Six months after Christopher Columbus set sail from Europe across the Atlantic Ocean in hopes of finding a new trade route to Asia, he found himself off of the coast of the Dominican Republic in what would later be called the New World. While Columbus is simultaneously celebrated and vilified for “discovering” the Americas, he does happen to hold a far less controversial milestone: the first to report a real-life mermaid sighting. But as you’re probably aware, Columbus’ mermaid wasn’t a mermaid at all, it was the portly manatee.
In a journal entry, Columbus reported that the mermaids were “not half as beautiful as they are painted,” which may be one of the biggest understatements in history. Columbus isn’t the first sailor who thought a manatee was a mythical creature. Many sailors from around Columbus’ era reported seeing mermaids.