The One Thousand and One Nights includes several tales featuring “Sea People”, such as Djullanar the Sea-girl. Unlike the depiction in other mythologies, these are anatomically identical to land-bound humans, differing only in their ability to breathe and live underwater. They can (and do) interbreed with land humans, the children of such unions sharing in the ability to live underwater.

In “The Adventures of Bulukiya”, the protagonist Bulukiya’s quest for the herb of immortality leads him to explore the seas, where he encounters societies of mermaids. “Julnar the Sea-Born and Her Son King Badr Basim of Persia” is yet another Arabian Nights tale about mermaids.When sailors come the mermaids sing, and some men are led straight to their doom. If they follow the mermaids’ lovely and beautiful voices, they do not know what they are doing or where they’re going.