Note 211 — XII THE MARVELS OF THE ICELANDIC SEAS: WHALES; THE KRAKEN

The kraken myth probably came to the North with the legend of St. Brendan, an Irish abbot, who was believed to have made a journey into the Atlantic about the middle of the sixth century. The oldest extant form of the legend, the Navigatio Brendani, dates from the eleventh century. For earlier versions of the myth see Nansen, In Northern Mists, II, 234.