Books, movies and video games have told us on countless occasions about gods and mythological creatures that lived in the past. Their stories and legends have been narrated throughout generations and thanks to this they have remained alive over the centuries. Among all these beings is the mighty kraken.
Considered one of the biggest, most impressive and fearsome monsters that humanity has come to imagine, this creature belongs to the Norse folklore from the Middle Ages. Whether it is something real or not is something that has been investigated for a long time, but what is its history so that it continues to be talked about after hundreds of years?
One of the deadliest beasts that lived in the depths of the sea
A giant squid capable of swallowing entire ships. That could be the simplified description of what the Kraken was, which was known for attacking ships that dared to sail the seas of Norway, between Iceland and Greenland. Anyone who mustered enough courage for it was unlikely to live to tell the tale.
Such was the power of the Kraken that it is said that with its arms it could hug any ship and destroy them easily. However, in the event that he was not capable of it, he also had the ability to generate a whirlwind so strong that it sank the ships under water and nothing was heard from them again.
Due to its size, it was capable of attacking any ship without problems and swallowing the entire crew to feed itself. Even so, despite the risk of meeting him, there were those who wanted to go after him, especially the most intrepid fishermen, because it was said that when the Kraken emerged from the water, shoals of fish would shoot out, which the fishermen caught in order to become with a huge amount of food.
On the other hand, to put us a little more in situation, the term Kraken comes from cracksan Old Norse word that used to define sea monstersas in present-day German Kraken (the plural of Krake) means octopus.
Its entire history dates back to an account written in 1180 by King Sverre of Norway. In an ancient manuscript it could be read that the Kraken was one of the many sea monsters that inhabited the waters and was said to be colossal in size. In fact, it was so immense that it was compared to an island and it was mentioned that it looked like a giant squid.
Over the centuries, its history did not disappear, but it was not until 1752 when his name became more popular Thanks to the Bishop of Bergen, Erik Ludvigse Pontoppidan, who described it in his account Natural History of Norway, noting that this beast was capable of all of the above. These stories generated great fear among sailors due to sheer ignorance of not knowing what they would find when they left on their trip.
A few decades later, in 1801, the French naturalist Pierre Denys de Montfort He wrote another novel that talked about some of the largest mollusks in the world, including the colossal octopus and the kraken octopus. The story was accompanied by images, which served to put a face on the Kraken, but also by anecdotes that said that this creature had killed a dozen British warships.
However, unfortunately for Montfort, this story ended up being denied because it was actually discovered that the ships were destroyed by a hurricane. As a consequence, his career collapsed completely and he ended up starving in 1820. That does not mean that the Kraken was never talked about again, because its legend gained more weight in 1853 thanks to norwegian naturalist Japetus Steenstrup.
At that moment, he came across a giant cephalopod, which they called Chief architect, on a Danish beach. no doubt it was the largest of all those that had been recorded up to that timesince it had a length of 18 meters counting its long tentacles, something totally out of the ordinary, because most are much smaller.
Likewise, the eyes of the giant squid are considered the largest of all the animals in the world, something that is understandable because it needs them to navigate the dark depths of the ocean, since it is capable of dive to more than 1,100 meters and it is said that it can reach up to 2,000 meters. Despite everything, this animal remains a mystery and very little is known about it, to the point that it is not clear if it is a single type of squid or if there are actually more.
The presence of the Kraken in video games
soap operas like Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seaby Jules Verne, or also workers of the sea, by Victor Hugo, made reference to the Kraken when talking about this famous huge squid that was found. In the cinema he has not been left aside either, hence he has made an appearance in Wrath of the Titans or also in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest.
As for video games, the Kraken has been present in a fairly considerable amount. Some of the most recent examples are in Sea of Thieves when it was added via a free update and could spawn at any time to attack player ships.
Above all, we have been able to see him as the final boss in a few RPGs, including Golden Sun, Final Fantasy, World of Warcraft or Shining Force II, to name a few. In the acclaimed Return of the Obra Dinn he can also be seen in one of the chapters or also as an enemy that bothers Donkey Kong in one of the levels of Donkey Kong Country Returns and Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze.
And someone who also dared to stand up to him was Kratos in God of War II in an epic battle. His presence was very striking, being one of the few creatures that appeared at that time in the saga without having anything to do with Greek mythology. However, now that this has been set in Norse mythology it would be an ideal moment to tear him to pieces again.
As if all of the above were not enough, Kid Icarus: Uprising, Risen 2, Wonder Boy in Monster Land, Tomb Raider: Underworld and even the late Evolve were other games that also remembered the Kraken and decided to include this fearsome monster in some way. Whatever it takes as long as his legend lives on no matter how many years pass.
