Giant squid
Architeuthis dux
— Where the name comes from
Architeuthis joins the Greek archi- (chief, supreme) and teuthís (squid): the “supreme squid”. The epithet dux is Latin for “leader”. The name, coined in the 19th century, tries to give scientific dignity to a creature that for centuries had existed only as the monster of sailors’ tales: the kraken.
— Facts
- Group
- Molluscs · Mollusca
- Order
- Squids
- Habitat
- The deep sea, between 300 and 1,000 metres
- Range
- All oceans, far from the coast
- Size
- Up to 12–13 m including the tentacles
- Diet
- Carnivore — fish and other deep-water squid
- Lifespan
- About 5 years
— Characteristics
- 01
It has the largest eye in the animal kingdom, up to 27 cm: the size of a dinner plate.
- 02
Two long hunting tentacles, armed with toothed suckers, seize prey at a distance.
- 03
Its only known predator is the sperm whale, which carries the marks on its skin.
— What sets it apart
For centuries the giant squid was only the kraken of legend, known to us solely from the remains in sperm whales’ stomachs and from carcasses washed ashore. Nobody had seen one alive in its abyss until 2004, when two Japanese researchers finally photographed one in the depths of the Pacific. Its enormous eye is not there to see more in total darkness, but to make out in time the shadow of the one enemy that counts: a sperm whale on the approach.
