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{{trope|wppage=Aspidochelone}}
[[File:IslandTurtlePSV-EN-
Mythical creatures of mystery: Fish, whales, or turtles (there's a definite preference for [[Turtle Power|turtles]] over any other animal) big enough to be mistaken for islands or even continents have shown up in [[Myth and Legend]] for thousands of years. They are often portrayed as being ''so'' large and ancient that soil and plantlife have grown on its back, sometimes ancient species containing something so rare that the hero (or villain) must marvel at it or try to obtain it. Often the hero gets only a brief opportunity to marvel at its existence, before it decides to set out and dive deep underwater, leaving the protagonist high and dry (or wet and drowning if he doesn't manage to get off in time). [[Fridge Logic|How the fauna and flora on its back can survive and grow when it frequently dives underwater is rarely addressed]].
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If [[This Island Earth|Earth]] is one of these, there's a [[Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress|good chance]] it's [[Turtles All the Way Down]].
{{examples|Examples}}▼
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* In ''[[
* El Doradimon from ''[[Digimon Savers]]'' is one of these.
** ''[[Digimon Tamers]]'' has Ebonwumon (aka Xuanwumon). He's got two heads that speak independently. And is a god. And is freakin' awesome.
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* [[Kurohime|Genbu]] is a [[The Four Gods|Spirit King]] who occasionally tromps around a nearby continent and is covered in ogres. He's also a [[Grumpy Old Man]].
== [[Comic Books]] ==
== Card Games ==▼
* Pictured above is the ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh Card Game|Yu-Gi-Oh]]'' card [http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Island_Turtle Island Turtle].▼
* In ''[[Magi Nation]]'', the underwater civilization of Orothe builds some of their cities on the backs of giant sea turtles, as seen [http://bluefurok.com/BSImages/Giant_Parathin.jpg here]. They're mostly mermaids and the turtles themselves usually stay submerged.▼
* ''[[Magic the Gathering]]'' has the [http://ww2.wizards.com/gatherer/CardDetails.aspx?&id=1203 Island Fish Jasconius], based on the fish from Saint Brendan's legend under Mythology.▼
== Comics ==▼
* ''[[The Authority]]'': Infinite City, the place where all the Jenny incarnations that have passed are placed, is a city on the back of a giant turtle.
* In the ''[[Lanfeust]]'' comic book series, {{spoiler|the Magohamoth}} isn't exactly a turtle, and it's intelligent and speaks to people telepathically, but it fits this trope otherwise. The protagonists follow its trail to an island off the coast of a river delta, and after some bizarre hallucinations we get a [[Distant Reaction Shot]], and the entire island is what they were looking for. Below the waterline it looks sort of like a manatee. With a volcano on its back.
== [[Film]] - Animated ==
* In ''[[Aladdin (Disney film)|Aladdin]] and the King of Thieves'', the [[MacGuffin]] is on one of these, called "The Vanishing Isle".▼
==
▲* In ''[[Aladdin (Disney)|Aladdin]] and the King of Thieves'', the [[MacGuffin]] is on one of these, called "The Vanishing Isle".
* Happens in the first of the 1990s ''[[Gamera]]'' movies.
* In the 1984 fantasy classic, ''[[The Neverending Story (
== [[Literature]] ==▼
* Taken to extremes in ''[[
▲== Literature ==
** There's also a parody in ''[[
▲* Taken to extremes in ''[[Discworld (Literature)|Discworld]]'': the Great A'tuin the star turtle carries four less-giant elephants on its back, who in turn carry the Discworld itself on their backs, and swims through space. A Turtle Planet, if you like.
* In [[
▲** There's also a parody in ''[[Discworld (Literature)/Jingo|Jingo]]'': Leonard dismisses sailors' tales about giant turtles being mistaken for islands as obvious myths, on the grounds that "you don't get giant turtles that small".
▲* In [[JRR Tolkien (Creator)|JRR Tolkien]]'s ''The Adventures of Tom Bombadil'', there is a hobbit rhyme about "Fastitocalon," a giant turtle mistaken for an island. Tolkien got the name from an Anglo-Saxon verse bestiary; it was a distortion of the Greek "aspidochelone"="Shield-Turtle."
* A humongous ''sea snail'' in one of the later ''[[Doctor Dolittle]]'' books.
* Larry Niven made a reference to this in ''The Ringworld Engineers'', where Louis Wu discounted tales of such creatures, knowing the same stories had been told speciously by Earth sailors. Of course, the Great Ocean on Ringworld is ''many thousands of times bigger'' than the puny little puddles on Earth, so it's not wholly unexpected when it's confirmed such "islandfish" really ''do'' exist there.
* ''[[The Neverending Story (
* ''Hungry Kid Island'' by [[Shel Silverstein]], about an island that's [[Exactly What It Says
{{quote|
Way out in the shimmerin' sea.
There's probably hungry kids out there
Who'll share my lunch with me.
But why call it Hungry Kid Island?
There's no kids around that I see,
So I'm goin' to Hungry Kid Island
To solve this mystery. }}
* There's a
* Near the end of ''Abarat: Days of Magic, Nights of War'' Candy Quakenbush washes up on the shores of an island and happily dozes. The island is not actually a turtle, but another kind of creature entirely, with a tree and other foliage growing straight out of its back. Interestingly, Candy first realizes she must be on a creature instead of an island because real islands in the Abarat are frozen at a single hour of the day, and she notices that the light has changed since she washed ashore.
* The trope is referenced in [[Star Trek: Titan]]: ''Over a Torrent Sea'', when the characters observe floating "islands" in the ocean of planet Droplet. Torvig asks a Chelon crewman (as the name suggests, Chelon are turtle-men) if they're relatives of his.
* ''[[
== [[Music]] ==▼
* The Italian singer, Ligabue, had a
== [[Oral Tradition]], [[Folklore]], Myths and Legends ==
▲== Music ==
* Mythologies from around the world came up with the idea of Earth as the body of a large creature, sometimes called a [[World Turtle]], often swimming in a cosmic ocean that predates the Earth, with the sky as another ocean above the firmament of stars.▼
▲* The Italian singer, Ligabue, had a [[http://cdn.blogosfere.it/festival/images/Ligabue_cover_Arrivederci,%20mostro!<!-- 28media29.jpg Fish Island]] on the cover of his album ''Arrivederci, Mostro!'' -->
* The mythologies of several
▲* Mythologies from around the world came up with the idea of Earth as the body of a large creature, often swimming in a cosmic ocean that predates the Earth, with the sky as another ocean above the firmament of stars.
▲* The mythologies of several Native American cultures tell of a giant tortoise that rose out of the sea when animals needed land to live on. In fact, the Iroquois Creation Myth has the ''entire planet'' as just one really big turtle in an infinite sea. Some current-day Native Americans prefer to use "Turtle Island" instead of "North America".
* One of the most famous early examples would be the island in the tales of ''[[Sinbad the Sailor]]'', which he discovered was on the back of a whale. Before they realize what it is, the crew find many rare fruits and plants on the surface. Due to the fact that he's possibly [[Doom Magnet|the]] [[The Everyman|unluckiest]] [[Unfazed Everyman|man]] of his time, his entire crew manages to escape ([[Doom Magnet|the only time they ever]], however), and he gets left behind when the whale submerges and is lost at sea for years.
* Supposedly the origin for the island of Bohol in the Philippines (you can find it as a little spec at the heart of the archipelago) is that a woman fell from the sky, so a turtle turned itself into an island that she could live on. [[It Makes Sense in Context]], sort of.
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* The Leviathan (or, sometimes, the Kraken) is occasionally portrayed as such. One of the original myths of the Kraken was that it was simply a giant monster that would sleep at the surface for so long that plants would grow on it and ship crews would mistake it for an island. Anyone unfortunate enough to light a fire while ashore would wake the Kraken, which would then submerge and pull the ship down with it.
* Russian folk tales have the Wondrous Whale Fish for this role.
* Indian (Subcontinent Indian, not Native American Indian) Mythology has it that the world is carried on the backs of four elephants which in turn are carried on the back of a turtle named Kurma or Akupara. [[Captain Obvious|This was likely the inspiration for]] [[Discworld|Great A'Tuin]] [[Captain Obvious|and]] [[Pokémon|Torterra]].
* [[Aztec Mythology]] told that the land was created from the corpse of Cipactli, a gigantic crocodile. The gods Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca, [[Arch Enemy|who normally hate each others' guts]], [[Enemy Mine|teamed up to kill the monster]]. Cipactli stayed at the bottom of the sea, so Tezcatlipoca lowered his foot to lure it to the surface. [[Deliberate Injury Gambit|After getting it bit clean off]], the two gods turned into snakes and strangled Cipactli, thus forming the North American continent.
* Singapore has a particularly localised myth to explain the origins of its own turtle-shaped island, [
* Myth has it that Indonesia was a giant solidified crocodile, as told in an episode of the ''[[Crocodile Hunter]]''.
* [[Older Than Feudalism]]: Pliny the Elder in his ''[[Natural History]]'' describes a giant fish called ''pristis'', which is so big that sailors have taken it for an island and landed on its back.
== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
▲=== Card Games ===
▲* Pictured above is the ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh Card Game|Yu-Gi-Oh]]'' card [http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Island_Turtle Island Turtle].
▲* In ''[[Magi Nation]]'', the underwater civilization of Orothe builds some of their cities on the backs of giant sea turtles, as seen [http://bluefurok.com/BSImages/Giant_Parathin.jpg here]. They're mostly mermaids and the turtles themselves usually stay submerged.
▲* ''[[Magic:
=== Tabletop
* ''[[Dungeons and Dragons|Dungeons & Dragons]]''
** ''Al-Qadim'' setting. The Zaratan, a huge turtle (
***
** 1E Oriental Adventures setting adventure OA5 ''Mad Monkey Vs. Dragon Claw''. An uninhabited island is actually a huge dragon turtle (100 yards across) sleeping on the ocean's surface.
** ''[[Spelljammer]]'' has kindori riders - that is, people living in villages on the backs of [[Space Whale]] traveling in herds.
* ''Space Master'' supplement ''Aliens & Artifacts''. Living Islands, which can grow up to 2 kilometers in diameter. They can dive under the surface, leaving whatever was on top of them behind.
== [[Video Games]] ==▼
* The original ''[[Golden Axe]]'' games has a village on the back of a giant turtle, and it actually swims across the sea as you make your way through the level. A later level has a another town on the back of a giant eagle, and halfway through the level, it takes to the sky with you on it, the fight continuing on its back as it soars through the air, landing at the final level, the [[Big Bad]]'s castle.
▲== Video Games ==
*
* In ''[[Pokémon]]'', the "Turtwig" evolutionary family (Torterra especially) is based on the world-on-a-turtle mythology.
* There is one of these in [[Endless Ocean|Endless Ocean 2]].
* The Groundshaker boss in ''[[
* In an early sequence in ''[[
* ''[[Secret of Mana]]'' features an island (which you never have to visit) that is allegedly a turtle's back. It certainly looks like it from an overhead view, but nothing ever comes of this fact. (Possibly related is the turtle that the heroes of the distant prequel, ''[[Seiken Densetsu 3]]'', use.)
* ''[[Rune Factory: Frontier]]'' has the aptly-named Whale Island. It gets bonus points for being [[The Sky Is an Ocean|in the sky]].
* In the final levels of ''[[Katamari Damacy]]'', when rolling up the entire world your Katamari will grow large enough to start snatching up entire islands and landforms by the dozen. Some of the islands will actually try to ''run away'' from
* In ''[[Kings Bounty|King's Bounty: The Legend]]'', a scientist (the would-be king of the humans who gave up his throne [[For Science!]], no less) hypothesizes that the world rests on the back of a giant turtle. He also remarks on how ludicrous an opposing hypothesis that says [[Does This Remind You of Anything?|the world is a giant sphere orbiting a sun in a large void.]] {{spoiler|He's right.}}
* ''[[
{{quote|
* The fourth ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' expansion Mists of Pandaria introduces a massive Turtle Island named Shen-zin Su, the Wandering Isle, as the starting zone for the pandaren.
▲== [[Web Comics]] ==
* Played for laughs in [http://70-seas.com/?p=1271 this] chapter of ''[
* Also seen [https://web.archive.org/web/20140106063437/http://www.dominic-deegan.com/view.php?date=2010-07-27 here] in "[
== [[Web
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110817062236/http://gizmodo.com/photogallery/windows7backgrounds2/1008047677 This Windows 7 wallpaper], with flying for added awesome.▼
▲* Played for laughs in [http://70-seas.com/?p=1271 this] chapter of ''[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ptitleioj2t8k1 70-Seas]''.
▲* Also seen [http://www.dominic-deegan.com/view.php?date=2010-07-27 here] in "[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DominicDeegan Dominic Deegan]".
▲* [http://gizmodo.com/photogallery/windows7backgrounds2/1008047677 This Windows 7 wallpaper], with flying for added awesome.
* [[Zoofights]]: {{spoiler|The Snapture became one after vol. 5.}}
== [[Western Animation]] ==▼
* In "[[Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad
▲== Western Animation ==
* ''[[Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas]]'', the Dreamworks animated film, has this, but instead it's a giant fish.▼
▲* In "[[Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad The Sailor]]," this island is alluded to as being the island where the egotistical, bullying Sinbad lives.
▲* ''[[Sinbad Legend of the Seven Seas]]'', the Dreamworks animated film, has this, but instead it's a giant fish.
▲* The Lion Turtle of ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender (Animation)|Avatar: The Last Airbender]]''.
* Episode "A Turtle Island" of the [[Alfred J Kwak|Alfred J. Kwak]] series.
* Once in ''[[
== [[Real Life]] ==
* The Turtle Island cosmology mentioned above in Mythology has become the basis for a famous often-cited [[Straw Man|"argument"]] or thought experiment in cosmology and metaphysics known as [
{{quote|
'''Man #2:''' Don't be a fool. It's [[Turtles All the Way Down]]! }}
** As [[Terry Pratchett]] pointed out in the ''[[Discworld]]'' novels, turtles don't need anything to hold them up; [[Space Is an Ocean|they know how to swim]].
* The [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1062575/Pictured-The-punk-rock-turtle-bright-green-mohawk.html Mary River Turtle] and other species that actually grow algae on their shells.
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Reptile and Amphibian Tropes]]
[[Category:Native American Mythology]]
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[[Category:Index of Fictional Creatures]]
[[Category:Older Than Feudalism]]
▲[[Category:Trope]]
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