I 

 Introduction. 



In the year 1853 Mr. P. Chr. Asbj0rnsen, the celebrated Norwegian poet and naturalist 

 was dredging in the picturesque Hardangerfjord, and obtained here from the great depth of 200 

 fathoms a very remarkable star-like Echinoderm quite unlike all that had hitherto been 

 known. Owing to its highly magnificent appearance, and in the presentiment of its true rela- 

 tion to forms long ago extinct, he applied to it the very characteristic and excellent mytho- 

 logical appellation Brisinga*), derived from „Brising", the breast-ornament of Freya, which 

 according to ancient Norwegian tradition was concealed by Loke in the .abyss of the primi- 

 tive Ocean. In 1856 he announced his important discovery in the 2 d Vol. of Fauna littoralis 

 Norvegise, where the animal in question was briefly described as a new genus and species 

 of A.3teridfe under the denomination of Brisinga enclecacncmos. 



Among the forms of animal life discovered in recent times there are indeed few so 

 highly interesting as this remarkable Star-fish, distinguished alike by its extremely peculiar 

 exterior and brilliant color and by its gigantic size. It exhibits in reality an appearance 

 so totally different from that of all hitherto known forms, that we cannot be surprised, that 

 the authors have been, and still are, in great doubt as to what place in the system it should 

 properly occupy. According to its external form we might be inclined to refer it to the 

 group of Brittle-stars or Ophiurse with which it seems specially to agree in its small circular 

 disc and the enormously prolonged arms or rays issuing from the same; while on the other 

 hand there are important features (such as the deep and wide ambulacral furrows running 



1 With reference to this name the learned Italian professor Sgn. Angelo de Gubernatis says in the 2* Vol. of 

 his „Mytbologie zoologique" pg. 459: .... „En effet, soit qu'on les (les mythes) examine en de'tail, soit qu'on 

 les prenne dans leur ensemble, on est oblige de eonvenir que le ciel est le grand miroir, dans lequel se sont 

 reHetees toutes les images primitives du langage humain. Ce n'est pas par hasard que le celebre conteur et 

 naturaliste Norwegien, V. Chr. Asbjornsen, a donne le nom mythologique de Brisinga a une nouvelle espece 

 d'animal decouverte parlui au fond de la mer du Nord, et offrant une ressemblanee frappante par sa confor- 

 mation avec le soleil, la perle lumineuse, l'anneau magique, qui tombe dans l'eau et que retrouve le poisson 

 mythique II n'y a que les poetes qui soicnt capables de deviner, de saisir d'instinct certaines verites de la 

 science, et Asbjornsen est un grand poetc." 



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