The points of resemblance between the northern and most often seen form of the sea-serpent and certain genera…
- Date of account
- Published 1886
- Source
- Mythical Monsters
- Reference
- Mythical Monsters · selected passage 202
- Rights
- public_domain
- Language
- English
- Record updated
- 2026-08-24
Record summary
The points of resemblance between the northern and most often seen form of the sea-serpent and certain genera of the Enaliosaurs, such as Plesiosaurus, are a long swan-like neck, a flattened lizard-like head and progress by means of paddles
Published source text
Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.
Source passage
Source text · mention onlyThe points of resemblance between the northern and most often seen form of the sea-serpent and certain genera of the Enaliosaurs, such as Plesiosaurus, are a long swan-like neck, a flattened lizard-like head and progress by means of paddles. A difficulty in this connection arises, however, in respect to the breathing apparatus. Palæontologists favour the idea that the Plesiosaurus and its allies were air-breathing creatures with long necks, adapted to habitual projection above the surface. Such a construction and habit is, as I have before said, to my mind, impossible in the case of an animal of so scarce an appearance as the sea-serpent; and I am incapable of estimating how far the theory is inflexible in regard to the old forms that I have mentioned. May there not be some large marine form combining some of the characters of the salamander and the saurians; may not the pigmy newt of Europe, the large salamander tenanting the depths of Lake Biwa in Japan, and the famous fossil form, the _Homo Diluvii Testis_ of Sheuzberg, have a marine cousin linking them with the gigantic forms which battled in the Oolitic seas?
Historical context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyThis is a historical compilation of unusual-animal reports and argument. Witness testimony, repetition between publications and the author's zoological assumptions all affect independence and reliability.
Modern context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyLattice compares morphology, behaviour and setting while keeping misidentification, folklore, exaggeration, error and known animals available as alternatives.
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