Creature Chats

Episode 2: The Kraken

• Maisie & Jana • Episode 2

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Today Maisie and Mom discuss our favorite (at least in the top 10) tentacled beast, the Kraken! Give a listen as you learn about the history of the kraken, some of the surprising places it shows up, and how it might be based on a real-life battle sailors would see out on the water!

Make sure to check out our Instagram to see pictures of all the stuff Maisie and Mom are talking about and to keep track of any upcoming hints for new episodes.

You can also email us at mom@creaturechats.com!

Music:

In shadows deep and starlit skies where ancient whispers never die. We walk the paths where legends tread. And summon tales the world once said.

Jana (Mom):

Welcome to Creature Chats, where myth and magic come to life through the eyes of a mother, me, and a daughter. I'm Maisie. And I'm Jana. Each week I'll introduce a mythical creature to Maisie, explore its origins, stories, and secrets.

Maisie:

I'll share my thoughts, ask the weird questions, and maybe even challenge the myth.

Jana (Mom):

So cozy in and join us for a journey into the enchanted forests, misty mountains, and mysterious waters of folklore and the creatures that reside there. How's it going? Good. Are you excited for episode two? I don't know what I don't know what creature it is. I know, that's why it's exciting. Yeah? What do you what what is something that you're hoping to get covered? Unicorn. Really?

Maisie:

Well, one thing. I've gathered up some hints throughout the week.

Jana (Mom):

Oh, you have? So. Tell me about them.

Maisie:

I know it's not a griffin.

Jana (Mom):

Mm-hmm. Correct.

Maisie:

And I feel like it's is it a dragon?

Jana (Mom):

No.

Maisie:

Unicorn?

Jana (Mom):

No.

Maisie:

What is it?

Jana (Mom):

Are you ready to find out?

Maisie:

Yeah.

Jana (Mom):

You don't want to make small talk?

Maisie:

No.

Jana (Mom):

Okay. So today for our second episode, I'm gonna introduce you to the Kraken. Huh. What do you know about a Kraken? It's a giant octopus. Kind of. Yeah, that's what the myth is based on. Do you know anything else about the Kraken?

Maisie:

It destroys a lot, a lot, and a lot, and a lot, and a lot, and a lot. Will we do this for the hep a whole episode and a lot? No. And a lot of ships.

Jana (Mom):

Mm-hmm. It does. Yep. Do you know anything else?

Maisie:

It's a giant octopus.

Jana (Mom):

Yes, we've determined that already.

Maisie:

It's giant octopus.

Jana (Mom):

There you go. Have you heard any legends or seen it anywhere in any sorts of things? D. Okay. Anywhere else? D. Okay. What about dad's tattoo?

Maisie:

Oh yeah.

Jana (Mom):

My dad is like a Yeah, but you've kind of got something. He's got like an octopus taking a ship down, right?

Maisie:

Yeah.

Jana (Mom):

Yeah. So it's something like that.

Maisie:

Wait, no, it's taking a lighthouse down.

Jana (Mom):

No, it's a ship.

Dad:

It's a ship right there on my cap.

Maisie:

Well, the lighthouse right there.

Jana (Mom):

I don't think dad has a lighthouse.

Maisie:

Yeah, he does. It was so big he had to go back.

Dad:

I don't think I have a lighthouse. This is not a great audio medium.

Maisie:

There's no lighthouse. There is a lighthouse.

Dad:

Just to verify, one, it's my body. Two, there's no lighthouse. Yeah, there is. Get back on your microphone, girl.

Jana (Mom):

No. Okay. So the Kraken originates from Norse and Scandinavian mythology. And so you're right. There are it's part giant octopus and part giant squid, is really where it comes from. And sailors up in that area say that it could engulf an entire ship and bring it down because it was so big and powerful. Sometimes it was so big that people would mistake it for an island.

Maisie:

A big purple island?

Jana (Mom):

I mean, we don't know what color it was, but yeah, like it was so big sticking. But it was so big sticking out of the ocean that it would create this like hump and people would think it looks like land, like a land mass.

Maisie:

And like, so like someone's just like, so like a pirate's just like land. Yeah. And then and then there's like doty doty do blah. Bye.

Jana (Mom):

Yeah. And then they would get engulfed in the tentacles and sucked into the ocean. Just like that. Um, so uh the first thing that the first time that they've ever seen writings was in the 13th century, which is like the 1200s. Okay. And it was described then to have many different types of animals or animal shapes, as different from like a snail-like creature to a sea crab, and even to whales. Yeah. A whale? A whale. But the description that we're using today and that people know as when we say kraken is this giant cephalopod creature that has lots of tentacles.

Maisie:

Yeah, that well, well, one thing. If it had like fingers, I would I would not like to be tickled with that.

Jana (Mom):

No, definitely not.

Dad:

You know how many tickles it would give you?

Maisie:

How much?

Dad:

Ten tickles.

Maisie:

Oh boy. Dad. Why? Stop with the dad joke.

Jana (Mom):

Okay. The first time that um it shows up is in the 18th century by a like researcher and writer named Eric Pontopadin. And he recorded that eyewitness accounts of the creature that could create deadly whirlpools with his body. And that's what they that's what they think sometimes would sink ships too, are the whirlpools that go around and around.

Maisie:

Because then the ships is like, oh my goodness, there's a whirlpool. Whirlpool. I can't wear a little pool. There you go. Whirlpool over there, and they're just like, I want to go in it. Little?

Jana (Mom):

No, definitely not. Nobody wants to go in a whirlpool.

Maisie:

I want to.

Jana (Mom):

Unless it's a hot tub. True.

Maisie:

Unless it's a very swirly, whirly hot tub.

Jana (Mom):

Sure. The next writings that we think it came from was another man named Hans, and I'm not pronouncing his last name, and he researched Norwegian informants or people that were sailors on these ships, and they reported that the body of this thing of the Kraken is said to be miles long and sometimes having many heads and claws.

Maisie:

How much heads does a person need?

Jana (Mom):

I don't know. Um, then in 1873, there's writing about men in Newfoundland that were fishing at Conception Bay, and they claim that they saw a large mass that had the beak the size of six, a six-gallon keg.

Maisie:

What is a keg?

Jana (Mom):

Um a keg is like what they hold beer and stuff in.

Maisie:

So I don't even know how to compare that to young people listening to this. So what what would be a keg?

Jana (Mom):

How big would be a keg, Dad?

Dad:

A five-gallon bucket.

Jana (Mom):

Oh.

Maisie:

As big as a game.

Dad:

Because that's a six-gallon barrel, right?

Jana (Mom):

Yeah. Six-gallon keg, yeah.

Dad:

Yeah, so five-gallon bucket.

Jana (Mom):

So like a menards bucket. Saving money and menards.

Dad:

Copyright strike.

Jana (Mom):

And okay, so imagine that something that is just the beak is the size of this like menard slash Home Depot bucket.

Maisie:

Saving money and menard.

Jana (Mom):

And they also said that the tentacles were longer than two men. So imagine dad times two and having it that long.

Maisie:

Because I know my dad is six foot four.

Jana (Mom):

Yes. And that when they went to try to capture this, they tried to cut off some of the tentacles that they saw and sent it in, sent it in to research and turned back, and it came back, that reported that it was real in like a biological sort of way that it exists.

Maisie:

So did they capture it? No. Did they get the tentacles?

Jana (Mom):

They got the tentacles and then sent it in to somewhere in the 1800s and reported back that it was indeed like a real creature.

Maisie:

They could have just well, they could have just grabbed really, really long sausages and molded them into tentacles and then painted them. And then ploppy got science.

Jana (Mom):

I mean, that would be clever, but they've learned that it's has actual cells of like a cephalopod from the ocean.

Maisie:

What's a cephalopodalopod?

Jana (Mom):

Like a squid or an octopus. Something that has arms. So part of the reason why people think Earth may have seen some whales or may have thought it that it was a whale, is because a lot of times giant squid, which is something that people this is kind of maybe based on, we don't know, that giant squid fight whales, like in present day. And so sometimes when people think they see tentacles and a whale together, and then they create this whole creature in their mind.

Maisie:

Well, well, one thing, if you haven't seen a who would win book, there was an octopus versus a blue whale.

Jana (Mom):

So yeah, that's right. There was. But didn't the whale win?

Maisie:

Facts, man. We need you.

Dad:

You need, but we don't want to give people spoilers for the who would win book.

Jana (Mom):

That's true. Go read the book and find out and report back to us. You don't wanna do you wanna know some fun, interesting things that I found? Yes. So the cool thing about the Kraken is a lot of the myths that we're doing or that we talk about. Yeah. Um, are based off of like gods, right? But the Kraken is something Yes. Okay. But the Kraken is what's known as like a force of the natural world, that it wasn't created by gods or fate or anything like that. But it was created by me. Well, it was like created by men. Me. Um, no. Me. Um, so yeah, so it was it's just this like creature that people have discovered that we found that have found to be kind of real in a way, based on like the giant squid, which I think is kind of cool. Real? Mm-hmm. Hence why they sent the tentacles in and found that the there's real biological are the are the those should be in a museum. Maybe they are. I don't know. Fact checker. Do you know what? So a lot of times what people assume the Kraken to be now is it to represent the vast unknown of the ocean. Because think how deep the ocean is. We don't know the majority of the things that are down here.

Maisie:

We haven't explored the whole entire ocean. Exactly. We've only explored like a quarter of it.

Jana (Mom):

Who knows? I don't even know. Like there could be like There could be a Kraken that just lives way deep in the ocean that we still don't know about.

Maisie:

There literally could be a liter there literally could be a dragon underwater. There could be anything. But we've only explored like like a quarter of the ocean.

Jana (Mom):

That's what makes talking about these creatures so cool, is because, like you said in our last episode, myths are often based off of legends or stories or things that people have seen in real life.

Maisie:

I think I said that earlier today.

Jana (Mom):

No, you said that in the last episode.

Maisie:

Okay.

Jana (Mom):

Mm-hmm.

Maisie:

Go watch the last go go watch the last well, I can't say. Go listen to the last episode. Yeah, yeah, go listen to the last episode and find out.

Jana (Mom):

Okay, I'm gonna tell you a little bit more about some of the culture and myths behind the Kraken. Okay. So there's a lot of other writings that have stories about the Kraken. Okay. There's a story that's called 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. Have you heard of that before? No. Okay. Um, it's where a man takes this big uh what would you call it?

Dad:

Uh submarine.

Jana (Mom):

Submarine, thank you. He's named Nemo. Mm-hmm. Look like Nemo? Yeah, his his own. Did they just have as a clownfish? No. This was way before Nemo. Anyways, so his submarine is named the Nautilus, and he takes it down to the depths of the ocean, and they encounter a battle with a kraken.

Maisie:

Well, one thing. There is well one thing. It is impossible to get it all the way down to the bottom of the ocean without it crushing like halfway there.

Jana (Mom):

Yes, in real life, yes, but this was a story.

Maisie:

Oh.

Jana (Mom):

Yeah. Okay. Um, we've seen the Kraken in other writings. We've seen the Kraken in movies, especially Clash of the Titans, is kind of what people are more familiar with.

Music:

Release the Kraken!

Jana (Mom):

And the Pirates of the Caribbean also have a Kraken in it.

Maisie:

And there is a children's book called The Friendly Kraken, I think.

Jana (Mom):

Is there?

Maisie:

Yeah, there is. Okay. That's cool. It's like a happy Kraken book, but everyone thinks he's mean. So, but then he becomes friends with pirates.

Jana (Mom):

Oh, well, that fits. That would be a good story.

Maisie:

No, because it is. Okay. It's actually a really good story.

Jana (Mom):

There's a Kraken that are in video games. And in Game of Thrones, the sigil for um House Greyjoy is also a Kraken.

Maisie:

What is Game of Thrones?

Jana (Mom):

It's a show that a lot of adults watch.

Maisie:

That I can't watch yet?

Jana (Mom):

Nope, not yet.

Maisie:

Okay.

Jana (Mom):

HP Lovecraft, who is an author, based allegedly based like his creature Cthulhu on it, or loosely based on it. Huh? Mm-hmm. Who's Cthulhu? That's for another episode.

Maisie:

It's like a Cthulhu. I can't Cthulhu.

Jana (Mom):

Cthulhu.

Maisie:

Cthulhu.

Jana (Mom):

Yep. Another creature. Yeah, that's for another episode.

Maisie:

It could be next episode. So stay tuned. Yeah. Yeah. It could be next episode. It could be all the way in like our 100th episode.

Jana (Mom):

Mm-hmm.

Maisie:

And even do that.

Jana (Mom):

Maybe. And you know what? The other part that I hear the Kraken about, or like hear about the Kraken, is Seattle's hockey team. They're new and they are called the Kraken.

Maisie:

Well, maybe it's because maybe it's because they have maybe it's because they were born with a million arms.

Jana (Mom):

Uh maybe. That would be that would be really helpful as a goalie in hockey.

Maisie:

I know. Like you just got like Yeah.

Jana (Mom):

No one can get past me. You want to know something cool that I really appreciate about the Kraken? Yes. Like the hockey team. Yes. They have the first female assistant head coach in the entire NHL league. Finally. Right? I really think that all NHL, NFL, all professional teams should be named after mythological creatures. She is um a really big hockey fan. Yeah, but imagine like the Vikings. Well, the Vikings are kind of right there with them.

Maisie:

It's football.

Jana (Mom):

Yeah.

Maisie:

Oh, the Minnesota fat-way, no. The Minnesota Phoenixes.

Jana (Mom):

Yeah.

Maisie:

The Minnesota flamingos.

Jana (Mom):

Flamingos isn't mythological.

Maisie:

Yeah, it is now.

Jana (Mom):

They are a really cool animal.

Maisie:

It's a nine-foot flamingo.

Jana (Mom):

Oh my.

Dad:

I think it would be the Minnesota Harry Men of Virgus.

Jana (Mom):

If you know, you know. What about like the Colorado Griffins?

Maisie:

Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh. Or the or the um or the um the Florida unicorns. No, the Florida vampires.

Jana (Mom):

Ooh, that's yeah, that would be fun.

Maisie:

California.

Jana (Mom):

Pegasi.

Maisie:

No. California Krakens.

Jana (Mom):

Well, we they already have the Krakens, though. Yeah. Um Seattle. Cal uh wait.

Maisie:

Oh, California dragons.

Jana (Mom):

Yeah, that'd be a good one.

Maisie:

Well, it could be a unicorns.

Jana (Mom):

Okay, we'll figure that out later. We have a comment thing, so leave in the comments. Yeah. What are some NHL NFL teams that you would rather have named after mythological creatures? Yeah.

Dad:

You can actually email us at mom at creaturechats.com.

Jana (Mom):

Mom at creaturechats.com.com. Okay, mais summarizes what I found out about the Kraken. What do you think about it?

Maisie:

I really liked all the fun facts you gave me in it.

Jana (Mom):

Yeah.

Maisie:

Yeah.

Dad:

Thank you. A fun item to add from Research Moment. They have two giant squid in the Smithsonian. Um, and there is a female one that is over 25 foot long on display.

Jana (Mom):

I don't remember seeing that.

Dad:

Where is the Natural History Museum? No, it's actually they have a specific C section.

Jana (Mom):

Oh.

Maisie:

Oh. Where's the natural?

Dad:

That's in DC. It's in DC.

Maisie:

We're going to DC.

Jana (Mom):

Some point. Eventually.

Maisie:

Okay.

Jana (Mom):

Some sometime. You know what I thought was really cool? What? I like the stories of when it was people thought it was an island. That it was so big that it was an island.

Maisie:

Yeah, like it was just like a little kid is like says driving the wheels. It's like, oh, a purple island. And they're just like, I can use says to light and then crack and gulp.

Jana (Mom):

Yep. With the big six-gallon beak. That kind of ends the information I had prepared for us. Okay. Do you have anything you wanted to add? It's a giant octopus. Kind of, yeah. So I'm gonna like sign us off with a poem by Lord Tennyson, who is a famous author and yeah, who's a famous author. Okay. And it's called The Kraken. Okay. Okay? Ready? Below the thunders of the upper deep, far, far beneath the abysmal sea, his ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep, the Kraken sleepeth, faintest sunlights flee. About his shadowy sides, above him swell, huge sponges of millennial growth and height, and far away into the sickly light, from many a wondrous grot and secret cell, unnumbered an enormous polypye, Winnow, with giant arms the slumbering green, there hath he lain for ages and will lie, battening upon huge sea worms in his sleep, until the latter fire shall heap the deep, then once by man and angels to be seen, in roaring he shall rise and on the surface die.

Music:

We walk the path where legends tread, and some tells the world once.

Jana (Mom):

Okay, is a poem by Lord Tennyson, who is a famous author, and he wrote a poem specifically entitled The Kraken. Okay.

Maisie:

Can we hear the poem?

Jana (Mom):

Yeah, I was gonna read it.

Maisie:

Okay.

Jana (Mom):

Below the thunders of the upper deep, far, far beneath the abysmal sea, his ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep, the Krapkin sleepeth.

Maisie:

The Krapken?

Dad:

Oh I heard it too, and I had to hold it, and then the team send it, and then I'm just gonna keep going in that. We need how much that's why I don't know what's the hole and I didn't craft it.

Jana (Mom):

That'll be on the bloopers.

Maisie:

Yeah, that'll be on wait, we have a bloopers thing?

Jana (Mom):

Maybe.