Lingyu

Sea Mermaid of Antiquity

Human-faced fish with hands and feet dwelling in the sea, an early Chinese mermaid.

Lingyu is the sea creature of the Inner Northern Sea with a human face, hands and feet on a fish’s body. It is one of the earliest mermaid-like beings in Chinese writing, a dweller of the deep who is almost human — and the ancestor of later tales of mermaids whose tears become pearls.