts. They can be of salted or sweet waters.

 

- Asrai
They are small of stature. They inhabit lakes and deep rivers of the north of Europe. They are diluted in the water if they have enough a sunbeam, they leave only in nights of full moon, the Nights of Asrai. They are old, but with young maiden's appearance, long and green, naked hair. They inhabit the holes of the rocks.

- Cotaluna
Ondina that inhabits the river Gramame of Brazil. During the summer she appears totally with form of woman, attractive and seductora. In winter it grows him/her a fish line and black long hair.


- DONAS D'AIGUA o GOGES
They inhabit waters of rivers, ravines and sources of Aragonese Pyrenees and Catalan and of Languedoc. Also in the Balearic Islands. They comb their hair with combs of gold and they feel a great attraction for the men. Some Doña d'Aigua has ended up getting married with a human, like it is counted in a legend of Montseny.
 
 
- FADAS D'OS IBONS
Ondinas that live in the deep ibones or lakes of origin glacier of Aragonese Pyrenees. They attract the shepherds and the montañeros with songs, especially in Christmas Eve. Also you the Moorish flame, and they dance on the waters in the dawns of San Juan's day, with snakes that coil in their arms.


- FOSSEGRIM
Spirit of the cascades of Norway. It hardly measures thirty centimeters, she has some golden splendid hair. she sings magic songs that make dance to the trees and it attracts the children to drown them.
  
- GLAISTIG
she has hidden goat paws under their green long dress. she is a woman seductora that, sometimes, she takes care of the livestock that goes down to drink to the bank. He likes children and it protects the old men. The lamiñak, lumias or lainas of the north of Spain can also have paws caprinas.
 
 - GWRAGEDD ANNWN (or annwfn)
In Wales they call this way to the fairies of the lakes. They are very similar women to the human, very beautiful and sensual. They usually marry men, to those that impose the condition that they don't hit them more than three times. They cry and they laugh without reason, and they are big experts of medicinal plants. In a rock next to a lake of Wales a door that she only can exists it turns in the mornings of the New Year. It drives to a magic island where they inhabit. A derivation is GRUAGACHS, the hairy ones, enter dripping water in the houses and they ask them to be allowed to warm to the fire. They are feminine and also masculine beings. They can be identical to GLAISTIG
 
 - LAMIÑAK AND LAINAS
Feminine beings related with the water of sources and creeks in Basque country, Navarrese and Aragon. They have goose paws or bird claws. Some can have goat paws, what would relate them with Glaistig. There are certain dispersed legends in other areas of Spain, where they call them Lumias.


- LAUNDRYMEN
They appear for the whole north of the Spanish peninsula and in countries of the Atlantic coast of Central Europe and United Kingdom. In some cases they have characteristic that associate them to the witches, in others they are properly fairies that dance and they spread the white clothes between the trees and envelope the grass of the grasslands, after washing it in the rivers. There is a great variety of legends on them, what endows them of very diverse descriptions.


- LIWA
In Nicaragua, they are some giant worms of white color that inhabit the bottom of the lakes


- LORELEI
The aquatic fairy of Rhin that inhabits the called rock LoreLay.

- LLAMHIGYN AND DWR
Monster of the rivers with form of giant toad, with wings and line. she gives some awful screams and she eats up to the livestock that goes down to drink to the bank.


- NAVI
The souls of dead children without baptism or drowned in the Slavic countries they become naiads dressed with white tunics and inhabitants of rivers and lakes. They sing to attract and to drown to the walkers.

 

- NIXE
Ondina of Northern Europe. she has many variants, so much of the masculine gender as of the feminine one. NECK. Scandinavia and Sweden. River man with red cap that she plays a harp of gold and it demands a human sacrifice a year. The word screams it "Crosses" for the riversides when somebody has drowned. NICK in Scotland, NOKKE in Denmark, NAKK in Estonia, NIKKRT in Holland, NAKKI in Finland, being most similar NAKINEIU to the mermaids...
 
  
- NOGGLE
It is Kelpie that inhabits Shetland. Gray Poney that anything near the mills of water.


- OIARÁ
In Brazil, she is a girl of black long hair covered with garlands that attracts the men to the deep waters. Sometimes, the males of Oiará fecundate the native women.


- RUSALKI
They Inhabit Russia, Bulgaria and Poland. They only can it turns in Week Santa. They have relationship with the Fairies Laundrymen, because from the trees to those that are gone up request linen garments to the walkers that wash and they spread to dry off. If somebody takes them to him, she dies. They make nests of feathers and rushes under the water. They walk for the fields, making move the wheat spikes., from the day of Pentecost up to June 29, when their circular dances begin until the first snow. They say that they are the spirits of the youths that you/they commit suicide in the rivers. Their enigmatic smile loves people and its hug is mortal.
 
 
- YEURE
In France they call this way to a mysterious animal that lives in the bottom of rivers and lakes and with their angers it overflows them.


- YACUMANA
Giant snake, Mother of the Water that becomes a great river when it leaves the depths.
 
- MERROWS
Name that she is given to the Irish sirénidos, and they are distinguished of the other beings residents of the seas in that you/they take cap of red feathers to be impelled toward their homes in the deep waters. If they are stolen the cap, they can no longer return to their liquid habitations. The female merrows is very beautiful and, as the other mermaids, they appear as a premonition before the storm, but they are of affable nature and they sometimes fall in love with the mortal fishermen. As much the males as the females sometimes arrive until the coast in small and hornless form of heads.

- SELKIES
Also well-known as fairies - seals. These shy creatures are housed in the seas that Orkney and Shetlandia surround. In Ireland they have the name of Roane. A selkie can come off of its seal skin and to arrive to earth transformed into a beautiful maiden. If a human being is able to take possession of that skin, the selkie will be forced to transform into an excellent (but melancholic) wife. The males unchain storms and they sink ships to retaliate of the slaughter without reason of the seals.
 
- NUCKELAVEE
it is without a doubt the most horrible among the Scottish deities of the sea. It is a monstrous horse, with paws that partly are fins; she has an enormous mouth and the burning and penetrating look. On their loin, together to him for the waist, an awful torso runs off with, with arms that almost the floor receives you/they; crowned by a solid head that oscillates from one to another side as if the neck was too flimsy to maintain it right. And it is worse still the horrible aspect of this being's meat, since she doesn't have skin. For their yellow veins she runs black blood, and the white tendons and the red vigorous muscles are to the air. Nuckelavee has aversion to the fresh water that she runs and those that go for him pursued they don't have more than to cross it to get rid.

 

- KELPIE
It is a Scottish deity of the waters. Although she sometimes appears with hairy man's form, it is more frequent to see it in horse form. Vague Kelpie for rivers and streams, and after leaving the human confident beings that mount it, she hurtles to the water and she gives them a chapuzón. Each-Uisge or Aughisky, like she calls it to him in Ireland, she inhabits the seas and bays and it is much more dangerous. After putting in the water to their victims, those make pieces and it devours them without leaving more than the liver. If she is ridden inland it is sure, but as soon as she smells or it sights seawater, it will cause the horseman's death...
 
- LAUDINE
she is the Lady of the source, that is to say, the Castilian that possesses the Source of Barenton. she marries Yvain who has killed their first husband in singular combat. It is the image of an old divinity of the sources in the Celtic mythology.

 

- URISK
she is a loner to be fantastic Scottish that wanders for the ponds. Frequently it leaves to look for human company, but their peculiar aspect terrifies those who are brought near.
 
 - CONCHUDO
she is a Scottish goblin that is about the currents of fresh water, and she goes covered with shells that make noise when moving. she has a good time deceiving and confusing the walkers, and making that they stray.
 
- GWRAGEDD ANNWN
They are Welsh fairies of the water, beautiful maidens of the lake that, some that another time, they take possession of the humans to make of them their husbands.
 
 - BORMO
Gallic divinity of the sources and the thermal waters whose name has lasted in the toponimia: Bourbon.
 
 - NECHTAN
Irish divinity of the sources, husband of Boyne. The name is the form gaélica of Latin Neptunus.
 
 - NINGYO
Of Japanese origin, it is a fish with alone woman's head that she cries pearls instead of tears. The woman that can play or, better, to eat up a Nigyom will win the beauty and eternal youth.