List of giant squid specimens and sightings

It includes animals that were caught by fishermen, found washed ashore, recovered (in whole or in part) from sperm whales and other predatory species, as well as those reliably sighted at sea.

Tales of giant squid have been common among mariners since ancient times, but the animals were long considered mythical and often associated with the kraken of Nordic legend.

[4] The giant squid did not gain widespread scientific acceptance until specimens became available to zoologists in the second half of the 19th century, beginning with the formal naming of Architeuthis dux by Japetus Steenstrup in 1857, from fragmentary Bahamian material collected two years earlier (#14 on this list).

[5][nb 2] In the same work, Steenstrup also named a second species, Architeuthis monachus, based on a preserved beak, the only part saved from a carcass that washed ashore in Denmark in 1853 (#13).

A report of the incident filed by the ship's captain[20] was almost certainly seen by Jules Verne and adapted by him for the description of the monstrous squid in his 1870 novel, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas.

[nb 4] The head and limbs of this latter specimen were famously shown draped over the sponge bath of Moses Harvey, a local clergyman, essayist, and amateur naturalist.

[29] Harvey secured and reported widely on both of these important specimens—as well as numerous others (most notably the Catalina specimen of 1877; #42)—and it was largely through his efforts that giant squid became known to North American and British zoologists.

[30][nb 5] Recognition of Architeuthis as a real animal led to the reappraisal of earlier reports of gigantic tentacled sea creatures, with some of these subsequently being accepted as records of giant squid, the earliest stretching back to at least the 17th century.

[47] Despite these recent advances and the growing number of both specimens and recordings of live animals, the species continues to occupy a unique place in the public imagination.

[48] As Roper et al. (2015:83) wrote: "Few events in the natural world stimulate more excitement and curiosity among scientists and laymen alike than the discovery of a specimen of Architeuthis."

In the 1980s, Aldrich resorted to distributing eye-catching "Wanted" posters offering rewards for "finding and holding" specimens stranded on the Newfoundland coast, "the value being dependent on their condition".

[66] Aldrich (1991:459) wrote that "[s]uch efforts were not futile, for in the intervening years I have secured either the specimens or information on 15 animals", though according to Hoff (2003:85) the rewards went unclaimed.

Largely through Aldrich's efforts, the Marine Sciences Research Laboratory at Logy Bay, Newfoundland, assembled a substantial early collection of giant squid; as of 1971, it held 8 specimens, with the remains of 3 displayed together in a tank by the main entrance.

The purpose-built Museo del Calamar Gigante in Luarca, Spain, had by far the largest collection on public display (4 females and 1 male[68]), but many of the museum's 14 or so total specimens were destroyed during a storm on 2 February 2014.

[71] The exhibition opened its national tour at Yale University's Peabody Museum of Natural History, which has maintained a strong association with the giant squid from the time of the Newfoundland strandings in the 1870s.

Preparations for the Peabody exhibition, overseen by site curator Eric Lazo-Wasem, uncovered giant squid material in the museum's collections that was not previously known to be extant, including original specimens from Addison Emery Verrill's time.

In the late 19th century, the giant squid's popular appeal and desirability to museums—but scarcity of preserved specimens—spawned a long tradition of "life-sized" models that continues to the present day.

[74] Verrill's description of the famous Catalina specimen of 1877 (#42), which he personally examined in New York City the same year, served as the basis for the earliest models.

[78] Following Verrill's design, his draughtsman James Henry Emerton built the very first giant squid model for the Peabody Museum of Natural History in 1883.

[79] A second, near-identical model was soon delivered to the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University, and a third was made for the International Fisheries Exhibition, held in London in 1883.

More recently, concerns about the fire and health risks posed by these substances[nb 8] have led to alternative preservative fluids being explored, such as propylene glycol (#254), glycerol (#495), and the hydrofluoroether Novec 7100.

[89] It is now thought likely that such lengths were achieved by great lengthening of the two long feeding tentacles, analogous to stretching elastic bands, or resulted from inadequate measurement methods such as pacing.

[35] No genetic or physical basis for distinguishing between the named species has been proposed,[101] though specimens from the North Pacific do not appear to reach the maximum dimensions seen in giant squid from other areas.

Earlier efforts to compile a list of all known giant squid encounters throughout history include those of marine writer and artist Richard Ellis.

[nb 12] In addition to these global specimen lists, a number of regional compilations have been published, including Clarke & Robson (1929:156), Rees (1950:39–40) and Collins (1998) for the British Isles; Sivertsen (1955) for Norway; Aldrich (1991) for Newfoundland; Okiyama (1993) for the Sea of Japan; Förch (1998:105–110) for New Zealand; Guerra et al. (2006:258–259) for Asturias, Spain; [TMAG] (2007:18–21) for Tasmania, Australia; and Roper et al. (2015) for the western North Atlantic.

Works exhaustively enumerating all recorded specimens from a particular mass appearance event include those of Verrill (1882c) for Newfoundland in 1870–1881 and Kubodera et al. (2016) for the Sea of Japan in 2014–2015.

Though the number of authenticated giant squid records now runs into the hundreds, individual specimens still generate considerable scientific interest and continue to have scholarly papers unto themselves.

[nb 14] Compositing and other forms of photo manipulation have been used to perpetrate hoaxes involving giant squid and these are occasionally circulated as records of actual news events, often accompanied by fictional background stories.

[163] The earliest surviving records of very large squid date to classical antiquity and the writings of Aristotle, Pliny the Elder,[164] and possibly Antipater of Sidon.

Basque and Portuguese cod fishermen observed what were likely giant squid carcasses in the waters of the Grand Banks of Newfoundland as early as the 16th century,[166] but conclusive evidence is similarly lacking.