The Legend Of The Kraken Explained

If all those crazy myths, legends, and tall tales are to be believed, going out on the open sea is akin to signing away your life. Now, to be fair, the ocean is a dangerous place full of dangerous things, from sharks to hurricanes, but back in the day, sailors spoke of unfathomable entities and creatures that would send even the bravest person scuttling back from the shoreline.

Perhaps the most terrifying sea monster of all, though, was the kraken. Originating from the frightened whispers of Scandinavian seamen, this tentacled monstrosity was believed to be capable of taking down entire boats in its many-armed embrace. Today, the lore of the kraken has entered popular culture, but these stories have evolved quite a bit over the years, and as time has gone on, a logical explanation for this enduring myth has come to be accepted by most historians and scientists. Was the kraken real? Well, dive in, and discover the truth, but don't forget your life jacket.

So, this kraken business was all a big joke, right? Just a way for Norwegian seamen to tease those on the shore, while sharing drinks and laughing at those ignorant landlubbers? Nope. Just like dragons and unicorns, people genuinely feared the kraken, and when you consider that this was an era before cellphone cameras or Wikipedia, that's not surprising. After all, if you encountered some bizarre craziness out on the sea, you'd be scared, too.

It's hard to say just how many kraken encounters genuinely happened, but at least a few tales from survivors must have turned into local gossip, as those who made it back to shore presumably vented about it at the pub, leading to others whispering about it to their friends ... until finally, academics started writing it all down. According to expert Rodrigo B. Salvador, kraken belief grew so widespread that Carl Linnaeus, the legend of biology, even included a description of the creature in the first edition of Systema naturae, though he called it a Microcosmus marinus. Sounds less scary, with that name. Perhaps the most famous description came from Danish writer Erik Pontoppidan, who wrote how local seamen, "unanimously affirm, without the least variation in their accounts," the very real dangers of the kraken. Similarly, according to the 1833 publication of The Naturalist's Library, "The belief in this monster is, however, universal among the sailors and fishermen of Norwegian coast." So, yes, kraken business was serious business indeed.

It's nice to imagine a streamlined narrative where sailors described a kraken, always called it the same thing, and the creature's overall appearance has been consistent from, oh, the 1100s until today. Like so many mythical creatures, though, the precise details, size, imagery, and even name of the kraken have varied tremendously, with some depictions resembling the original story about as much a banana still resembles a banana after you put it through a blender with chocolate syrup ... or in other words, not really.

Essentially, while the kraken is uniquely ancient — though sea monster myths have always been around, most didn't survive this long — and the stories are relatively consistent, Rodrigo B. Salvador clarified that it wasn't until the 1800s when the kraken was universally accepted as being the cephalopod monstrosity that you know today. While the kraken's immense size has always been part of the mythos, as well as its vicious distaste (or, well, taste) for human ships, its physical appearance used to run the gamut. Some descriptions of the kraken likened it to a lobster-like crustacean. Others described it as a sea serpent, a vaguely humanoid monstrosity, or even just a "misshapen mass," perhaps more Shoggoth than Cthulhu. Similarly, while the name "kraken" is the most common title for the mythical beast, other writers identified it as anything from the super-exciting "Skykraken," to the mundane "Krake," to the bewildering "Crab-Fish." Some, according to the 1833 publication of The Naturalist's Library, called it "Soe-Trolden."

Over the years, legends of the kraken have prominently circulated throughout literature, both of the non-fiction and fiction variety, which has in turn inspired more people to write about it — and thus, has kept the mythology going strong. One piece of kraken-inspired text that never stops circulating among the more monster-enthused literati is the 1830 sonnet by Alfred Lord Tennyson, titled (what else?) "The Kraken," which contains stunning lines like the following: "Unnumbered and enormous polypi/Winnow with giant arms the slumbering green." Perfect? For sure. The kraken was also mentioned in Herman Melville's Moby Dick, and probably influenced the depiction of the giant squid in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

One of the kraken's most significant contributions to popular fiction, though, is that it almost certainly inspired H.P. Lovecraft's creation of Cthulhu, a powerful cosmic being, found out at sea, which basically just uses the kraken's tentacled body for the head of its humanoid, bat-winged body. While Cthulhu's mythos is more elaborate than that of the kraken, seeing as the latter is basically just a sea monster with a big appetite, the parallels are impossible not to see.

The kraken's big screen legacy will probably forever be tied to the 1981 fantasy film Clash of the Titans. What's a Norse creature doing in a movie about Greek mythology, you ask? Who knows, because the film's kraken could be called KINO, or "Kraken In Name Only." This Kraken is said to be one of those titular Titans, and depicted as a towering reptilian humanoid, far more Godzilla than Cthulhu. Nonetheless, the stop motion kraken created by the legendary Ray Harryhausen is so magnificent to behold that you can easily forgive the unfaithfulness to the source. Now, as for why the kraken took the place of Cetus, the sea monster from the original Greek legend? According to James J. Clauss of John Hopkins University, the filmmakers were inspired by the Alfred Lord Tennyson poem, and felt that "as a name for a sea monster, it was too good to miss." Fair enough.

When Clash of the Titans came back around for reboot time in 2010, the kraken also returned, though this later film's depiction tried to meet both ends somewhere in the middle: yes, this kraken is a humanoid/reptile Titan, but it also comes with the tentacle action that kraken purists crave. Arguably the reboot's most significant contribution to kraken lore, as the Daily Dot points out, occurs when Liam Neeson's Zeus lets the sea monster loose, proclaiming (wait for it) ... "Release the Kraken!"

Okay, so why was the kraken such a vicious beast? Was there a curse of some sort, which perhaps once transformed a sailor into a terrible monster? Given that this is Norse mythology, maybe it has something to do with Loki? Nah. According to expert Rodrigo B. Salvador, people generally believed the kraken was just a big animal that liked eating human flesh. What about actual giant squids, though? Once you've accepted the fact that these real-life animals presumably inspired kraken myths, you then have to contend with the notion that your next boating trip might involve a cephalopod attack. Maybe. Or maybe not?

Frankly, giant squids aren't generally known for attacking boats, considering they rarely emerge in the first place. That said, reports of squid aggression are (occasionally) made, though hard to verify. In the aftermath of World War II, according to National Geographic, a group of shipwrecked sailors claimed to have been attacked by a giant squid, even stating that the animal devoured one of their companions. In 2003, then, French yachtsman claimed that a giant squid clung onto their boat. Similarly, according to the Guardian, there have been many descriptions of the Humboldt squid, nicknamed the "red devils," as being prone to aggression, though this later breed of squid is not quite as large as its giant cousin, as they only tend to grow about six feet long. Not that a hostile, human-sized squid is particularly less scary than a giant one, but hey.

These days, kraken imagery is tied almost exclusively to giant squids, to the point where it isn't uncommon to simply see the real animals referred to as the kraken. A quick Google search for "kraken" will bring up loads of giant squid images and headlines, and in a way, this is a nice form of vindication for the mythical beast: if anyone in the 1800s ever doubted those sailors, oh boy, they're hearing about it now. Or not, because they died a long time ago, but you get the idea.

Clash of the Titans aside, the kraken's tentacles have only gotten more and more tangled into popular culture. To date, the kraken's most impressive (and accurate) film appearance was probably an epic take-down scene in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, though the creature has also appeared in goofy B-movies like 2006's Kraken: Tentacles of the Deep. There is a Kraken roller coaster at SeaWorld, and since 2011, Kraken has also lent its name to a form of cryptocurrency, for those who thought Dogecoin wasn't cool enough. Meanwhile, if you wanted to inject some tentacles into your next party, there are a number of kraken-themed beers out there, and your next Halloween party would be ideally served by some Kraken Black Spiced Rum, the liquor with the most badass label of all-time. So the real kraken might not sink ships, but if you drink enough Kraken rum, it'll definitely sink you.