The sea monk (also monk-fish or monkfish) was a sea creature found off the eastern coast of the Danish island of Zealand in 1546. It was described as a "fish" that outwardly resembled a human monk in his habit. A 2005 paper concluded that the animal was most likely an angelshark. Names The creature was called "monk fish" () by Belon (1553), and ("fish [wearing] the habit of a monk") by Rondelet (1554). The name "sea monk" () was applied to it by Gesner (1558), and Joannes Sluperius (1572; ; ) as well. History The alleged sea monk was captured at sea between Denmark's Zealand and Sweden, in the strait Øresund, probably in 1546. Christian III of Denmark sent an illustration of it to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor. The creature is recorded in Vedel's Den danske Krønicke (1575) as measuring 4 ells long. It was either caught in a herring net, or stranded, depending on the source. 16th century natural history The capture of the sea-monk is dated to either 1546 or 1549 in 16th century literature, or to both dates, in the case of Lycosthenes (1557), who states both captures occurred near Copenhagen, Denmark. There is also a German woodcut by Stefan Hamer possibly dating to 1546, illustrating the sea-monk caught in Copenhagen in 1546. The sea monk was listed in several illustrated natural history books published in the mid-16th century, such as Pierre Belon (1553), Guillaume Rondelet (1554), and Conrad Gesner (1558). It was described as a "fish" that looked superficially like a monk. Belon (1553) gave a briefer notice on piscis monachus (monk-fish) in his Latin volume, a more expanded account appearing later in his French version of 1555. Rondelet (1554) called it "the fish with the habit of a monk (piscis monachi habitu), and classed it as a merman (homo maris). But he did not think the pictorial representations he obtained could be taken at face value, and suspected they were embellished "by the painter to make the thing seem more marvelous". What prompted his suspicions of artistic license seems to be his discovery of other portrayals of the monkfish, quite different from his own, obtained by his rival and friend Gesner and others in Rome. Rondelet stated that a drawing of it from life (or corpse) was made by an artist in the presence of a certain gentleman, who gave a copy to Charles