All aboard, sanguine sailors, and a hearty welcome to today’s chapter of An Assemblage of Grandiose and Bombastic Grandiloquents. You may have guessed that today we are heading to the ocean and exploring the deep blue sea, for today’s word is: manatee.

A manatee is a large, fully aquatic, mostly herbivorous marine mammal, sometimes known as a sea cow, in the kindest way possible, of course. They resemble cows because they are slow plant-eaters, peaceful, and graze on water plants in tropical seas. They are up to four metres in length and 590 kilograms in weight, and spend approximately fifty percent of the day sleeping submerged, surfacing for air regularly at intervals of less than twenty minutes. Amazonian and West African manatees live in freshwater exclusively, whilst the West Indian manatee can move between salt and freshwater. All three of the four classes of manatee that exist today are currently recognised as vulnerable to extinction, largely due to habitat conditions and population growth. 

The history of the word ‘manatee’ is still rather unclear; some believe that it comes from the Spanish ‘manati’ and Carib ‘manattoui’ meaning breast or udder referring to the two teats that the female has under each udder. Another theory is that the word comes from the Latin ‘manatus’ meaning ‘having hands’, because the manatee’s paddle-like flippers often resemble hands. 

The manatee has been linked to folklore on mermaids. Native Americans used to ground the bones of manatees to treat asthma and earache. In West African folklore, they were considered sacred and thought to have been once human, and killing one was taboo and required penance. They are also mentioned in Herman Melville’s ‘Moby Dick’ and distinguished from the whales as ‘lamatins’. Today, many conservationists strive to protect manatees from humans, as they are largely calm, docile creatures that can be injured easily, despite their large size and adorableness. 

Isn’t language wonderful?

Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C Weber

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