Merlion

The Merlion () is the official mascot of Singapore. It is depicted as a mythical creature with the head of a lion and the body of a fish. Being of prominent symbolic nature to Singapore and Singaporeans in general, it is widely used to represent both the city state and its people in sports teams, advertising, branding, tourism and as a national personification.

Key facts

Mythical creature.name: Merlion
Mythical creature.image: Singapore Skyline 2019-10.jpg
Mythical creature.image_size: 250px
Mythical creature.caption: The Merlion Park viewed with the Singapore skyline in the background
Mythical creature.Country: Singapore
Mythical creature.Region: Singapore
Chinese.child: yes
Chinese.s: 鱼尾狮
Chinese.t: 魚尾獅
Chinese.p: Yú wěi shī
Chinese.msa: Singa-Laut
Chinese.tam: மெர்லயன்

via Wikipedia infobox

~14 min read

Encyclopedic overview

16 sections

Contents

History
Incident
Merlion statues
The Merlion in art and popular culture
In music
In film
In TV series
In gaming
In literature
As mascots and performance characters
In local parlance
In sculpture
See also
References
Further reading
External links

The Merlion was first used in Singapore as the logo for the tourism board. Its name combines "mer", meaning the sea, and "lion". The fish body represents Singapore's origin as a fishing village when it was called Temasek, which means "sea town" in Javanese. The lion head represents Singapore's original name—Singapura—meaning "lion city" or "kota singa".

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Merlion” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.