MERMAIDS AND MERMEN, in the folk-lore of England and Scotland, semi-human beings who dwell in the sea, but can live on land and enter into social relations with humans.
The typical mermaid has the head and body of a lovely woman, but below the waist is fashioned like a fish, with scales and fins. For a time a mermaid may become to all appearance an ordinary human being; an Irish legend ("The Overflowing of Lough Neagh and Liban the Mermaid," in Joyce's Old Celtic Romances) repre sents the reverse case.
The mermaid legends of all countries may be grouped as fol lows : (a) "A mermaid or mermaids either voluntarily or under compulsion reveal things that are about to happen." Thus in the Nibelungenlied. (See also Kong Fredericks den andens Kronike, Copenhagen, 168o, p. 302.) (b) "A mermaid imparts supernatural powers to a human being." (See "The Old Man of Cury," in Hunt's Popular Romances of the West of England, 1871.) (c) "A mermaid has some one under her protection and for wrong done to her ward exacts a terrible penalty." (See the "Mermaid's Vengeance" in Hunt's book already quoted.) (d) "A mermaid falls in love with a human being, lives with him as his lawful wife for a time, and then, some compact being unwittingly or intentionally broken by him, departs to her true home in the sea." Here the typical legend is that of Melusine (q.v.), made the subject of a romance by Jean d'Arras: (e) "A mermaid falls in love with a man, and entices him to go to live with her below the sea; or a merman wins the affection or captures the person of an earthborn maiden." This form of legend is very common, and has been a
favourite with poets. Danish ballads are full of the theme ; as "Agnete and the Merman," an antecedent of Matthew Arnold's "Forsaken Merman"; the "Deceitful Merman, or Marstig's Daughter"; and the story of Rosmer Hafmand (No. 49 in Grimm). The mermaid has generally to be bribed or compelled to utter her prophecy or bestow her gifts, and whether as wife or paramour brings disaster in her train. The fish-tail is really of secondary importance, for the true Teutonic mermaid—prob ably a remnant of the great cult of the Vanir—had no fish-tail. The Tritons, the Sirens of classical antiquity, the Phoenician Dagon, and the Chaldaean Oannes are well-known examples. (See also Jones, Traditions of the North American Indians, 183o; Dennis, Folklore of China, 1875.) Quasi-historical instances of the appearance or capture of mer maids are common enough, and serve, with the frequent use of the figure on signboards and coat of arms, to show how thoroughly the myth had taken hold of the popular imagination.
The best account of the mermaid-myth is in Baring-Gould's Myths of the Middle Ages. See also Pontoppidan, who has collected much matter to prove the existence of mermaids; Maillet, Telliamed (Hague, 1755) Grimm, Deutsche Mythologie, i. 404, and Altddn. Heldenlieder (5855) ; Waldron's Description of the Isle of Man.