A colossal sea creature from medieval Scandinavian legend, often described as a giant squid or octopus capable of swallowing entire ships. Mentioned in Norse texts as early as the 13th century, it embodies sailors' terror of the unfathomable depths of the ocean.
Kraken
Kraken
9 min read
Frequently asked questions
Key Facts
- First written mention in the Konungs skuggsjá (King's Mirror), a 13th-century Norwegian text (around 1250)
- Bishop Erik Pontoppidan describes the Kraken in detail in his Natural History of Norway (1752), presenting it as a real animal
- Alfred Lord Tennyson dedicated a sonnet titled "The Kraken" to the creature in 1830, popularizing it in Romantic culture
- The term "kraken" is likely derived from the Old Norse "kraki", referring to a twisted animal or a gnarled tree
- The discovery of the giant squid (Architeuthis dux) in the 19th century fueled theories about the natural origins of the myth
Works & Achievements
A Norwegian didactic treatise written in Old Norse describing the wonders of the world, including the sea monsters of the north. It is one of the earliest written sources to describe a creature identifiable as the kraken, referred to by the name hafgufa.
An illustrated encyclopedia of the northern peoples published in Rome, which codified and spread Scandinavian sea monster legends across Europe. Its engravings of colossal serpents and sea beasts had a lasting influence on the iconography of the kraken.
A natural history of Norway by the Bishop of Bergen, and the first work to systematically use the term kraken and offer a serious zoological description of it, based on accounts from contemporary sailors.
A Romantic English poem that transforms the kraken into a metaphor for the dormant power of the deep. This work firmly embedded the creature in global literary culture and has inspired countless reinterpretations.
A science fiction novel featuring a battle against a giant squid aboard the Nautilus. Without explicitly naming the kraken, Verne popularized its image for generations of readers around the world.
The first scientific classification of living things, in which Linnaeus briefly included the kraken under the name Microcosmus marinus. This episode symbolizes the blurry boundary between science and myth during the Age of Enlightenment.
Anecdotes
The term 'kraken' first appears in Nordic literature in the 13th century, in the Konungs skuggsjá (The King's Mirror), a Norwegian treatise that describes the creature as a monstrous fish capable of creating deadly whirlpools by diving into the depths. The author includes it among the great wonders of the Norwegian Sea, alongside the hafgufa and the lyngbakr.
In 1755, the bishop and naturalist Erik Pontoppidan devoted several pages of his work Natural History of Norway to the kraken, claiming it was the largest animal in the world. He recorded accounts from Norwegian fishermen who reportedly fished on its back, believing they were on a sandbank, before the creature suddenly dove beneath them. Pontoppidan attempted to reconcile the legend with the naturalist observations of his era.
The Swedish naturalist Carl von Linné briefly listed the kraken in the first edition of his Systema Naturae (1735) under the name Microcosmus marinus, before removing it in subsequent editions. This episode illustrates the difficulty Enlightenment scientists faced in distinguishing myth from zoological reality, at a time when the ocean depths remained entirely unexplored.
The 19th-century discovery of the giant squid (Architeuthis dux) reignited debate about the origins of the kraken myth. Specimens measuring up to 13 meters occasionally washed ashore on Norwegian and Icelandic coasts, providing medieval sailors with tangible evidence of tentacled monsters lurking in the deep. The kraken was thus reinterpreted as an exaggerated memory of real encounters with these giant cephalopods.
In Icelandic tradition, the kraken was sometimes confused with the hafgufa, a creature described in the saga of Örvar-Odd as so enormous it could be mistaken for two islands close together. Sailors who ventured between these supposed landmasses discovered their mistake too late, as the creature closed its flanks around their ships. This image of the island-monster appears in many medieval maritime traditions, from the North Atlantic to the Mediterranean.
Primary Sources
In the Norwegian Sea live two creatures of such size that no one can measure them. One is called hafgufa, the other lyngbakr. The hafgufa is the largest of all sea creatures that live in the waters.
They saw two islands in the sea. Ögmundr Eythjófsbani said: do not sail between them, for these are not islands but the hafgufa, and it would swallow you and your ship.
The kraken is never fully described in size by those who see it: its surface resembles shallow sandbanks, with spines or points emerging from the mud. Fishermen report having fished on its back, believing themselves to be on a reef.
In the northern waters there exists a serpent of extraordinary size and girth, two hundred feet long and twenty feet thick, which dwells in the rocks and caves near Bergen. It emerges at night in summer and devours calves, lambs, and pigs.
Microcosmus marinus: an animal entirely different from all others, inhabiting the deep sea and swallowing other marine creatures.
Key Places
A body of water between Norway, Iceland, and the Faroe Islands, considered the kraken's prime territory. Its extreme depths (down to 3,900 m) and dark waters fueled legends of abyssal monsters.
Norway's main medieval port and center of Hanseatic trade, a departure point for sailors who returned with tales of sea monsters. Olaus Magnus placed sightings of giant marine creatures in these waters.
A volcanic island in the North Atlantic where the principal sagas describing giant sea creatures were written. The Icelandic oral tradition is the primary source of the founding stories behind the kraken myth.
The narrow channel between Sicily and Calabria, identified in antiquity with Charybdis, the whirlpool-monster. This ancient Mediterranean figure, an ancestor of the kraken, illustrates the universal nature of myths about sea monsters that swallow ships whole.
Coastlines where, in the 19th century, several specimens of giant squid (Architeuthis dux) were found washed ashore, providing a real zoological basis for the Scandinavian legend of the kraken.
Typical Objects
A dragon-headed Viking longship, symbol of Norse mastery of the seas. It was precisely this type of vessel that the kraken was said to be capable of swallowing whole, illustrating humanity's vulnerability before the depths of the ocean.
A weighted rope used by medieval sailors to measure water depth. The areas where the line never reached the bottom were exactly those where sailors most feared the presence of the kraken.
Medieval cartographers decorated unexplored ocean regions with sea monsters, including kraken-like creatures. These illustrations expressed both the terror of the unknown void and a warning to navigators venturing into uncharted waters.
According to Pontoppidan, Norwegian fishermen recognized the kraken's presence by miraculously abundant catches — the creature rising from the depths would drive vast schools of fish toward the surface.
Tentacles from giant squid occasionally washed up on Scandinavian shores, providing medieval coastal communities with physical evidence of monstrous sea creatures and directly fueling the legend of the kraken.
A magical Norse symbol worn by sailors to protect against storms and creatures of the deep. Carved onto helmets or ship prows, it embodied protection against the hostile forces of the ocean.
School Curriculum
Vocabulary & Tags
Key Vocabulary
Tags
Lieu
Daily Life
Morning
The kraken is a creature of the abyssal depths, indifferent to the cycles of day and night. According to medieval texts, it spends most of its existence motionless on the seafloor, concealed beneath the appearance of an islet or sandbank, in the total darkness of the great depths of the Norwegian Sea.
Afternoon
During the summer months, when the waters warm slightly, the kraken was said — according to Pontoppidan — to rise toward the surface, drawing around it vast shoals of fish in prodigious quantities. Nordic fishermen interpreted these miraculous abundances as a sign of its nearby presence, and would hasten to leave the area before it dived back down.
Evening
The creature is traditionally associated with night and storms: medieval sailors particularly dreaded moonless nights on the open sea, when a dark islet might turn out to be its back. Its return to the depths created enormous whirlpools capable of pulling ships under — a silent, total death in the darkness of the ocean.
Food
The kraken was said to feed on fish and sea creatures in immense quantities, herding entire shoals toward its maw. Some medieval texts suggest it also consumed ships and their crews, its tentacles seizing everything within reach during its rare surfacings.
Clothing
As a mythological sea creature, the kraken wears no clothing. Its body is described as covered in rough, dark skin dotted with protrusions resembling rocks or coral, allowing it to disguise itself as a stretch of seafloor or a rocky islet.
Housing
The kraken dwells in the deepest abysses of the northern seas, where sailors' sounding lines never reached the bottom. The texts speak of gigantic underwater caverns in the depths of the Norwegian Sea, between the Norwegian and Icelandic coasts, in waters so cold and dark that no human being could survive there.
Historical Timeline
Period Vocabulary
Visual Style
Esthétique inspirée des bestiaires médiévaux nordiques et de la peinture romantique maritime : créature colossale aux tentacules enchevêtrés, palette abyssale, lumière nordique dramatique.
Sound Ambience
Ambiance des profondeurs glaciales de la mer de Norvège médiévale : grondements abyssaux, coque de drakkar qui craque, tempête arctique et terreur des marins face à l'émergence du monstre.
Liens externes & ressources
Références
Œuvres
Konungs skuggsjá (Le Miroir du Roi)
vers 1250
Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus — Olaus Magnus
1555
Naturhistorie af Norge — Erik Pontoppidan
1752
The Kraken — Alfred, Lord Tennyson
1830
Vingt Mille Lieues sous les Mers — Jules Verne
1870
Systema Naturae (1re édition) — Carl von Linné
1735
