Started by War Wager, Aug 07, 2007, 05:08:36 PM
Total Members Voted: 56
Quote from: Still Collating... on Dec 25, 2023, 06:07:42 PMI vote for Local Trouble. Maybe more legendary than mythic, but close enough..
Quote from: WikipediaThe notion that eating its flesh imparts longevity is attached to the legend of the Yao Bikuni [ja] ('eight hundred [year old] Buddhist priestess', cf. §Yao Bikuni)
Quote from: Live ScienceOn Feb. 7, the team finally released its findings in a KUSA statement (translated from Japanese). And what they found out about the mermaid was even more bizarre than expected.The results showed that the mermaid's torso did not belong to a monkey but instead was made predominantly from cloth, paper and cotton that was held together by metal pins running from the neck to lower back. It had also been painted with a paste made from a mix of sand and charcoal. However, the torso was covered in components stripped from other animals. Mammal hair and fish skin, likely from a pufferfish, covered parts of the arms, shoulders, neck and cheeks. The mermaid's jaw and teeth were also likely taken from a predatory fish, and its claws were made from keratin, meaning they likely came from a real but unidentifiable animal.The lower half of the mermaid did come from a fish, likely a species of croaker — a ray-finned fish that makes a croaking sound with its swim bladder, which helps it control its buoyancy.The researchers were not able to identify any complete DNA from the mermaid, but radiocarbon dating of the scales indicated they could date back as far as the early 1800s.The new analysis suggests that the mermaid was most likely created to trick people into believing that Ningyos and their supposed healing abilities were real, researchers wrote. However, it also shows that the tricksters behind the creation also put much more effort into stitching together the counterfeit creature than expected.There are 14 other "mermaids" that have been found in Japan, and the team now hopes to analyze others for comparison.
