Bestiary: Bestiary. sea ​​monsters

23.04.2016 17:25

Monster legends are found in cultures different people. Dragons, sea snakes, unknown animals with mystical powers - all this became the basis a large number legends.

Let's get acquainted with several legends about unknown monsters. Was there ever a basis for such stories, or are they all scary tales? Who knows…

The Story of the Lambton Worm

This story happened in Northern England with the heir to Lambton Castle, John Lambton, who had a chance to face a monster. Hence the name of the monster - Lambton Worm.

One Sunday, when all people were supposed to be in the service in the church, John went fishing to the river Ware instead of the service. However, instead of fish, the heir to the castle took out a disgusting-looking worm from the waters of the river. To get rid of the vile creature, the man threw it into the well.

After this incident, circumstances developed in such a way that John had to leave the country. He spent seven whole years abroad and, of course, managed to forget about his strange and unpleasant find. However, the worm has not disappeared anywhere, moreover, over the years it has grown to a gigantic size.

The monster climbed out of the well and returned to the river. The legend tells that during the day the worm rested on a rock located in the middle of the river, and at night it crawled ashore, where it hunted people and cattle. Local residents repeatedly tried to get rid of the monster, but their attempts were unsuccessful - no matter how much they tried to cut the worm into pieces, the parts grew back together.

When John Lambton returned to his homeland, he learned about the horror that a vile monster brings to people. The man remembered his old find and firmly decided to get rid of this creature. He sought advice from a sorceress, who told John to put on his armor, covered with sharp spikes, and fight the monster in the water. The heir to the estate heeded her advice - putting on such armor, he went to the river. When he was in the water, the worm wrapped around the man's body, but the sharp spikes tore the monster's flesh into many small pieces, which were immediately carried away by the current, so the pieces could not grow together, and the terrible worm was finally defeated.

Legend of the Furry Beast

In many cultures, dragons are dangerouscreatures with huge fangs and claws, with the ability to spit fire. The legend of the Furry Beast, which has come down to us from the Middle Ages, tells the story of a dragon that attacked a French village.

In addition to the ability to kill his victims with fire, the Furry Beast had another terrible feature. The whole body of the animal was covered with thick hair, for which he got his name. Poisoned spikes flew out of the animal's fur, which killed local residents. The villagers were in despair. The beast destroyed fields, destroyed crops, ate small children and killed anyone who got in its way.

Once the Furry Beast killed a girl with whom a fearless young man was in love. Upon learning of the death of his beloved, the young man was furious and firmly decided to kill the beast. Pouncing on the dragon, he cut in half his tail, which was the only vulnerable spot on the body of the animal, and the animal died immediately. The brave young man lost his beloved, but it was this pain and anger that helped him defeat the terrible monster, and thereby save the lives of hundreds of other people.

The Legend of the Giant Sea Serpent

This story took place in 1852, when two whaling ships set sail from the port of New Bedford and set sail on the waters. Pacific Ocean.

The navigation of the ships, which bore the names "Monongahela" and "Rebecca Sims" was joint. While sailing in the ocean, an unusual meeting took place - the ships found a large animal that looked like a whale from a distance. The captain of the Monongahela, Mr. Seabury, inspired by the discovery, launched three boats that set off in pursuit of the animal. However, it was not a whale.

The captain managed to kill an unknown animal with a harpoon, which, writhing in death convulsions, sank two of the three boats. Examining the carcass of a dead creature, people were finally convinced that their find had nothing to do with a whale. It was a huge brownish-gray reptile, whose body turned out to be about 45 meters in length.

Due to its gigantic size, it was not possible to take the carcass of an animal with you.possible, so the sailors cut off only the head of an unknown creature, and the body was left in the water. According to the sailors, the head of the reptile looked impressive - dozens of sharp, curved teeth peeped out of the monster's mouth. The find was placed in a barrel with brine, which was in the hold of the Monongahela - in this way it was planned to deliver the trophy to the shore.

However, when the ships were returning home, a strange story happened - along the way, the Monongahela mysteriously disappeared. The second ship, the Rebecca Sims, made it safely to port, but the people on that ship were unable to explain where the second ship had gone. Later, the wind brought the wreckage of the Monongahela to the coast of Alaska, but the barrel with the head of the monster was not among the wreckage. Thus, the terrible trophy was irretrievably lost. The only evidence of this story was the ship's log of the captain of the second ship, "Rebecca Sims" - in it the captain described this story, and thanks to him it has survived to this day.

The story of the sea monster from the mist

One day, in 1962, a severe storm broke out off the coast of Florida. He took to the open sea an inflatable raft of the US Air Force, on board of which there were five scuba divers. People were in a difficult situation, but they all managed to survive the storm.

When the sea calmed down, a thick fog appeared above the water, from which it was necessary to somehow get out. However, as it turned out, fog was the main problem for people in trouble. About an hour later, the scuba divers heard splashing water and a strange hiss. There was an unpleasant smell of dead fish.

Suddenly, a large head rose out of the water, outwardly resembling the head of a turtle. The neck of the monster, or the part of its serpentine body that rose above the water, was about four meters long. The appearance of the monster frightened the scuba divers so much that a terrible panic began among the people - people screamed in horror and rushed about randomly, trying to find each other in the fog. Ultimately, four out of five scuba divers jumped or fell into the sea, where they found their death. Only one person from the team managed to escape, who told about the meeting with this terrible monster. The bodies of his other comrades could not be found.

Anastasia Cherkasova

Throughout the history of mankind, people have been accompanied by myths and legends. The study of them is very interesting for the reason that such stories usually arise on the basis of real events. For example, sea monsters, which ancient legends tell about, may well turn out to be real plesiosaurs or other sea lizards, albeit somewhat embellished.

Myths and truth

The seas have always attracted people - since ancient times, attempts have been made to conquer this element. However, this has not been fully achieved so far. Modern man knows more about life or its absence on other planets than about what is happening at the bottom of the oceans of his native Earth. Modern technologies they don’t allow you to go down to great depths, so people can only guess what kind of life exists there, at the bottom.

The sea sacredly keeps its secrets. Only sometimes do they break through to the surface, and then the surf brings strange finds to the shore, or sailors meet in the ocean such strange creatures that they then talk about the meeting for a long time. Over time, such stories acquire colorful details, and it is not easy for researchers to separate truth from lies, especially when you consider that no one knows the truth. Legends about sea monsters have existed since ancient times, when people were just beginning to explore the seas.

Most often they talk about giant sea snakes, which may well be descendants of plesiosaurs. A sea monster with a huge mouth may also be giant shark or an ancient lizard. And existence giant squid and octopuses do not cause doubts among scientists - there is too much evidence that these creatures exist, modern science. However, there are no photos of such monsters yet, and a stuffed animal huge inhabitant the depths of the sea is still only a dream for world museums.

Amazing finds

The fishermen of a small Japanese settlement throughout the spring of 1977 were fishing off the coast of New Zealand. One fine day, their net brought back the remains of a half-decomposed animal. The length of the carcass was 13 meters, and the weight was about two tons. The corpse had four limbs, a small head on a narrow neck and an elongated tail. Before throwing the fetid remains of the monster overboard, eyewitnesses severed a limb from it and took a couple of photographs. The surviving limb was taken to the zoological laboratory. Scientists have concluded that this is nothing more than a representative of one of the types of prehistoric lizards that lived in sea ​​depths.

Interestingly, the fishermen claimed that the animal was missing bones. It is possible that this was a consequence long stay in sea water, where decomposition processes proceed somewhat differently than on land. And L. Ginzburg (a paleontologist from Paris) believes that the sailors caught the corpse of a giant seal with a net. All that is known about this species is that giant seals frolicked in ocean waters 20 million years ago. The paleontologist made his conclusion only on the basis of photographs and the only limb of the animal, so it is possible that it is not true.

In Chile, the people were able to see an animal whose appearance defied any explanation. The monster was thrown onto the shores of the Pacific Ocean, and only therefore were casual eyewitnesses able to describe it. According to their stories, the fins of the monster looked like human hands. The front ones had five fingers with claws, the back ones had no fingers at all. The skull was distinguished by an oblong elongated shape, in the mouth there were three huge fangs.

The find was immediately nicknamed the "humanoid monster" for its five-fingered fins. Scientists, however, considered that the corpse belongs to the Triassic sea lizard. How this lizard was able to survive to this day, there is no explanation yet.

Giant squids have terrified sailors since the Middle Ages, as evidenced by numerous stories, illustrations and engravings.
It is believed that squid large sizes Animals that live in deep sea waters. Found in 2002, a dead squid weighing 250 kilograms on the coast of Tasmania disproved the knowledge of scientists. The length of its tentacles reached 15 meters. After laboratory studies, experts came to the conclusion that this specimen lived at a depth of only 200 meters. It turned out that it was a female that swam out in shallow water and accidentally ran aground. Disputes began over myths that spoke of the danger of huge octopuses and cuttlefish sinking ships.

Fragments of huge octopuses and squids have been found more than once in the stomachs of whales or on the shores of the seas. In the nineties of the last century, Japanese experts were able to capture a live huge octopus with a special camera that emits infrared light. And in 2006, such a specimen was caught by Japanese researchers.

real unicorns

It is generally accepted that encountering sea monsters is dangerous for sailors. But sometimes such meetings are fatal for monsters. That's what happened with sea ​​cows and sea unicorns. Legends of unicorns came mainly from northern latitudes, from travelers who talked about the existence of an unknown creature with a long horn.

A three-meter process was attributed magical and healing qualities. Therefore, the hunt was open for "unicorns". Animals were killed, and the tusks were sold in the markets. The hunters, blinded by the bait, could not even describe the animals - they paid attention only to the huge horns that could be sold at a profit.

Surely there are such greedy hunters today. But still modern people a better understanding of the value of rare finds, and this inspires hope that if someone manages to find a living or dead inhabitant of the deep sea, unknown to science, such a find will become known to scientists. And then, perhaps, people will learn more about the depths of the sea and their inhabitants.

Sensational reports of unseen sea monsters splash out on the pages of newspapers and magazines from time to time. Occasionally they are illustrated with photographs. But the mysterious creatures don't seem to like being photographed - photos always come out blurry and misty. It was much easier to illustrate such works in the past. To see this, just look at the map. northern seas, compiled in 1572 by Antoine Lafrérie. Comments here are obviously unnecessary.

But here is a post related to late XIX century. The French researcher M. Geerre writes: “In July 1897, the gunboat Avalanche met two snakes 20 meters long and 2-3 meters thick in Along Bay. cannon shot from a distance of 600 meters forced them to hide under water. On February 15, 1898, the same ship and in the same place again met the snakes; a shot followed from a distance of 300 meters, and the ship went forward at full speed, trying to overtake the animals. At the moment when the ship was already quite close to them, one of the monsters dived under the gunboat and emerged behind it. One can imagine the confusion the crew was in at that moment. Nine days later, off the same coast, the "Avalanche" again encountered two such animals. The hunt lasted 35 minutes, but its only result was the coincidence of all observations."

There are many incomprehensible things in this story. Firstly, why each time only the crew of a single gunboat saw snakes, and the crews of other ships were not shown snakes? Secondly, it is difficult to explain the monsters' commitment to a permanent place. Finally, thirdly, their invulnerability is absolutely amazing. A warship at a minimum distance fires artillery at a target, but there are no results. Finding no explanation for the facts cited, M. Geerr points out that "the story of this incident was regarded in the highest instance as a collective hallucination."

The Dutch scientist Oddemansa collected all the information about giant sea snakes. According to him, the first documented meeting of sailors with a huge sea serpent took place in 1522. Over the next three centuries, sailors caught sight of snakes on average once every ten years - by 1802, 28 cases were recorded. But in the 19th century, encounters with sea monsters increased dramatically: between 1802 and 1890, they were seen 134 times! They caught the eye both in the past and in this century. Despite frequent meetings with sea ​​snakes until no one has been able to clearly photograph or film them with a video camera. Mysterious sea monsters with equal success are saved from artillery fire and from the lens directed at them.

Since the monsters refuse to pose, you have to describe them appearance by fleeting observations, often on the basis of information not received from the observer himself. So, in 1926, a certain monster was seen at night off the coast of Madagascar. This is reported in his book "Fishing in Madagascar" French scientist J. Petit. The animal shone with a bright, but fickle light, which flashed on and off. It seemed that this light, which could be compared with a sea searchlight, was emitted by a body rotating around its axis. According to the natives, this animal appears very rarely. Its length is 20-25 meters, the body is wide and flat (which means that in this case we are not talking about a snake!), It is covered with a hard lamellar shell. The tail of the veto is like a shrimp, the mouth is on the belly. The head glows and emits flames as the monster rises to the surface of the sea.

Regarding the presence of limbs, local residents had no consensus: some argued that the "master of the sea" was legless, while others believed that he had limbs similar to "whale flippers". It is extremely rare that a person manages to touch a mysterious creature, or rather, its remains. So, in 1883, a resident of Annam saw and touched the decomposed remains of a sea monster resembling a giant centipede on the shores of Along Bay.

In April 1977, a sensational message about the discovery of Japanese fishermen from the trawler "Tsuyo Maru" went around the world. When fishing for mackerel near New Zealand, the net brought a half-decomposed corpse of an unknown animal. The condition of the find was deplorable. The thirteen-meter carcass, weighing about two tons, spread a stench. The fishermen distinguished a shapeless body with four limbs (either fins or flippers), a long tail and a small head on a thin neck. The prey was measured, photographed, and then had to be thrown overboard. Previously, a part of the best-preserved limb was separated from the body and placed in a freezer.

Controversy erupted around the find. Based on several bad photographs and a description made by fishermen, Professor Yoshinuri Imaitsumi, head of the department of zoology in Japanese national museum Sciences, recognized in the caught animal a plesiosaur - a representative of a long-extinct group of marine reptiles. Plesiosaurs are well known from fossils. mesozoic era. 100-200 million years ago, they, like modern seals, inhabited coastal areas of the sea and could crawl out onto sandbanks, where they rested after hunting. Plesiosaurs, like most other reptiles, were distinguished by a powerful development of the skeleton. Judging by the descriptions of the fishermen from the "Tsuyo Maru" and the photographs, the mysterious animal had no bones. The Parisian paleontologist L. Ginzburg believes that Japanese fishermen recovered from the sea the remains of a giant seal, also extinct, but relatively recently - "only" 20 million years ago. The French scientist came to this conviction on the basis of the shape of the head and the structural features of the vertebrae. However, neither Ginzburg himself nor anyone else saw the latter, because the find was thrown overboard in its entirety.

With such a shaky argument, one must have a lot of courage to insist that the find belongs to plesiosaurs or extinct giant seals. Moreover, there are many skeptical scientists who believe that Japanese fishermen have recovered a half-decomposed corpse of a shark or a small whale from the sea. But there is still an opportunity to judge the find by the structure of that part of the limb that was left in the freezer. Having studied its structure, experts can easily tell who it belongs to: a fish, a reptile or a mammal. A scientific dispute would be settled simply, quickly, and definitively. However, on this occasion, the owners of the fin or flipper still keep stubborn silence.

Why don't they publish the results of the study? The answer to this may be given by the story of another sensational discovery. Here we have a small newspaper note dated 1904: "Unknown animal."

"Santiago, June 18. In the province of Magallanes (Chile), an unknown animal was found washed ashore by the waters of the Pacific Ocean. According to the Chilean newspaper Golpe, it weighs about two tons, has a length of six, and a width of two meters. Two The front fins of the animal, the newspaper points out, are very similar to human hands with five fingers and nails, two rear fins have no fingers. The head of the animal is elongated, the mouth has three large fangs. The animal will be investigated by Chilean scientists."

The reader has the right to expect that the veil of mystery will now fall, and the world will finally be told all the details about a monster with human hands and three huge teeth in its mouth. It wasn't there! As soon as the Chilean, New Zealand or any other similar maritime miracle falls into the hands of scientists, not a trace remains of the myth. In fact, "plesiosaurs" turn out to be either a part of the body of a dead whale, or a shark, or an accumulation of luminous planktonic organisms, or simply a figment of fantasy and optical illusion. No wonder sea monsters do not leave a trace on the film and calmly move away from shells and bullets.

Despite the large number of enthusiasts who really want to believe that individual representatives of long-extinct reptiles are still living their lives in the ocean, not a single reliable information about this has yet been recorded. Even the statistics of Oddemans (over 150 encounters with giant sea snakes) are not supported by any material evidence of the reality of the observations. Such is the practical side of the question of modern sea monsters.

The theory also does not give any reason to hope for the reality of their existence today. No species of animal or plant can exist in a single copy or in a small number of individuals. As soon as the population of a species falls below the critical level, it is doomed to extinction. What is this critical value? For different animals, of course, it is different. According to the "Red Book", by the end of the 20th century, orangutan monkeys are on the verge of extinction, their total strength is equal to 5000 individuals. Specialists in whales and whaling believe that with 2,000 whales blue whale it is still possible to maintain and even restore this species. Science knows only one case of an increase in the number of a species, when it was reduced to 45 individuals. It's about teeth. But this required energetic measures and large expenditures of funds. All animals were placed in nurseries and zoos. Only under these conditions was it possible to increase the herd of bison and release some of the animals back into the protected forests.

But sea ​​monsters no one protects or protects. Therefore, their number must be equal to at least several thousand individuals of each species. Whether they are snakes, plesiosaurs or other reptiles, or giant seals, they need to periodically rise to the surface to breathe. Why are they so rarely seen? Where do their bodies go after death? Why hasn't the sea thrown out a single bone of these monsters so far? The answer to this, to the chagrin of lovers of everything unusual, can only be unambiguous. No giant sea creatures except known to science, not in the ocean. They don't exist, just as they don't exist snowman. Marine plesiosaurs are as unreal as the famous Loch Ness miracle. But you don't have to be completely disappointed. The ocean still holds many secrets. It is home to many unknown and little-known animals, even more amazing than any fantastic monster or extinct reptile. You can see some of them in the photos below.

This unidentified moving object with a diameter of about one and a half meters suddenly appeared in front of the window of a submarine at a depth of 770 meters while examining the outer slope of one of the equatorial Pacific Ocean. The body of the animal emitted a greenish light, the tentacles wriggling vigorously. Isn't it true that it vividly resembles the appearance of a Martian, as described by HG Wells in his novel "The War of the Worlds"? Looking at this fantastic creature, the participants of the dive involuntarily remembered the ancient Greek myth about the glorious hero Perseus and the terrible gorgon Medusa, on whose head instead of hair moved Poisonous snakes. The study of photographs showed that this is indeed a jellyfish, which can be attributed to the scyphoid. Until now, such huge jellyfish have never been in the hands of scientists, they are not in any museum in the world.

An inhabitant of the Antarctic waters is a large predatory seal - sea ​​leopard- feeds mainly on penguins. He either stealthily approaches the floating bird and drags it under the water, or noisily pursues it, raising cascades of spray, and finally catches up with the last long throw. The appearance of this real sea monster speaks of its far from peaceful inclinations. While working in Antarctica, zoologists-scuba divers have repeatedly experienced the increased attention of the leopard seal. Noticing the scuba diver, the beast immediately rushed to him and swam around, gradually narrowing circles, opening his mouth and demonstrating powerful teeth. No means of scaring away the sea leopard worked - they had to get out onto the ice. On the ice, the sea leopard moves with difficulty and therefore is not dangerous.

Every year in October and November, on the sixth night after the full moon, the sea over the coral reefs off the islands of Samoa suddenly boils with the sudden appearance of myriads of worm-like creatures that scurry in all directions. From their abundance sea ​​water becomes like a thick soup with vermicelli. Flocks of fish and sea birds gather for the feast. The Samoans calculate in advance the date of the arrival of the palolo - this is how they call the perpetrators of the sudden transformation of the sea element. For many centuries, palolo has served the natives as a delicacy and everyday food. On these nights, they scoop up prey with baskets and nets, then on the reef they eat live seafood, bake them in leaves and prepare them for the future for the whole year, drying them in the hot tropical sun in the morning. Zoologists know that palolos are modified rear ends of marine polychaete worms. The worms themselves, reaching a length of up to half a meter, cannot be seen, since they live in crevices and caves in the thickness of coral limestone. When spring comes to Samoa, the worms start breeding. The hind ends of the worms, overflowing with sexual products, break off and float to the surface, where the walls of their body soon burst, the germ cells enter the water and are fertilized there. One can only imagine how many of these huge worms, hidden from human eyes, live in the depths of the reef!

Entries from the category "Sea monsters"

People are classified as terrestrial beings, since basically all their activities are connected with land. Therefore, water is fraught with many mysteries and inexplicable phenomena for us. In the water - a completely different world, inaccessible and incomprehensible. Dwelling in the ocean deep sea creatures so different from those that live on earth that they cause ...

Perhaps the most famous sea monster is the kraken. According to legend, he lives off the coast of Norway and Iceland. There are different opinions about what his appearance is. Some describe it as a giant squid, others as an octopus. The first handwritten mention of the kraken can be found in the Danish Bishop Erik...

One of the most ancient sea monsters is giant snakes. The first written mention of them is found in the historical chronicles of the 13th century. But if giant squid can be called a kraken, then analogues of monstrous snakes among the known marine life no. Therefore, scientists tend to consider them fictions ....

Not all sea monsters instill fear in people. There are those who lure people into a deadly trap with their beautiful appearance and charming singing. Such mysterious creatures are mermaids - the heroines of many scary stories and legends. Mermaids are beautiful women with long thick hair and fish...

The sea leaves no one indifferent. Some admire the great and formidable element, others are mortally afraid of it. Sometimes these conflicting feelings get along together. The changing nature of the ocean, its immense size, the incomprehensibility of the depths involuntarily envelop it with mystical mystery. Even today, the most experienced sailors, when it comes to the sea, become a little superstitious. What to say in this case about people ancient world! The sea seemed to them full of secrets, inhabited not only by fish, but also by many sea monsters, ready at any moment to drown a fragile ship and swallow the unfortunate sailors. It is not for nothing that all the peoples inhabiting the sea coast have many myths about the mysterious inhabitants of the sea depths. Many of these legends live on to this day. From time to time, one of the ancient legends suddenly receives new confirmation. Sometimes sailors witness dramatic events in the open ocean - they see giant sea snakes and dragons, either devouring each other, or causing the death of either a person or an entire ship. Sensational reports about this bypass all the newspapers of the world, occasionally they are illustrated with photographs. But the mysterious creatures apparently don't like to be taken - photos always come out blurry and hazy. Such writings have been much better illustrated in the past. To be convinced of this, it is enough to look at the map of the northern seas, compiled in 1572 by Antoine Lafrery. The myths give very colorful descriptions of sea monsters.

Here is how the ancient Roman poet Virgil in his Aeneid sang of the giant sea serpents that killed the Trojan priest Laocoon and his sons:

... two snakes lying on the waters,

Nearby swim and slowly stretch to our shore.

Breasts rose from the waves, bloody crests above the waters

On end; leaving a deep radiant trail behind you,

Tails are beating; unbending, bending, heaving back.

Foaming, the moisture beneath them rustles: they crawl ashore;

Eyes brightly bloodshot and glowing and shining;

With a whistle, nimble stingers lick their open mouths.

(Translated by V. Zhukovsky)

Every visitor to the Hermitage can see images of these giant snakes based on a copy of a sculptural group from the 1st century BC.

Apparently, huge sea snakes were found not only in ancient times. The French researcher M. Geer cites the following interesting fact: “In July 1897, the gunboat Avalanche met two snakes 20 m long and 2-3 m thick in Along Bay. A cannon shot from a distance of 600 m forced them to hide under water. On February 15, 1898, the same ship and in the same place again met the snakes; a shot followed from a distance of 300 m, and the ship went forward at full speed, trying to overtake the animals. At the moment when the ship was already quite close to them, one of the monsters dived under the gunboat and emerged behind it. One can imagine the confusion the crew was in at that moment. Nine days later, off the same coast, Avalanche again met two such animals. The hunt lasted 35 minutes, but its only result was the coincidence of all observations.

There are many things that are not clear in this story. Firstly, why each time only the crew of a single gunboat saw snakes, and the crews of other ships were not shown snakes? Secondly, it is difficult to explain the monsters' commitment to a permanent place. Finally, thirdly, their invulnerability is absolutely amazing. A warship at a minimum distance fires artillery at a target, but there are no results.

Finding no explanation for the facts cited, M. Geer points out that “the story of this incident was regarded in the highest instance as a collective hallucination,” although he himself, apparently, does not quite agree with the opinion of the high naval authorities. After all, the case with "Avalanche" is not the only one. So, the crew of the ship "Polina" in 1875 twice witnessed the battle of a sea snake with a sperm whale, about which the corresponding entries were made in the ship's log on July 8 and 13. There are other known cases of encounters with giant sea snakes.

The Dutch scientist Oddemansa collected all the information about giant sea snakes. According to him, the first documented meeting of sailors with a huge sea serpent took place in 1522. Over the next three centuries, sailors caught sight of snakes on average once every ten years - by 1802, 28 cases were recorded. But in the 19th century, encounters with sea monsters increased dramatically: between 1802 and 1890, they were seen 134 times. They caught my eye in this century. Despite frequent encounters with sea snakes, so far no one has been able to photograph them. Mysterious sea monsters are equally successful in escaping from artillery fire and from the lens directed at them.

Since the monsters refuse to pose, one has to describe their appearance from passing observations, often on the basis of information not received from the observer himself. In 1926, a monster was seen at night off the coast of Madagascar. This is reported in his book "Fishing in Madagascar" French scientist Dr. J. Petit. The animal shone with a bright, but fickle light, which flashed on and off. It seemed that this light, which could be compared with a sea searchlight, was emitted by a body rotating around its axis. According to the natives, this animal appears very rarely. Its length is 2025 meters, the body is wide and flat (which means that in this case we are not talking about a snake), it is covered with a hard lamellar shell. He has a tail like a shrimp, his mouth is on his belly. The head glows and emits flames as the monster rises to the surface of the sea. Regarding the structure of the monster, the locals did not have a consensus. Some claimed that the “master of the sea” was legless, while others believed that he had limbs similar to whale flippers.

It is extremely rare that a person manages to touch a mysterious creature, or rather, its remains. So, in 1883, one resident of Annam not only saw, but also touched the decomposed remains of a sea monster resembling a giant centipede on the shore of Along Bay. In April 1977, a sensational message about the discovery of Japanese fishermen went around the world. When fishing for mackerel on the trawler "Tsuyo Maru" near New Zealand, the net brought a half-decayed corpse of an unknown animal. The thirteen-meter carcass weighing about two tons spread a stench. The fishermen distinguished a shapeless body with four limbs (either fins or flippers), a long tail and a small head on a thin neck. The prey was measured, photographed, and then had to be thrown overboard. Previously, a part of the best-preserved limb was separated from the body and placed in a freezer.

Controversy erupted around the find. Based on several bad photographs and a description made by fishermen, Professor Yoshinuri Imaitsumi, head of the zoology department at the Japan National Science Museum, recognized the fish as a plesiosaur, a member of a long-extinct group of marine reptiles. Plesiosaurs are well known from Mesozoic fossils. 100-200 million years ago, they, like modern seals, inhabited coastal areas of the sea and could crawl out onto sandbanks, where they rested after hunting. Plesiosaurs, like most other reptiles, had a powerful, well-developed skeleton. Judging by the descriptions of the fishermen from the Tsuyo Maru and from the photographs, the mysterious animal had no bones.

Parisian paleontologist L. Ginzburg believes that Japanese fishermen recovered the remains of a giant seal from the sea, also extinct, but relatively recently - "only" 20 million years ago. The French scientist came to this conviction on the basis of the shape of the head and the structural features of the vertebrae. The latter, however, neither L. Ginzburg himself, nor anyone else saw, because the find was thrown overboard entirely. With such a shaky argument, one must have a lot of courage to insist that the find belongs to plesiosaurs or extinct giant seals. Moreover, there are many skeptical scientists who believe that Japanese fishermen recovered from the sea a half-decomposed corpse of a shark or a small whale. But there is still an opportunity to judge the find by the structure of that part of the limb that was delivered in the freezer. Having studied its structure, experts can easily say whether it belongs to a fish, a reptile or a mammal. A scientific dispute would be settled simply, quickly, and definitively. However, on this occasion, the owners of the fin or flipper remain stubbornly silent.

Why don't they publish the results of the study? The answer to this may be given by the story of another sensational discovery. Here we have a small newspaper article dated 1964: "Unknown animal."

“Santiago, June 18 (TASS). In the province of Magallanes (Chile), an unknown animal was found washed ashore by the waters of the Pacific Ocean. According to the Chilean newspaper Golpe, it weighs about two tons, is six meters long and two meters wide. The two front fins of the animal, the newspaper points out, are very similar to human hands with five fingers and nails, the two back fins have no fingers. The animal's head is elongated, with a mouth with three large fangs. The animal will be examined by Chilean scientists."

The reader has the right to expect that now the veil of mystery will fall and the world will finally be told all the details about the monster with human hands and three huge teeth in its mouth. It wasn't there. As soon as a Chilean, New Zealand or any other similar maritime miracle falls into the hands of scientists, there is no trace of the myth. In fact, the "plesiosaurs" turn out to be either a part of the body of a dead whale, or a shark, or an accumulation of luminous planktonic organisms, or simply a figment of fantasy and optical illusion. No wonder sea monsters do not leave a trace on the film and calmly move away from shells and bullets.

Despite the large number of people who really want to believe that individual representatives of long-extinct reptiles are still living their lives in the ocean, not a single reliable information about this has yet been recorded. Even the statistics of Oddemansa (over 150 encounters with giant sea snakes) are not supported by any material evidence of the reality of the observations. This is the factual side of the question of modern sea monsters.

The theory also does not give any reason to hope for the reality of their existence today. No species of animal or plant can exist in a single copy or in a small number of individuals. As soon as the population of a species falls below the critical level, it is doomed to extinction. What is this critical value?

For different animals, of course, it is different. Thus, according to the International Red Book, orangutan monkeys are on the verge of extinction, although at present their number is 5 thousand individuals. Specialists in whales and whaling believe that with 2,000 blue whales, it is still possible to maintain and even restore this species. giant monitor lizard survived on the island of Komodo in the amount of about 300 copies, and its number, despite the conservation measures taken, last years does not increase. Science knows only one case of an increase in the number of a species after only about 45 individuals remained. It's about teeth. But this required energetic measures and large expenditures of funds. All 45 animals were placed in nurseries and zoos. Only under these conditions was it possible to increase the herd of bison and release some of the animals back into the protected forests.

Nobody guards the sea monsters. Therefore, their number must be equal to at least several thousand individuals of each species. Whether they are snakes, plesiosaurs or other reptiles, or giant seals, they need to periodically rise to the surface to breathe. Why are they so rarely seen? Where do their bodies go after death? Why hasn't the sea thrown out a single bone of these monsters so far?

The answer to this, to the chagrin of lovers of everything unusual, can only be unambiguous. There are no giant sea creatures, except those known to science, in the ocean. They do not exist, just as Bigfoot does not exist. Marine plesiosaurs are as unreal as the famous Loch Ness miracle.

But you don't have to be completely disappointed. The ocean holds many secrets. It is inhabited by unknown and little known animals, more amazing than any fantastic monster or extinct reptile. We still have to talk about them, and now let's talk about real marine animals.