One of those legends is merfolk. These half-fish, half-human mythological sea-dwellers have appeared many, many times in mythology, folklore, literature, and other sources of media. Although the origins of merpeople are a bit murky, I’ve found some sources that help clear the water (and some bonus creatures similar to merfolk.)

Syria, circa 1000 BCE

One of the first stories that mention something mermaid-like is the tale of Atargatis, the main goddess and protector of the people of Syria. After accidentally killing her lover (or, depending on how you interpret the story, being overfilled with sadness since the day of her birth), she jumped into a lake out of shame and grief. However, her beauty struck the sea gods, so they saved her by turning her into half a fish so she wouldn’t drown.

Mesopotamia, unknown date

Berossus was a Babylonian priest, astronomer, and writer. One of his first books touches on the topic of the origins of life. In it, he writes that Oannes gave mankind all the knowledge we needed. Images and art of Oannes depict him as a man wearing a fish, except the fish is a part of him. He’s like a merman, except the fish part is on his left side instead of his lower body. 

Scotland, also unknown date

Half-person, half-salmon creatures that originate from Scottish folklore called Ceasg. Very similar to merfolk, except when caught they can grant you three wishes. 

There are very few stories I could find about the Ceasg. However, I found a book on Internet Archives from 1935 called Scottish Folk-lore and Folk Life, which gave me more insight on the creature. Turns out, in folklore, humans would fall in love with the Ceasg and have children with them. All of the relationships ended quickly, but the Ceasg would linger around and protect its descendants from storms. However, in some stories, the Ceasg eats people. Then their lover has to free them from the Ceasg’s stomach by playing a harp. It’s this whole thing, but the story’s really long and I have a problem with telling long stories, so if you want to read more about this creature, I’d recommend reading Donald A. MacKenzie’s Scottish Folk-lore and Folk Life.

Greece, and I’ve given up trying to find dates

When talking about sirens in mythology, an image of a mermaid may start swimming around in your brain. Well, tell your brain to knock it off because sirens aren’t mermaids; in fact, they aren’t even half fish. They’re part bird, which is something I learned while doing research for this article. In older works of art (and by older, I mean thousands of years old) they are shown as birds with human heads. In this myth, sirens sing songs to lure sailors to their deaths, who die either by crashing their boats into rocks or by being pulled underwater.

Okay, now that that’s out of the way, let’s get back to talking about mermaids. 

One thing I find really fascinating is the etymology of the word “mermaid.” It’s a combination of the old British word “mere,” relating to a body of water, and “maid,” a young woman. It’s just so cool to me that most words can be split into words that mean something relating to the word. (Jabber warning: Take “autodefenestration,” which is the act of jumping out of a window. The word “defenestration” comes from the Latin prefix de-, meaning off, down, or away from, and “fenestra,” Latin for window. And “auto” in Latin means self. So it literally means “throw yourself away from a window.” Pretty neat.)

As far as I know (which is very little in this vast, infinite universe in which we are all just specks), mermaids aren’t that dangerous. But if I’m wrong and they are dangerous and somehow real, I’ve used my big brain to come up with a sure-fire way to defeat them: set them on fire. (There are probably more ways than that, but it’s the first that comes to mind.)