The Kraken — Terror of the Deep — Paranormal History

What Is the Kraken?

The Kraken is a legendary sea monster from Scandinavian folklore — so large it could swallow ships whole and create whirlpools capable of dragging entire vessels beneath the waves. For centuries, sailors in the North Atlantic and Norwegian Sea told stories of an enormous creature lurking beneath the surface, capable of destroying ships with a single swipe of its tentacles. The Kraken was one of the most feared entities in maritime history, a monster so massive that some accounts described it as an island — only for the island to suddenly sink below the water.

The modern understanding of the Kraken is inseparable from the giant squid (Architeuthis dux), a deep-sea creature that was once thought to be purely mythological but has since been confirmed as real. In 2004, Japanese scientists captured the first-ever photographs of a live giant squid in its natural habitat, and in 2012, a team from the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology filmed one swimming at a depth of over 600 meters. The discovery did not confirm the existence of the Kraken in its full mythological glory — no squid has been found that could sink a ship — but it proved that the oceans harbor creatures far more massive and mysterious than anyone had imagined.

History and Legend

Ancient and Medieval Origins

The Kraken legend has roots that stretch back to the earliest days of Scandinavian seafaring. The oldest known reference appears in the Örvar-Odds saga, an Icelandic text from the 13th century, which describes a creature called the “hafgufa” — a massive sea beast that rose from the ocean and created enormous waves. The saga describes the hafgufa as so large that it was often mistaken for an island, and its appearance was a harbinger of storms and destruction.

In 1250, the Norwegian King’s Mirror (Konungs skuggsjá), a treatise on education and etiquette, included a detailed passage about a creature called the “krake” (plural “kraken”) that lived off the coasts of Norway and Iceland. The text described it as larger than an island and warned sailors never to approach it, as the whirlpool it created could swallow any ship that came near. The author recommended that sailors watch the sea for changes in water color — if the water turned red or became unusually turbulent, the Kraken might be surfacing.

Erik Pontoppidan and the Enlightenment

The Kraken entered mainstream European consciousness through the writings of Erik Pontoppidan, the Bishop of Bergen, Norway, who published The Natural History of Norway in 1752. Pontoppidan devoted an entire chapter to the Kraken, compiling sailor testimonies and attempting to give the creature a scientific classification. He described it as “round, flat, and full of arms” — possibly as wide as 1.5 miles across. He warned that the Kraken could pull entire ships to the bottom of the ocean and that the whirlpool it created when diving could be fatal even to the largest vessels.

Pontoppidan’s account became the definitive description of the Kraken for centuries and influenced writers from Jules Verne (who featured a giant squid attack in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea) to Alfred Lord Tennyson (who wrote a sonnet titled “The Kraken” in 1830). The creature became synonymous with the terror of the open ocean, and Pontoppidan’s description — accurate or not — shaped how generations of Europeans imagined the deep sea.

The Giant Squid Connection

Naturalists had long debated whether the Kraken might be based on a real animal. In 1853, a Danish zoologist named Japetus Steenstrup published a paper arguing that the Kraken legend was based on encounters with the giant squid (Architeuthis dux). Steenstrup had studied several large squid specimens washed ashore in Denmark and argued that their size, tentacles, and deep-sea habitat made them a plausible basis for the legend.

Steenstrup’s theory was supported by the discovery of giant squid beaks — hard, parrot-like structures found in the stomachs of sperm whales, which are known predators of giant squid. These beaks confirmed that giant squid existed and were far larger than any known squid species. However, no living giant squid had ever been observed in the wild, and skeptics argued that a creature the size of the Kraken described by Pontoppidan was physically impossible.

Sightings and Evidence

Historical Sightings

Sailor reports of Kraken encounters span centuries. In 1734, a Norwegian missionary named Hans Egede reported seeing a creature off the coast of Greenland that he described as “longer than our church” (approximately 100 feet). The creature had a large, rounded body, long arms, and a spout of water. Egede’s account is considered one of the most detailed historical descriptions of what may have been a giant squid.

In 1783, the crew of a French ship reportedly encountered a creature they described as a “colossal octopus” near the Azores. The creature wrapped its tentacles around the hull, and the crew had to use axes to cut them free. Several crew members were injured in the encounter, and the ship sustained significant damage. The story was published in the Journal of Natural History and contributed to growing scientific interest in large cephalopods.

Throughout the 19th century, giant squid carcasses washed ashore in locations across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. In 1861, the crew of the French naval vessel Alecton encountered a giant squid near the Canary Islands. They attempted to capture it but were only able to retrieve a small piece of flesh. The incident was documented in an official naval report and helped convince the scientific community that giant squid were real.

Modern Evidence

The 2004 photographs captured by Japanese scientists using a baited camera at a depth of 630 meters off the coast of Japan were the first confirmed images of a living giant squid in its natural environment. The squid was approximately 8 meters (26 feet) long — large, but far smaller than the most extravagant Kraken descriptions.

In 2012, the same Japanese team achieved a more spectacular feat: they filmed a giant squid swimming at a depth of 630 meters off the Ogasawara Islands. The footage showed the creature moving gracefully through the water, using its fins for propulsion and its tentacles for steering. The video confirmed that giant squid were not just occasional deep-sea wanderers but active inhabitants of the ocean’s twilight zone.

In 2020, researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) discovered the largest giant squid ever recorded — estimated at over 12 meters (40 feet) — in the waters off the coast of New Zealand. The specimen was captured on deep-sea video and represented a significant increase over previous size estimates.

The Limit of Evidence

Despite these discoveries, no evidence suggests that giant squid grow to the sizes described in Kraken legends — hundreds of feet or even miles across. The largest confirmed giant squid specimens have measured approximately 12-13 meters, which, while enormous, is far short of the Kraken’s legendary proportions. Some researchers argue that the largest specimens may have been fossilized remains of prehistoric cephalopods, which could have grown considerably larger than modern species.

Scientific Analysis

Could a creature like the Kraken exist? The short answer is: not as described, but the ocean is vast and largely unexplored. The giant squid is real, and its existence was confirmed only in the last two decades. The colossal squid (Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni), an even larger species found in Antarctic waters, has been observed only from specimens retrieved from the stomachs of sperm whales. If these creatures exist, the possibility of undiscovered deep-sea species — potentially larger than any known cephalopod — cannot be entirely ruled out.

However, the Kraken as described in legend — a creature capable of sinking ships and creating whirlpools — is almost certainly exaggerated. Giant squid are deep-sea animals that rarely come to the surface, and their anatomy does not support the kind of sustained, destructive behavior described by sailors. The whirlpool creation attributed to the Kraken is more consistent with underwater currents, submarine volcanic activity, or even tidal patterns that early sailors could not explain.

The most likely explanation for the Kraken legend is a combination of factors: occasional encounters with giant squid or other large marine animals, misidentification of natural phenomena (waves, currents, floating debris), and the natural human tendency to embellish dangerous stories to make them more compelling. The deep ocean is genuinely terrifying — dark, cold, and largely inaccessible — and the Kraken gave sailors a face for that terror.

What Do You Think?

The Kraken occupies a unique position in the intersection of myth and science. For centuries, it was dismissed as pure fantasy — a sailor’s tale told to frighten landlubbers. Then giant squid were proven real, and the line between legend and biology became uncomfortably thin. The discovery did not validate the full Kraken myth — no squid has been found that could sink a ship — but it demonstrated that the deep ocean harbors creatures more extraordinary than anyone had imagined.

The Kraken endures because it represents something fundamental about humanity’s relationship with the sea: we know more about the surface of the Moon than we do about the deepest parts of our own oceans. The Kraken is not just a monster — it is a symbol of our ignorance, our fear, and our fascination with what lies beneath.

Summary

The Kraken is a legendary sea monster from Scandinavian folklore, described as a creature so large it could swallow ships whole
The legend dates back to the 13th century and was popularized by Bishop Erik Pontoppidan in 1752
The myth is likely based on encounters with giant squid (Architeuthis dux), which were confirmed as real in 2004 with the first photographs of a living specimen
The largest known giant squid measure approximately 12-13 meters, far smaller than the legendary Kraken, but the deep ocean remains largely unexplored
Bottom line: The Kraken may be the most famous sea monster in history, and its basis in a real, if exaggerated, animal makes it one of the most plausible cryptids ever proposed