mere + maid

Old English mere meant a body of water — a sea, lake, or pond. Maid comes from mǣden (a young woman, a virgin). A mermaid is a mere-maid: a girl of the water. The word is first recorded in English in the fourteenth century, though the concept is much older. The corresponding 'merman' exists but has always been less popular — mermaids outnumber mermen in folklore by a ratio that suggests the myth is about male sailors projecting femininity onto the ocean.

Mermaid myths appear worldwide. Greek mythology has the Nereids and Sirens (though Sirens were originally bird-women, not fish-women). The Mesopotamian god Ea/Enki was depicted as part fish. The West African water spirit Mami Wata — a figure still worshipped in coastal and diaspora communities — is often depicted as a mermaid. Japanese ningyo are fish-like creatures whose flesh grants immortality. The Caribbean has Lasirèn, a mermaid figure in Haitian Vodou. Every maritime culture, independently, placed human women in the water.

Christopher Columbus reported seeing mermaids off the coast of Hispaniola on January 9, 1493. He wrote: 'They are not as beautiful as they are painted, although to some extent they have a human appearance in the face.' He was almost certainly looking at manatees. The manatee — a large, slow-moving marine mammal with a vaguely humanoid face — has been proposed as the real animal behind many mermaid sightings. The theory is probably correct and deeply unromantic.

Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid (1837) gave the world the version most people know: a mermaid who trades her voice for legs, endures agony, and dissolves into sea foam when the prince marries another woman. Disney's 1989 adaptation removed the suffering and added a happy ending. The Danish fairy tale was about the price of transformation. The American film was about following your heart. The mermaid changed more than her tail.