Do mermaids exist?

"A Mermaid" by John Miller Waterhouse.

When I was about six, seven or eight years old my family and I went to Greece on a holiday. On our way there the movie Splash played in the airplane. Back then everyone didn’t have their own little screen and option of 100 movies to choose from – everyone had to watch the same movie that was projected onto a screen at the front of the cabin. The movie we saw, both when flying to Greece and when returning to South Africa was Splash. Also, while in Greece practically all the tourist sites sold mermaid souvenirs, alongside little models of the Acropolis and pendants of talismanic blue eyes. So began a fascination with mermaids. The visit to Greece merely enforced what seemed to be an inherent enthrallment with mythological creatures and chimeras have always been of special interest.



But do they exist? These beautiful aquatic femme fatale that beguile sailors to their death? Are they marine apes, as suggested by some theorists, or fish with limbs, or are they real merfolk living under the sea, or the strange fantasy of cultures all over the world? One thing we cannot deny is the latter. Talk of mermaids seem to be universal. I was shocked to read in a recent column that according to some there are mermaids in the Karoo! (The Karoo is a desert-region in Southern Africa).

Do they exist? I would like to think so. The world would be such a more interesting place if they do.

Some Links:

• Mermaids are Real! is an interesting blog obsessed with mermaids, however I think the blogger has a femdom fetish.

• Mermaids on the Web is a nice portal site that gives a good overview of everything mermaid with links to various related sites.