In the first century, Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder wrote a book called Natural History that would shape European science for centuries. In Natural History, Pliny wrote about half-human, half-fish creatures that he called nereids. Even though these mermaids were part human, Pliny said “the portion of the body that resembles the human figure is still rough all over with scales.”
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Pliny had not seen the nereids himself, but he provided a source for his belief that they were real. One of Emperor Augustus’s military officers in France wrote that he found a pile of nereids “dead upon the sea shore.” Pliny also reported a “sea-man” who climbed onto ships at night and could sink the ship if he stayed on board long enough.
On his first voyage to the Americas, Christopher Columbus claimed to have encountered three mermaids. Columbus spotted the mermaids off the coast of Haiti in January of 1493. He wrote about the mermaids in his travel journal, where he said the mermaids “rose well out of the sea; but they are not as beautiful as they are said to be, for their faces had some masculine traits.”
Apparently, all the European art showing mermaids exaggerated their beauty – just like artists did with Europe's royalty.
These mermaid-like creatures began to appear in Antwerp in the mid-16th century. Sailors called them Jenny Hanivers, and they sold the objects to tourists. The curious name may be an English translation of the French phrase jeune d'Anvers, or young person of Antwerp, where English sailors bought Jenny Hanivers.
For centuries, Jenny Hanivers were visible proof that mermaid-like creatures lived in the ocean. But others saw them as proof of something darker – they were also called devil fish, and one tradition claimed they were enemies of Christ.