Sea Serpent
2 of the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Sea Serpent. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
a more or less hypothetical serpent of great length, thought by some to inhabit the deep sea. There are numerous marine serpents inhabiting tropical waters. They are all venomous. They live on fish, which they pursue in the water. They give birth to their young on rocky shores. So far as scientists are informed, none of these serpents exceed five feet in length. Various rock formations, particularly limestone, once at the bottom of the sea, contain the fossil remains of serpent-like animals up to seventy feet in length. There are numerous seemingly well authenticated reports of huge serpents seen at sea. One was reported off Gloucester, Massachusetts, in 1815 and 1817. Fishermen reported a similar monster off the coast of Norway in 1819, 1822, and 1837. In 1848 a sea serpent was reported by the officers of a British brig off the coast of Africa. It was said to have a diameter of about fifteen inches behind the head, and to have, at a moderate estimate, a length of not less than sixty feet. According to the report given, it passed very near the ship and had the form of a large serpent or eel. Various explanations of these and hundreds of other reports have been given. Tide rows of seaweeds acquire an undulatory motion by reason of the waves, and may be mistaken for sea serpents. Not infrequently schools of porpoises have been seen following each other in single file. At a distance they might be taken very excusably for the successive undulations of a serpent's body. There is also a deep sea fish known from its shape as the ribbon fish. Specimens over twenty feet in length have been cast ashore. Others of much greater length have been observed swimming. The long, slender, eel-shaped shark, known as the basking shark from its habit of basking in the sun, has been observed swimming in pairs one closely behind the other. Without doubt, these subjects furnish the true explanation of a number of sea serpent stories. Scientists are not ready to deny, however, that the deep sea may still shelter a few monstrous serpents similar to those whose fossil remains have been studied.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
the name given to gigantic animals, presumedly of serpentine form, which have been frequently described by sailors and others. Gigantic cuttlefishes, now proved to have a veritable existence, might in many cases imitate an elongated marine form, swimming near the surface of the sea. It is by far the most plausible theory of sea serpent existence to suppose that most. of the animals described are really giant cuttlefishes of the Loligo or squid type. The marine snakes or hydrophidæ of the Indian ocean would also serve to personate the "great unknown" if unusually large.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Aiton's 1910 entry left the door open, saying scientists were "not ready to deny" that the deep sea might shelter monstrous serpents; that door has since closed, and no such animal has ever been found. What was vindicated instead is the guess Collier's made in 1921 about "gigantic cuttlefishes": the giant squid Architeuthis, known then only from carcasses and beaks, was photographed alive in the wild off Japan in 2004 and filmed in its own deep-water habitat in 2012, and an even bulkier relative, the colossal squid, was described in 1925. The other candidates the 1910 writer listed have also firmed up — the ribbon fish, or oarfish, is now confirmed at lengths of over 20 feet and has been filmed swimming, and bloated basking-shark carcasses have repeatedly been mistaken for monsters, most famously the 1977 Japanese trawler catch. Sightings themselves have not stopped; they simply moved from natural history into the fringe field of cryptozoology, given fresh life by the Loch Ness reports that began in 1933.
Written for this edition, 2026.