All About Mermaids

The first mermaid was actually a man. He was the god Oannes from Babylon. He is often shown as a man with a fish's tail. According to written descriptions he had the head and body of a fish but under the fish head is a human head and under the tail are human feet.

*In heraldry the two-tailed mermaid is shown full face with the ends of her tails held in each hand. Both single-tailed and double-tailed varieties symbolize eloquence. If she has her comb and mirror with her then it means vanity.

*A two-tailed mermaid is the basis for the Starbuck's logo. It has been somewhat edited because some people found the original image too sexually suggestive.

*For a brief period during the Middle Ages mer-ladies with wings were carved on tombstones. These are probably descendants of the bird-sirens used in classical times. They are meant to represent both mourners and guides bringing the spirit of the dead to the afterlife.

*Sirenomelia, alternatively known as Mermaid Syndrome is a very rare congenital deformity in which the legs are fused together, giving the appearance of a mermaid. This condition is found in approximately one out of every 70,000 live births and is usually fatal within a day or two of birth.
There are only two known cases in the world of children who survived the affliction. Tiffany Yorks, a 19-year-old American had her legs successfully separated when she was a baby, and 4-year-old Milagros Cerron, from Peru had her legs surgically separated several years ago.

Under the strain of voyaging, sailors through the ages have seen in the ocean the embodiment of their deepest desires and fears. On early maps the figure of the enchanting mermaid shared space with the hideous monsters and fearsome beasts who lay in wait for the explorers of unknown waters. The woman who lures men to their death has a rich life in the annals of sea history.
In Physiologus, the mermaid is "a beast of the sea wonderfully shapen as a maid from the navel upward and a fish from the navel downward, and this beast is glad and merry in tempest, and sad and heavy in fair weather."
Combined with the pressures of travel, toil, isolation and the will to believe, the legend of the mermaid has distorted the perceptions of humans for hundreds of years. The certainty of people who saw her in the past acquires, in retrospect, an amusing quaintness; but it differs little, basically, from the certainty felt by contemporary witnesses to the movements of flying saucers and the monster of Loch Ness. Like many creatures of the imagination, the mermaid, in a harmless way, exemplifies the paradox that things unseen provide humanity with its most compelling visions.

Existence Greeting Cards by artbyjulie Making new friends by MartinArtStudio Little Mermaid by Spice

Vendessa the Gothic Mermaid by ShazJustice

Mermaids by Nushka

Sand Dollar Angel Shirt by Jaenne