Mermaids have long been associated with beauty, music, and much like that of Orpheus, the power of their singing voices had the ability to enthrall. Along with their legendary vanity, the hair-combing and mirrors, the association of mermaids with music is coupled with another association of a vocal nature: they are said to be able to confer verbal eloquence, much like the Muses of the ancient Greek myths. They have at times been seen as inspirational figures. In other tales however, mermaids have also been seen as icons for a sinister or threatening female sexuality.
Anyone have any info on African mermaids or traditions of mermaids derived from Africa? Different from the mermaid tales of Europe or Asia, or basically the same?Jamaica is replete with fishermen's tales of mermaids although I am not sure if they brought it over from Africa themselves or it was passed down from European sailor's tradition esp. English..but a great deal of Jamaican fishermen will tell you they are real.
Here is a relatively recent story
The Mermaid and the Comb
published: Sunday | January 14, 2007
Clarence Chance
Back in 1984 in a sleepy district in western St. Mary, a very strange thing happened. For many years a story had been told about a mermaid and a comb. It was said that for one night out of every year a mermaid would come to the surface of the river, sit on a rock and comb her hair. If that mermaid were frightened she would dive quickly into the river, to her home deep under the river, leaving her golden comb behind. The person who found the comb then would get a dream from the mermaid directing the finder to vast treasures - Spanish treasures which had been looted by pirates and brought deep into the hills of St. Mary. The pirates forgot the hiding place, which, as it stands, is only known by the mermaid.
That was the folklore; the reality was that 15-year-old Elvis Smith's mother had taken ill. It was her kidneys, the doctor said. There was no money for dialysis, and a kidney transplant was out of the question - there was just no money. It was when Elvis saw his mother getting weaker that he thought that the pirate's treasure could save her life. So he determined in his mind that if there were a mermaid he would find her, and if there were a comb he would take it, and if there were pirates' treasure he would find it, for his mother's sake.
Despite his mother's protestations, Elvis built a hut of plywood and zinc just below his house, at the riverside, overlooking a rock. He had picked out that rock because he calculated that if the mermaid surfaced that was where she would sit. There the river was a silent, expansive pool. Further up, the water was fast-moving. It cut into the rocks and cascaded down and down, until it came to a narrow section from where it seemed to just trickle into the pool and become silent. Boys dived under rocks there to catch shrimps, big black shiny ones and small, almost transparent ones. Further down, the river narrowed again and became fast-moving once more. Standing over that section of the river was a massive white concrete bridge, the bridge they said separated St. Mary from St Ann.
So, while everybody in the district celebrated the coming of the New Year that night, Elvis climbed into the little hut he had made. He thought that if the mermaid were real then he would not leave there for a long time, and so he took up residence at night in the little hut. His 12-year-old sister he mandated to care for his mother at night.
Two weeks into his vigil, Pastor Lincoln came to convince him Elvis the mermaid and the comb were only folklore, brought from Africa by slaves and modified through the ages. But Elvis was not convinced. He said, 'If it is a myth, by New Year's Day next year I will know.'
Elvis' cousins and uncles and aunts came to him, telling him to stop the foolishness and go sleep in his bed, but he remained unmoved. When that still didn't work, they destroyed the hut, but he sat in the cool air outside that night, watching and waiting; and when the whole district combined couldn't get him to stop his vigil, they left him alone. Elvis rebuilt his hut and, night after night, waited for the mermaid. But she didn't come. February, March, June, July - no mermaid.
Elvis looked up at the moon and saw that it was almost in the centre of the sky. He thought it might have been up for four hours or so, and by that deduction he surmised that it was around 10 p.m.. It was a cool September night - the frogs were croaking and the crickets were scraping, and Elvis' relentless determination was still intact. He yawned, and was about to go into the hut when he heard a swoosh, then a splash.
Then in the moonlight he saw her. She was seated on the massive stone. Her hair was dark and silky, and as long as China's Great Wall. He couldn't see her face, but her great tail she curled up and rested on the rock too. She was combing her hair.
Elvis thought of running to scream in the district that he had seen the mermaid, but that wouldn't save his mother's life. He thought, 'I will have to frighten her,' so he stole past the star apple tree and floated over the soft mud near the water's edge and shouted, 'River Mumma!'
The mermaid dived quickly into the water and was gone. And there it was, the comb, golden and lovely. The moonlight lent mystery and magic to it.
Elvis was hesitant. Should he take it up? But why not? He had slept in the cold for nine months; why then should he not take it up? And how then would his mother's life be saved? He quickly grabbed it, as if he thought it might disappear, but when he examined it he saw that it was old and ugly and he wondered if it was the right comb. He looked around. Perhaps the golden comb was near him somewhere. But he saw nothing. He went to his little hut, located the bag he had placed there in January for this very purpose, and put the comb in it. Then he climbed the hill to his house, rushed to his mother's room, shook her and said, 'Here it is, Mama; your life will be saved.'
But his mother was groggy and asked: 'What yu talking 'bout, Elvis?'
'Mama, a' find the mermaid's comb, here it is, mama.'
But she turned over onto her side, curling her feet so that knees and elbows almost touched. She clasp both hands and laid her head on them, and quietly said, 'Elvis, a' really feel tired.'
'So you don't believe, Mama?'
By this time his sister had awa- kened and come into the room. To her, Elvis said: 'Here it is, see, the mermaid's comb.' He brought it up to Nicole's eyes for her to see. 'You believe though, Nicole?' And he saw the look in her eyes.
He shook his head disappointedly and said, 'So you don't' believe me either, Nicole.' Finally she asked, 'Where did you get that old comb, Elvis?' She embraced him and said, 'Let us agree that you really tried Elvis. Goodnight.'
His feet felt weak, and his gut had a strange tingle to it. They didn't believe. They just didn't believe. But when he found the treasure they would have to believe!
He went to his bed with great anticipation that night. He fell asleep with a smile on his face, for he had reasoned that that night he would have the dream revealing the place of the buried treasure and his mother and sister would believe.
But that night no dream came. He got out of his bed and dragged himself out to the road and wondered what was happening. He told his cousin about the night's events, and by noon seven or eight boys were at his house demanding to see the mermaid's comb. 'Show wi the comb!'
'Nobody going to see it,' Elvis said
And the boys said, 'Him no have no comb, a' lie him a' tell.'
Elvis thought of rushing to the hiding place to show them he had the comb but one boy said, 'Unno come yaw, a' lie him a' tell.'
That night Elvis went to bed with hope and believed that he would have his dream.
In his dream, he saw the mermaid, her face ugly and scared and angry; he was standing by the river and she was threatening him, telling him that if he didn't return the comb she would wash their house down into the river. And he saw when she dived into the water and lashed her mighty tail against it and the water rose and almost swallowed up the house, and he woke up frightened. In the morning, he rushed down to the river and saw that some of the land had actually washed away.
For a week he had the dream every night. Every morning he would rush down to the river and see that a piece of the land had been washed away. It was then that the people started to wonder: 'Wonder if Elvis really have the mermaid comb fi true?' By the start of the next week they had come to believe, and they started to exhort him to return the comb to the mermaid, and Pastor Lincoln came again to convince him to give back the comb and to save his mother's house. 'Yu father dead lef' that house fi yu mother and it going to be yours when she gone and yu using yu own hands to mash it up, boy? Now, where yu hide the comb?'
Elvis' mother and sister, too, begged him to throw the comb back into the river. But he had one thing to say to them all - that the mermaid had not kept her part of the bargain, and that he was going to keep the comb until she did because his mother's life must be saved.
It was a Sunday afternoon when it happened. The whole district had come to see, 'how the little boy mek mermaid mash up him father dead lef' house.' The men had helped to take the furniture out of the house and Elvis' mother and sister were out there too, watching the last of their house come down. But Elvis was nowhere to be found.
Then the people saw him coming up from somewhere in the bushes. And they said, 'See the fool deh.' Elvis came with the old rusty comb in his hand. And the people said, 'Then is really the comb that?'
Elvis came and stood on the bridge. He held the comb in his hand for a while, then threw it into the river. And the people said: 'It too late fi that.'
And then, with a mighty sound, the house came crumbling down. The debris fell down at the riverside and some of it was washed away.
Then, from close beside Elvis, one little boy shouted, 'Is what that?'
And a man asked, 'What, what?'
'Seet there,' the little boy said, pointing. 'Something like a trunk.'
They saw it and hurried down to the river. It was not one but three chests, and when they finally got an axe to break the chain and opened one chest they held their collective breath - for it was like a dream. In the chest were glorious things, great jewellery and gold and things they didn't know. And the man who had asked the little boy 'what' said, 'The treasure was buried under the house. The mermaid has given us the pirate's treasure.' The people looked at him strangely and he rephrased his statement: 'The mermaid has given Elvis the pirate's treasure.'
Then the people held Elvis aloft and sang 'For he's a jolly good fellow,' and Elvis went to his mother and said: 'Now you can get yu treatment properly, Mama.'
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