Skeptics have long believed that all large animals on Earth have already been discovered, and the statements of cryptozoologists about the real monsters that live in the oceans and are still unknown to scientists are just sensational fictions. However, eyewitness accounts, instrument readings, photographs and videos, as well as the remains of mysterious creatures washed ashore by the waves, suggest otherwise.

Ten tentacles and a powerful beak

It is difficult to imagine a more terrible image than the image of one of these huge monsters hovering in ocean depths, even darker from the inky liquid released by these creatures in huge quantities; it is worth imagining hundreds of bowl-shaped suckers with which its tentacles are equipped, constantly in motion and ready at any moment to cling to anyone and anything ... and in the center of the interweaving of these living traps is a bottomless mouth with a huge hooked beak, ready to tear apart the victim, caught in the tentacles. At the mere thought of this, frost cuts through the skin.

This is how the English sailor and writer Frank T. Bullen described the largest, fastest and most terrible of all invertebrates on the planet - the giant squid.

In ancient times, sailors called these monsters krakens. These terrible creatures have been feared by sailors for several centuries. Sometimes all sorts of fables were told about them, for example, that sailors mistook a kraken resting on the surface of the water for an island, landed on it and woke up a dormant monster. It plunged sharply, and the resulting giant whirlpool pulled the ship into the abyss along with people. Of course, this was a clear exaggeration, but there is no doubt that the krakens actually reach giant size and can be dangerous to humans.

In size, the giant squid is quite comparable to the average sperm whale, with which it often enters into a deadly fight, although it is armed with very sharp teeth. The squid has ten tentacles: eight ordinary ones and two that are much longer than the rest and have something like spatulas at the ends. All tentacles are studded with suckers. The usual tentacles of a giant squid are 3-3.5 meters long, and a pair of the longest stretches up to 15 meters. With long tentacles, the squid pulls prey towards itself and, braiding it with the rest of its limbs, tears it apart with its powerful beak.

Biologist and oceanographer Frederick Aldrich is sure that giant squids even 50 meters long can live at great depths. The scientist points to the fact that all found dead specimens of a giant squid about 15 m long belonged to still young individuals with suckers of five centimeters in diameter, and after all, on many sperm whales, harpooned or thrown ashore by a storm, traces of suckers of 20 centimeters in diameter were found ...

The most terrible collision of a man with a giant squid was written in newspapers in 1874. The steamer Strathoven, heading for Madras, approached the small schooner Pearl, which was rocking on the water. Suddenly, the tentacles of a monstrous squid rose above the sea surface, they grabbed the schooner and dragged her under the water. According to the surviving schooner captain, his crew watched the fight between huge squid and sperm whale. The giants hid in the depths, but after a while the captain noticed that at a small distance from the schooner a huge shadow would rise from the depths. It was a monstrous squid about 30 meters in size. When he approached the schooner, the captain fired a shot at him with a gun, followed by a swift attack of a monster that rammed the schooner and dragged it to the bottom.

Legendary sea ​​serpent

If most scientists no longer doubt the reality of the giant squid, then many of them do not believe in another legendary monster - the Great Sea Serpent. Meanwhile, the first mention of the sea serpent was made two thousand years ago. Since then, the monster has been described more than once by various eyewitnesses in many languages ​​of the world. Of course, many of these testimonies are clearly fiction or exaggeration, but some of the reports are quite reliable.

One of the most reliable reports was received from the sailors of the English ship Daedalus, who west coast On August 6, 1848, Africa noticed a snake-like creature about 30 meters long near the side of the ship. The animal, which was observed for 20 minutes, swam at a speed of about 15 knots. The drawing of one of the Daedalus officers shows an animal with a head in a medium-thick tree trunk, and one of the reports indicates that the monster had long, uneven teeth.

Scientists have already found one candidate for the "title" of the Great Sea Serpent. In 1959, Dutch explorer Anthony Bruun published a description of a 1.8 meter long eel larva caught at a depth of 300 m off the coast of Africa. If the size of an ordinary eel larva is about 3 centimeters, then an almost 2-meter "baby" may well grow into a 20-30-meter monster. Perhaps it was just such a giant eel that was seen and photographed in 1965 by tourists in clear water near the Bolshoy barrier reef. It was a creature 20-25 meters long with a domed head and a body tapering towards the end with a long, whip-like tail. Another creature, which, according to skeptics, can be mistaken for a sea serpent, is the oar king, reaching a length of seven meters or more.

Fantastic monsters of the depths

If someone believes that the mysterious monsters that were observed in the old days in the seas and oceans have not survived to this day, then he is greatly mistaken. So, in the late 80s of the 20th century, sea captain S. Lebedev told the cryptozoologist S. Klumov about a meeting with an unknown large animal in one of the Kuril straits. At first, they wanted to harpoon an unknown animal on the Dolphin whaling ship under the command of S. Lebedev, but its size turned out to be so impressive (the part of the gray back that protruded from the water reached about 15 meters in circumference) that the sailors decided not to risk it.

More recently, Australian scientists conducted a scientific experiment related to the migration along the coast of great white sharks. Suddenly, their thermal sensors, according to Metro, recorded a giant monster at a depth. It swallowed whole a three-meter white shark, nicknamed Alpha, whose movements were recorded by scientists using a GPS navigator and thermal imagers. As the researchers say, science still does not know a creature capable of swallowing such a large prey without tearing it to pieces.

By the way, a megalodon could swallow a three-meter white shark without any problems. This is an ancient shark of the species Carcharodon megalodon, which lived in the seas and oceans 2 million years ago. It is believed that this shark has long since died out, but some researchers doubt this. The fact is that in 1918, Australian lobster fishermen saw a huge white fish 30 meters long. And among the teeth of the megalodon, discovered by oceanologists at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, there was one only 11 thousand years old, by historical standards - completely “fresh”. Based on the discovered remains of an ancient shark, scientists have recreated its appearance. The length of the megalodon reached 25 meters, weight - 100 tons, and the two-meter mouth of the monster was littered with 10-centimeter teeth.

The fact that incredible monsters lurk in the depths is also evidenced by a mysterious sound in the ocean, nicknamed by the Americans Bloop. It was recorded in the ocean by employees of the National Agency for the Study of Oceanic and atmospheric phenomena USA. Amazingly, the sound was so loud that it was picked up by two microphones 3,000 miles apart. According to scientists, all the characteristics of sound indicate that it belongs to a living being. Who so "yells" in the ocean, scientists do not know. None of the creatures known to science is capable of making such an impressive "scream".

For those who still doubt the presence of monsters unknown to scientists in the World Ocean, I advise you to dial in search engine just three words "monsters washed ashore" and see pictures on this topic. You will see many photographs of the most incredible creatures; I think that after this viewing your skepticism will noticeably decrease.

Since time immemorial, the sea has seemed full to man dark secrets, inhabited by various sea monsters that are ready at any moment to drag the ship into the abyss. It is not for nothing that almost all coastal peoples have myths about the mysterious inhabitants of the deep sea. From time to time, some of the ancient legends suddenly receive new confirmation. Even today, sailors sometimes see huge sea monsters, snakes and dragons in the open ocean. Sensational reports of such encounters go around all the newspapers in the world, sometimes they even manage to take a picture of the monster.

Encounters with the sea serpent

1848, August 6 - The frigate of the British Royal Navy "Dedalus" was heading back to Plymouth after a campaign in the East Indies. The ship kept its way to the northeast, in the direction between the cape Good Hope and Saint Helena.

At five o'clock in the evening, the ship's midshipman, noticing an object overboard, reported this to the watch officer. The officer of the watch was on the bridge along with the navigator and the captain. The boatswain's mate and the helmsman were at the helm. The rest of the crew had dinner.

Coming closer, they saw that it was a sea serpent; his head rose above the water surface to a height of 4 feet (1.2 m). The sailors estimated that the length of the monster was approximately at least 60 feet (18.3 m). There were no visible organs for translational movements. The animal was motionless: in appearance, it did not make any movements, despite the fact that it moved at a decent speed - up to 12-15 miles per hour (19-24 km / h). approached the frigate so close that the officers standing on the deck could even see some details.

The neck region, starting just behind the head, was approximately 15 inches (38 cm) long and resembled a snake's neck - dark brown in color, with a yellow-white tint in the throat region. On the back was a noticeable seaweed-colored mane.

On a 50-foot (15.2 m) yacht around the world, English explorer and yachtsman John Ridgway was at sea for about five months. Once, while in the Pacific Ocean, he approached Cape Horn. After a long period of calm water and dense fog, black clouds and high waves appeared ahead of the yacht. Everyone understood: a storm is coming. And at this time some creature swam up from the stern. Team members saw albatrosses and whales and squid glowing at night, but this was something else.

“The ship was traveling at a speed of 9 or 10 knots (16.5-18.4 km / h), and for an animal this is quite a speed, if you also consider that it did not lag behind the yacht for a long time.

Its color was yellowish-brown, and it floated with a noticeable "sinusoidality". The body was very strong, muscular and, being far in the open sea, moved for a long time to high speed through huge waves, appearing here and there. It swam with its head still raised, and I believe that if you mentally continue the neck and torso, you get an ordinary sea serpent.

1942 - Mr. Welsh was on board a military transport ship. He was on lookout watch.

“At a considerable distance from the ship, I saw a large black object. My heart sank into my heels: I mistook it for an enemy submarine, and immediately sounded the alarm - the ringing of the bell was desperately ringing throughout the ship. We had a great time. It was close to panic. The watch officer, after looking through the binoculars, said: “Uh, guys, this is not a submarine at all! I can't figure out what it is at all. Maybe something is just floating on the surface.”

When the ship came closer, we saw what it was - I think the word "monster" to this subject fit better everything: he looked like a snake, a very fat creature - probably as thick as a tree trunk, and up to 20–30 feet (6.1–9.1 m) long, with an arched, in several places, curved back. I didn’t get a good look at the head: it was always obscured by the waves. We continued on our way, and the snake, apparently not paying any attention to us, swam its way and after some time disappeared from sight.

giant squid

2002, July - a giant dead squid weighing 250 kg was found on the beach of Tasmania. After studying his tissues, scientists concluded that he lived in a bay 200 meters deep. Previously, it was believed that the giant squid was a deep-sea animal, because the incident caused a discussion about the reality of legends about huge mollusks sinking ships.

The first evidence of the existence of a giant squid was found in 1856, when the Danish scientist Japetus Steenstrup studied the beak of an individual of this species washed ashore. Since that time, the remains of huge marine animals have been constantly found on the coast or in the stomachs of sperm whales, whose body kept the imprints of huge suckers.

The length of the tentacles found on the coast of the city of Hobart (Australia) squid was more than 15 meters. Zoologists found out that this is a female that swam out in shallow water to lay eggs, and was stranded. It differed from previously discovered giant squids by having long, thin sacs of muscle attached to the base of each of its eight tentacles. This find was the third in Tasmania.

Scientists from Japan managed to shoot a live giant squid on camera just over a decade ago. For this, a special highly sensitive camera and infrared light, invisible to the human eye, were used. 2006 - researchers for the first time managed to catch a living representative of huge mollusks.

Goonch fish

This sea monster lives in the Kali River (between Nepal and India), loves the taste of human meat. Its weight reaches 140 kg. People can be attacked not only in a secluded place, but also with a mass gathering of people. The goonch began to experience this craving for human meat because of ... the customs of the people themselves. Since ancient times, the locals have been using the Kali River for "burials" of the dead. Partially burned bodies are thrown into the river after Hindu rituals.

Legendary Kraken

It is believed that it was the giant squid that served as the prototype legendary kraken- a monster that lives in the ocean, which is able to drag an entire ship to the bottom. As the legends say, he lives off the coast of Norway and Iceland. There are different opinions about what his appearance is. Some describe it as a giant squid, others as an octopus. The first handwritten mention of the kraken can be found with the Danish bishop Eric Pontoppidan, who in 1752 wrote down various oral legends about him. At first, the word “kgake” was used to refer to any deformed animal that was very different from its own kind. Later, it passed into many languages ​​​​and began to mean exactly "the legendary sea monster."

It was truly colossal in size, it was compared to a small island. At the same time, its danger lay precisely in its size and the speed with which the monster sank to the bottom. From this, a strong whirlpool arose, which could destroy the ship. Most of the time, the kraken was in hibernation on seabed, and then a lot of fish swam around him. Some of the fishermen allegedly even took risks and threw their nets right over the sleeping kraken. It is believed that the kraken is responsible for many disasters at sea.

In the XVIII-XIX centuries, some of the zoologists suggested that the kraken could be a giant octopus.

Angler

In the seas and oceans, one of the rarest deep-sea monsters lives, with an ugly appearance - monkfish. The second name is his angler. For the first time, the "monster" was discovered in 1891. The fish does not have scales, ugly growths and bumps grow in its place. The mouth of this monster is surrounded by waving rags of skin resembling algae. Dark coloring adds to the angler inconspicuousness. A huge head and a giant mouth opening make this deep-sea monster the ugliest on our planet.

A fleshy and long process sticking out of the anglerfish's head acts as a bait (fishing rod). This is a very serious danger to fish. Monkfish attract their victims with the light of a "fishing rod", which is equipped with a special gland. He lures her to his mouth, forcing her to swim inside on his own initiative. Anglers are unusually gluttonous. They can attack prey that is many times their size. During an unsuccessful hunt, both die: the victim - from mortal wounds, the aggressor - from suffocation.

Creature El Cuero

According to legend, the waters of Chile and Argentina are inhabited by creatures called El Cuero, which means "skin" in Spanish. El Cuero is something similar to the skin of a huge bull, along the edges of which there are processes that resemble clawed paws or spikes. To determine where the monster's head is, perhaps by the two tentacles sticking out of it, at the ends of which there are red eyes. In the center of the underside of the skin, El Cuero has a mouth that looks like a huge sucker, with which the monster sucks all the juices out of the victim. Most "skins" prefer rivers, ponds and lakes South America, but some of them also live in salty sea water. So, living off the coast of the Chiloe El Cuero archipelago, they usually attack animals, but it also happens that people and boats become their victims.

According to the descriptions, the prototype of this monster was a giant sea devil - the largest stingray in the order of stingrays. The name of this species - manta - echoes one variant of its names El Cuero, manta del Diablo, the literal translation is "devil's blanket". The span of the fins of the sea devil reaches about 7 meters. In fact, the manta ray does not pose a danger to humans, since its interest extends to small fish and plankton. Despite their rather impressive dimensions and weight, which reaches 2 tons, giant stingrays are able to jump out of the water to a height of 1.5 meters.

unknown animal

1977, April - a sensational message spread around the world about the discovery of fishermen from Japan. When fishing for mackerel on the trawler "Tsuyo Maru" near New Zealand, the net brought the half-decayed remains of an unknown creature. A stench spread from a 13-meter carcass weighing up to 2 tons. The fishermen could distinguish a shapeless body with four limbs, a long tail and a small head on a thin neck. The find was measured, photographed, and then thrown overboard. Previously, a part of the best-preserved limb was separated from the body and placed in a freezer.

Controversy erupted around the captured creature. Based on several bad photographs and descriptions of fishermen, Professor Yoshinuri Imaitsumi, head of the zoological department at the Japan National Science Museum, recognized the creature caught in the net as a plesiosaur, a member of a long-extinct group of marine reptiles. Plesiosaurs are well known from fossils. mesozoic era. 100-200 million years ago, they, like modern seals, inhabited coastal marine areas and could crawl out onto sandbars, where they rested after hunting. Plesiosaurs, like most other reptiles, had a powerful, well-developed skeleton. Judging by the descriptions of the fishermen from the Tsuyo Maru and the photographs, the mysterious animal had no bones.

Paleontologist from Paris L. Ginzburg believes that Japanese fishermen got the remains of a giant seal from the sea, which died out 20 million years ago.

sea ​​monk

In the Middle Ages, the inhabitants of Northern Europe often saw humanoid creatures with a fish tail and flippers off the coast. They were called sea monks. The German theologian Konrad von Megenberg noted that the sea monks danced to attract a person to the shore, and he, losing caution, came up to look at the miracle, they grabbed him and devoured him, dragging him to the bottom.

In the middle of the 16th century, one of the sea monks was found on east coast Danish island of Zealand. A strange creature about 1.5 meters long was immediately sent to Copenhagen, where it was sketched by one of the founders of biology, Konrad Gesner. In the 18th century, these drawings were carefully studied by the Danish zoologist Japetus Steenstrup. The zoologist came to the conclusion that the sea monks are nothing more than a ten-tentacled black cuttlefish. In our time, cryptozoologists have suggested that the prototype of the sea monk is a walrus or flat-bodied shark. But the cuttlefish does not have such strength to pull a person under water, the walrus does not eat people, and the flat-bodied shark eats invertebrates and small fish, and is not interested in human meat.

Sea Bishops

There were sea bishops in the Baltic waters. The first mention of this creature dates back to 1433, when the first specimen caught was offered to the Polish king. The priests convinced the king that the animal should be returned to its natural habitat. The bishop fish had a wide fin on its back, which it used instead of a cloak, as well as a crest resembling a bishop's miter on its head. Most likely, the source of this fantasy was the same sea devil.

Speckled stargazer

The representative of Astroscopus guttatus is a real sea monster. The second name of these creatures is the speckled stargazer. At first glance, this nickname fits some small fish with large eyes, but this creature does not fit this description. Having not the most attractive appearance, the speckled stargazer usually lives on the seabed, buried in silt, and watching from below everything that moves nearby. He has special organs above his eyes, from which electrical discharges emanate.

giant centipede

1883 - A resident of Annam discovered the decomposed remains of a sea monster that looked like a giant centipede on the shores of Along Bay.

Iloglot

This creature belongs to the sac-shaped, detachment of ray-finned fish. It lives at great depths. Compared to the huge mouth, the body of the itologlot looks disproportionately small. This fish lacks scales, ribs, swim bladder, pyloric appendages, ventral and caudal fin. Most of skull bones are reduced or disappeared altogether. The preserved skeleton is quite difficult to compare with other fish to establish kinship. The slight similarity between the fry of pouch-shaped eels and leptocephalic eels suggests some " family ties between the mentioned species.

As soon as the horror movie ends, we calm the thumping heart - it's all fiction, it's fake, it doesn't happen in life... Especially for you and only in the deep-sea issue of DARKER, in the arena of the underwater circus of nightmares - real creatures, creatures of the gloomy depths that are waiting your fleshy bodies!

Every time plunging into a pond, the author of these lines panics, he imagines death. Divers-maniacs (a legacy of the "Amsterdam Nightmare" viewed in childhood), algae, wet sliding over the body - the tentacles of an underwater creature, and further and deeper - bloodthirsty sharks are waiting. But summer is coming. Swimming in the city is unbearable. Everyone will take a vacation or go on vacation. Will go to the deep blue sea. When he gets tired of wallowing on the sand, he will dive into the cool waves. And there, and there...

goblin shark

Shark-goblin or scapanorhynchus (lat. Mitsukurina owstoni) is a deep-sea shark, the only representative of the genus shark-goblin or scapanorhynchus (Mitsukurina), singular kind family Scapanorhynchus sharks (Mitsukurinidae). The muzzle ends in a long beak-like outgrowth, and the long jaws can be extended far. The color is close to pink (blood vessels show through the translucent skin). The largest known individual reached a length of 3.8 meters and weighed 210 kg. Found at depths of over 200 m worldwide from Australian Pacific waters to Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic.

Black sea devil

Cerate-shaped or, in a simple way, anglerfish. One of those creatures that you immediately think of when thinking about deep-sea monsters. Creepy grin. Damn flashlight decoy. And the unusual shape of the body is the result of natural deformation: these fish live at great depths: from 1.5 to 3 kilometers. But as soon as they are raised to the surface... they become even uglier: the difference between internal and external pressure inflates their bodies.

giant squid

It was these animals that gave rise to legends about monsters that, with their powerful tentacles, drag sea vessels to the bottom. Frequent characters of old engravings on the marine theme. The inspiration behind the Kraken stories. Long time they were considered mythical creatures. They were first described by the Danish zoologist Japetus Smith Steenstrup in 1857. But it took almost 100 years before their existence was documented by Norwegian researchers. The body of a mighty clam washed ashore. But almost half a century passed, until in 2004 the first pictures were taken by Japanese oceanologists. Giant squids feed on fish, other squids and octopuses. And their only natural enemy... sperm whale! Talk about sunken ships - fairy tales? ..

mantis shrimp

Sea mantis shrimp (Odontodactylus scyllarus) - I want to talk about this amazing animal a little longer. But, I see, he has already taken a fighting stance with his legs. There is a known case when this small (about 20 cm) crayfish broke an aquarium glass with one blow! And unlucky divers, fearing decompression sickness, hurried to surface closer to the hospital - to urgently sew on a finger. But this animal is worthy of the pen of Howard Phillips Lovecraft. Pay attention to his unusual eyes. Marine mantis shrimp distinguishes 12 primary colors, focuses simultaneously on the foreground and background, sees in infrared, ultraviolet spectrum and even in polarized light.

giant isopod

Depth favors size. The force of gravity is compensated by the Archimedean force. That's why there are so many gigantic ones. Isopods or isopods are one of the most numerous and diverse groups of crayfish: from goats to those in the photo, the size of two palms of an adult male. Despite the fact that they are predators, giant isopods usually live in places where conditions do not indulge in good hunting. And therefore, it is worth descending the "ocean manna" in the form of carrion, as a hundred vile arthropods gather around the carcass of a dead whale or shark.

Iloglot

Needletooth

Even though the above image is a computer work by the talented Ajdin Barucija from London, take a look at . Perhaps I will admire the work of an English artist and console myself with the fact that at least it is not real. The long-horned, or common saber-toothed, or needle-toothed (lat. Anoplogaster cornuta) is a predatory fish that lives in tropical and subtropical waters of all oceans. It reaches a length of 15 cm, the weight of an adult is about 120 g. This fish was recognized as one of the most terrible animals. And the ratio of teeth to the body of her fish is the largest.

Sarcastic Bandedhead

Let's try to translate the English Sarcastic fringehead like this. We don’t know who they seemed “sarcastic” to. This fish is extremely aggressive. Defending its territory, it opens its mouth in an unusual, frightening mine. How can I not remember the series. It is worth noting that the imaginary increase in one's own size is a fairly common technique in the animal world. When two “bordered heads” grapple in a struggle for territory or a female, they close their open mouths, as if in passionate kiss. They live in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of North America.

moray eel

Wikipedia

Huge underwater "snakes" fascinate and frighten at the same time. They can grow up to 3 meters and weigh about 50 kilograms. An experienced diver will never get close to a moray eel. Moray eels - predatory fish and extremely dangerous. They attack with lightning speed and furiously. There are cases of people dying from the attack of moray eels. In ancient times, it was believed that their bite is poisonous. After all, with their appearance, moray eels are so reminiscent of snakes. The reality is harsher. In the blink of an eye, a moray eel can tear human flesh so hard that a diver bleeds to death.

Japanese spider crab

The legs of the Japanese spider crab (inhabitant from 150 to 800 meters deep) can reach 3 meters in length. He lives for about 100 years. This means that one individual can terrify several generations of arachnophobes. Still, Ray Bradbury was right in the story "A Matter of Taste" about the planet of huge intelligent spiders:

« - They are our friends!

— Oh my God, yes.

And again tremble, tremble, tremble.

“But we will never get anything done with them. They are just not human.».

Human activities are mainly related to land. That is why everything related to water raises many questions and assumptions. Water is a completely different world, sometimes incomprehensible and very often inaccessible. The creatures that live in the depths of the seas and oceans are so different from those who live on land that they can cause not only surprise, but very often fear.

In ancient times, people were convinced that water was fraught with danger. All these fears and conjectures are reflected in legends and myths.

Despite the fact that a person managed to descend into the Mariana Trench, which is considered the most deep place on the planet, however, he knows next to nothing about the scary and terrible monsters that live at the bottom of the ocean. Sailors often in their stories mentioned sea monsters that dragged large ships under water. On old maps you can see images of giant octopuses, newts, snakes and whales. Myths that talk about sea monsters are found in almost all peoples who have dealt with water. And almost all descriptions indicate that the monsters had lion's mouths, huge tentacles and luminous eyes.

With the beginning of the development of navigation, when people began to travel across the continents, gradually the fear of water disappeared, but stories about sea monsters still arose. Over time, such stories became less and less, but even in the modern world, in the age of scientific progress, such stories are sometimes found.

It should be noted that, as a rule, a wide variety of creatures were mentioned in ancient legends. But to answer the question of whether they really existed, scientists cannot. Some researchers are sure that most of these stories are memories of pterodactyls, dinosaurs and plesiosaurs, who managed to survive until the time of the appearance of man.

Probably one of the most famous ancient sea ​​monsters is Leviathan. This monster can be found in the Old Testament. His description is a mixture of fear and delight. This is a beautiful, proud creature, which at the same time is associated with Satan and inspires fear.

This image appeared in the book of Job, and turned out to be so vivid that the name Leviathan became a household name. A similar character breathing fire is found in many books, films and songs, and even in computer games.

Scientists say that it cannot be ruled out that Leviathan actually existed, since such legends could not be born from scratch, something must have provoked the creators of the Bible to create such an image, some kind of prototype. On the other hand, everything that is written in Holy Scripture cannot be taken literally, because its authors preferred allegory. The authors did not have to meet in real life with a similar monster - it is quite possible that the image of this terrible monster was taken only as an illustration of a certain phenomenon. But the image appeared for a reason, so it could be preceded by meetings with large lizards.

Could it be that the prehistoric monsters that lived in the seas and oceans managed to survive until the appearance of man on the planet and were noticed by him? Such a development of events cannot be ruled out at all. Scientists still have not been able to establish the cause of the disappearance of the ancient giant lizards, so it is impossible that some of them survived and bred offspring. It could also be sea ​​monsters, which, at great depths, could survive those cataclysms that resulted in the death of ancient lizards.

Science does not know what is happening in the depths of the world's oceans, so it cannot be ruled out that ancient lizards can exist even now. They may well occasionally appear on the surface, from time to time meeting with a person. It is also likely that mutants could appear in the depths of the sea, which are equally similar to ancient lizards and modern animals. This, at least, can explain the origin of the legends about creatures of enormous growth that emerge from the depths of the sea and which are called "sea monks."

In medieval legends, there are stories of creatures resembling mermaids. They had a fish tail instead of legs and hands instead of fins. They are often seen on the northern European coasts. The German theologian Megenberg told the legend of the "sea monks" who went to Coast. These creatures danced, attracting the attention of people. The dance was so beautiful and mesmerizing that people lost their vigilance and came very close to these creatures. "Monks" grabbed the unwary and ate them in front of the rest. And in the last century on the territory of Denmark, even managed to find the corpse of the "sea monk". His height was 15 meters. The remains of the creature were sent to Copenhagen, where a sensational statement was made: this creature is an ordinary cuttlefish with ten tentacles.

However, scientists do not exclude that during the Middle Ages, certain types of sharks or walrus representatives could be mistaken for “monks”. True, in this case it is not entirely clear how they could arrange dances on land. Cuttlefish do not have enough strength to drag an adult under water, sharks do not leave the water and react only to the smell of blood, and walruses do not attack people. Therefore, it is quite possible that in the legends we are talking about some animals unknown to modern science.

Another variety of sea monsters became known in 1522, when the Dutch scientist Oddemansa spoke about gigantic snakes that lived deep under water. These monsters were rarely seen by people - in one place they were seen only once every ten years for three centuries. However, since the beginning of the nineteenth century, the number of reported cases has increased dramatically - in one year, this creature appeared to sailors as many as 28 times. Scientists cannot say what caused such activity, but at the same time they suggest that sea creatures simply did not like the presence of ships in the sea.

Already in the last century, these monsters have become less active, although even now there are more than enough stories about giant snakes. The most interesting thing is that none of the eyewitnesses managed to take a picture mysterious creature. Therefore, you can leave an idea of ​​\u200b\u200bhow giant snakes actually looked like only from the stories of sailors.

At the same time, scientists say that in ocean waters in Triassic period there were Tanistofeus lizards, which had a short body and very Long neck. According to paleontologists, these creatures lived on land, but soon moved to the depths of the sea. This lizard can be mistaken for a snake of gigantic size, assuming that these creatures could survive to our time.

In history, legends have been preserved about diving into the depths of the sea of ​​Alexander the Great in a glass barrel. Allegedly, he saw a huge monster at the bottom, which swam around the barrel for three days and three nights. Of course, one can argue about the veracity and originality of this story. Moreover, there are quite a lot of similar legends in ancient texts. So, in particular, ancient texts contain a legend that the Assyrian king Sargan II saw a giant snake. A terrible monster attacked the Roman legionnaires, they used a catapult and killed the monster. It was later skinned and taken to Rome to be shown to the general public. The length of the trophy reached 20 steps.

There are mentions of mysterious sea monsters in Chinese sources. So, in one of the manuscripts dating back to the twelfth century, you can find a story about the existence of a certain dragon. According to the author of the text, he saw the skeleton of this creature in the court pantry. The fins, limbs, torso and tail were completely intact, only the horns were cut off. Outwardly, the skeleton was very reminiscent of dragons, the images of which existed at that time.

The Central African tribe of pygmies still have legends about the terrible monster "mokele-mbembe". According to eyewitnesses, this is a cross between a dragon and an elephant. On the territory of Zambia, according to legend, there lives a creature resembling a dinosaur, which the local population calls the "devourer of hippos." This creature has a neck and head like giant lizard. And the famous hunter Jordan even had to meet him. As the hunter notes, this creature has the body of a hippopotamus covered with bone scales, the head of a crocodile. Interestingly, Jordan's guides fully confirmed his story.

But the head of one of the scientific expeditions, Marcellin Anyana, even managed to film a mysterious animal. It happened on Lake Tele. Three hundred meters from the shore in the water, the scientist saw a snake head on a massive neck. This creature "posed" for about 10 minutes, after which it disappeared into the water. According to Anyanya, this animal is very similar in appearance to the brontosaurus, a gigantic herbivore that became extinct about 70 million years ago.

Relatively recently created in Germany, the deep-sea submersible "Hyfish" almost died after meeting with one of the sea monsters. The device sank in the area Mariana Trench to a depth of about 7 kilometers, but later he could not rise to the surface. Then the hydronauts turned on the thermal imager to see what was preventing the device and were shocked by what they saw: a monster resembling a lizard clung to the body of the device. Fortunately, such an opportunity was foreseen in advance: with the help of an electric gun with a large current charge, we managed to get rid of the monster.

There are many such stories. To explain what kind of creatures they are, and where they came from, modern science cannot yet. From this it follows that in the ocean there are still many mysteries and mysteries that scientists have yet to unravel. Modern science strives for the stars, while the depths of the sea hold no less mysteries than space. Deep sea diving will be full of surprises for a very long time to come. But perhaps someday these mysteries will still be unraveled.

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Depths of the modern World Ocean - scary place, teeming with barracudas, sharks, giant squids and the monster Cthulhu. But whatever creatures we find in sea ​​waters today, none of them compare to the gigantic, fearsome monsters that infested Earth's oceans in the distant past: the gigantic sea ​​lizards, huge sharks and even super predatory whales. For most of these monsters, humans would be nothing more than a snack.

So, before you - the ten most terrible prehistoric underwater monsters that have ever lived in the ocean.

10. Megalodon (Carcharodon megalodon)

This is possibly the most famous underwater prehistoric creature on this list. It's hard to imagine a shark the size of a 10-16 meter truck, but that's exactly what these 40-ton monsters were. Also, entertainment/educational resources like the Discovery Channel love to talk about creatures that look like monsters from horror movies.

Despite the popular belief that megalodons existed at the same time as dinosaurs, they actually lived 25-1.5 million years ago, which means that, at best, they diverged in time from the last dinosaur by 40 million years. On the other hand, this means that they could have existed even when the first people had already appeared on Earth. Ouch!

Megalodons lived in the warm oceans that were around the globe until the last ice age at the beginning of the Pleistocene, as a result of which these creatures probably lost their food and stopped reproducing. Sometimes it seems that nature is covering us.

9. Liopleurodon (Liopleurodon)


If in the movie "Park Jurassic"If there was an underwater scene in which they would show as many animals as possible that lived on our planet at that time, then Liopleurodons would most likely be present in it.

Although the actual length of these animals is still disputed by scientists (some of them claim that this monster was over 15 meters), most agree that they were almost 6 meters long, and about 1.2 meters of them - the head with sharp teeth.

If the mouth of the "smaller" supposed monster is already large enough to eat a whole person, one can imagine the huge mouth of the larger one.


Scientists studied the structure of the flippers of these creatures using small floating robots and found that, although they were not very fast, they were incredibly flexible. In addition, they could also make short, quick and sudden attacks like crocodiles, which does not make them any less intimidating.

8. Basilosaurus (Basilosaurus)


Despite its name and appearance, this is actually not a reptile, but a whale (and not the scariest one on this list). Basilosaurs are the predatory ancestors of modern whales, the length of which reached from 15 to 26 meters!

They are described as the whales most closely related to snakes due to their length and ability to squirm. Imagine swimming in the ocean with an alligator whale that is over 24 meters long! Now, having imagined this, you are unlikely to want to swim in the sea again.

Physical evidence suggests that basilosaurs had neither the cognitive abilities of modern whales nor the ability to echolocate: they could only move in two directions (without swimming in and without jumping out of the water). So these huge whales were dumber than a bag of prehistoric axes, and they would never have been able to chase a man either in water or on land.

7. Jaekelopterus rhenaniae


Agree, there can be nothing comforting in the phrase "sea scorpion", so this creature quite rightly seems creepy and terrible to you. It was one of the two largest arthropods to ever live on Earth, reaching over 2 meters in length as an armored pincer terror.

Most people are already beginning to get scared at the thought of centimeter ants and meter spiders, so it's easy to imagine the scream that would come from a person who accidentally stumbled upon such a creature, if they still lived.


The good news is that sea scorpions (crustacean scorpions) became extinct before the dinosaurs, having been wiped out during the Permian mass extinction (which resulted in 90% of aquatic and terrestrial species animals living on the planet).

Partly managed to survive only horseshoe crabs, which pose a much smaller threat than ordinary crabs. There is no evidence that sea scorpions were venomous, but their tail structure is similar to that of modern scorpions, suggesting that they may well have been venomous.

6. Mauisaurus, a giant genus of the elasmosaur family of the plesiosaur order (Mauisaurus)


The Mauisaurs were named after Maui, the Maori demigod who is said to have pulled the New Zealand Islands from the bottom of the sea with a fishhook, so you guessed these creatures were incredibly huge.

The neck of Mauisaurus reached 15 meters in length: this is the longest neck in proportion to the body of all animals that have ever lived on the planet, with the exception of some species of sauropods (sauropods).

The total body length of this monster was almost 20 meters, and this absurdly long neck had many vertebrae, which suggests that it was flexible. Imagine a snake with the body of a turtle without a shell, and you will have a rough idea of ​​​​what this giant looked like.


Mauisaurs lived during the Cretaceous period, which means that creatures that jumped into the water to avoid meeting with velociraptors and tyrannosaurs had to confront them; The competition for the title of the best has long ended.

As far as science knows, Mauisaurs were endemic to New Zealand, which suggests that the area that once became Australia and its neighbors has always been a land of horror.

5. Dunkleosteus


Dunkleostei were 9-meter carnivorous "tanks". Instead of teeth, they had bone plates, like turtles. It is estimated that their jaw pressure was 55 MPa, placing them on par with crocodiles and tyrannosaurs in terms of having the most powerful jaws in history.

They are also believed to have powerful jaw musculature that could open their mouths in 1/50th of a second, meaning that the stream of water literally sucked their prey inward.


The "teeth" plates changed as the fish's hard, tough jaw evolved into segments that were easier for it to hold on to its prey and were more effective at crushing the shells of other armored fish. In the "arms race" that was the prehistoric ocean, the Dunkleosteus was a predatory supertank.

4. Kronosaurus (Kronosaurus)


Kronosaurus is a short-necked pliosaurus whose length, like Liopleurodon, is a subject of debate in the scientific world. The length of their torso was "only" 9 meters, and the longest tooth in their powerful mouth was 28 centimeters long. That is why these creatures were named after Kronos, the king of the ancient Greek titans.


Guess where kronosaurs lived? If you said that in Australia, then you are attentive (and right). The head of this monster was up to 3 meters in length. They could eat modern man whole, and they would still have room for half of the other.

In addition, it is assumed that, since their swimming membranes are very similar in structure to those of modern sea ​​turtles, they could crawl out onto land to lay their eggs. You can be sure that no one dared to dig up the nests of these animals to feast on their eggs.

3. Helicoprion (Helicoprion)


These sharks could grow up to 5 meters in length, and their lower jaw was shaped like a spiral. It's like a cross between a buzz saw and a shark, and when a super predator pairs up with a powerful power tool, the world shakes in fear.


The teeth of the Helicoprion were serrated (sorry for the tautology), which suggests that they were definitely predators. However, there is controversy as to whether their teeth were in front of the mouth, as shown in the picture, or slightly further back, which would suggest a softer diet, such as eating jellyfish.

However it was set up, it clearly worked. Helicoprions survived the Permian mass extinction, which means that these creatures may have been smart enough to create "bomb shelters" for themselves. Or perhaps they simply lived at great depths.

2. Leviathan Melville (Livyatan melvillei)

Remember we mentioned super predatory whales? This is what he is. Imagine a cross between a killer whale and a sperm whale. Melvilla's Leviathan is a whale that ate other whales!

Its teeth were larger than any other animal that has ever used them for eating (and although elephants have larger tusks, they really only look impressive, and with their help, elephants only break things, but do not eat), reaching an incredible 36 centimeters.

They lived in the same oceans and ate the same food as megalodons, so these whales really had to compete with the largest predatory sharks in history.


Not to mention their head, which was 3 meters long and had the same echolocation "equipment" as modern toothed whales, making them more effective in murky waters.

In case it's not obvious, this animal was named after Leviathan, the giant Biblical sea monster, and Herman Melville, author of Moby Dick, or the White Whale. And if big White whale in the novel was one of Melville's leviathans, he would have eaten the Pequod whaling ship with everyone on board in one crunch.

1. Himantura polylepis stingray

What grows up to 5 meters in diameter, has a 25 cm venomous spike on its tail, and is so strong that it can capsize a boat full of people? In this case, it is a prehistoric superfish that still lurks in fresh and salty waters from the Mekong River to northern australia. giant stingrays appeared there a few million years after the dinosaurs died out, and proved the success of their structure, like the sharks from which they descended.


Giant stingrays use their time-honored build and somehow managed to survive several ice ages and even the catastrophic eruption of the Toba volcano, which occurred about 75 thousand years ago during the last ice age.

These creatures are notorious for being able to pierce a limb (bone) with their neurotoxin-coated spike. The good news is that, for all that, these prehistoric marine