http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TurtleIsland

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Not to be confused with the 1995 animated series

Mythical creatures of mystery: fish, whales, or turtles (there's a definite preference for turtles over any other animal) big enough to be mistaken for islands or even continents have shown up in Mythology and Legends for thousands of years. If it's a turtle, the proper term is Aspidochelone. 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). How the fauna and flora on its back can survive and grow when it frequently dives underwater is rarely addressed.

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A variant of this trope place the best on land rather than in the sea — a Turtle Hill, so to speak. In these cases, the creature may be mistaken for a regular hill or mountain, as soil and dirt may cover its body entirely and forests or villages grow on its back, until something prompts it to move and a piece of the landscape stands up and walks away.

A Sub-Trope of That's No Moon!. See also Kraken and Leviathan for other gargantuan sea creatures.

If Earth is one of these, there's a good chance it's Turtles All the Way Down. If it's a dead turtle, it's a Giant Corpse World.

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Examples:

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Anime and Manga

Art

On the Carta Marina of 1539, the English ("Angli") have cast anchor on a giant whale and are in the process of boiling a kettle on its back.

Card Games

Magic: The Gathering: The old card Island Fish Jasconius , based on the fish from Saint Brendan's legend under Mythology. A more recent example is Arixmethes, Slumbering Isle a tremendous kraken with a city on its back that becomes both the site and the subject of a violent dispute between the sea god Thassa and the Planeswalker Kiora. Hamletback Goliath depicts a couple of goblins living on the Goliath's back, and plant growth that makes it look like a mountain.

In Magi-Nation, the underwater civilization of Orothe builds some of their cities on the backs of giant sea turtles, as seen here ◊ . They're mostly mermaids and the turtles themselves usually stay submerged.

. They're mostly mermaids and the turtles themselves usually stay submerged. Yu-Gi-Oh!: Island Turtle is, naturally, an example.

Comic Books

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 Forets D Opale, a series by the author of Lanfeust, a smaller and and land-based version exists, looking like a six-limbed sea turtle with trees on its back. It gets a Dying Moment of Awesome when it gets rid of an enemy ship by diving under it and ramming it from below, sinking soon after.

Lanfeust: 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.

Fanfiction

Kaiju Revolution: This incarnation of the lost continent of Mu is an utterly colossal filter-feeding anomalocarid Kaiju that has a unique ecosystem inside and outside its body and also serves as a nesting ground to other kaiju.

Monster Island , a Doctor Who fanfic, has an island called Monster Island which turns out to be a shapeshifting alien monster, one of the Volmiy-Shapebeasts.

, a Doctor Who fanfic, has an island called Monster Island which turns out to be a shapeshifting alien monster, one of the Volmiy-Shapebeasts. Pokédex: Torterra are mentioned to have been mistaken for islands before when they grow large enough and hibernate. They usually get mistaken for hills or other parts of the landscape, but they are also noted to be naturally buoyant and good swimmers, and as such it's common for a sleeping Torterra adrift at sea to be mistaken for an island. It turns out that Sinnoh itself is a Torterra of tremendous size.

Films — Animated

Films — Live-Action

The Neverending Story: The giant turtle Morla, who lives in the Swamps of Sadness and is first perceived by Atreyu to be a hill of some sort.

In Pokémon Detective Pikachu, what the main characters think is a mountain range is actually a group of Torterra subjected to growth experiments, big enough to play this trope straight.

Gamebooks

Seas of Blood contains a sleeping Sea Monster mistaken for an island. Essentially, its only purpose is to rob you of some crew members, as the pirates who are exploring the island when it wakes up all meet a watery death.

Literature

Live Action TV

Used in-Universe on one episode of Star Trek: Voyager. The crew encounters a traveler in a space-port bar who claims to have landed on a moon, started a fire, only for the "moon" to unfurl and start moving, sending him clamoring for his spaceship and barely escaping alive. Unsurprisingly, everyone else in the bar treats it as a ridiculous tall tale.

Music

The Italian singer Ligabue has a Fish Island ◊ on the cover of his album Arrivederci, Mostro!

Mythology, Religion, and Legend

Roleplay

Avernus from Embers In The Dusk has these. They were known to spit psionic nukes at any Daemonic invaders, and, in one case, a city containing a rogue Alpha+ psyker.

Tabletop Games

Atlantis The Lost World: Leviathans are giant marine turtles 200-400 feet long. Their shells are encrusted with corals, mollusks and seaweed, and when basking on the surface sailors often mistake them for small reefs or islands. If the sailors "go ashore" and are still there when the leviathan dives, the results are disastrous.

Dungeons & Dragons Al-Qadim setting. The Zaratan, a huge turtle (200-350 feet across) with rock outcroppings on its shell and flippers that looked like small reefs. When asleep on the surface, it could be mistaken for a small floating island. 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. Dungeon magazine #46 adventure "Floating Rock". The title wandering island is actually a Zaratan from the Al-Qadim campaign setting. D&D Expert rulebook (1980). The dragon turtle monster is so large that sailors have mistaken their hard shells for islands and tied their ships up to them while they were floating on the surface. Zaratans appear in the 5th edition sourcebook Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes are a type of Elder Elemental, a vast turtle made entirely out of stone and earth. Dragonlance campaign setting, adventure DL12 Dragons of Faith. While voyaging on a ship, the Player Characters encounter a small rocky island that turns out to be the back of an old sea dragon resting on the ocean surface. If they go ashore to explore, the sea dragon will swim away from their ship and attack the party, hoping to have them for dinner.

Fantasy Wargaming: The Kraken is a marine monster that floats just under the surface of the ocean and is large enough to be mistaken for an island. It doesn't notice people walking on it, but it does notice attempts to beach a ship on it.

Numenera: The granthu, a titanic crustacean that lives deep beneath the sea to the west of the main setting. It's big enough that a good-sized city, Joira, has been built on, in and beneath its carapace. The Fish People who inhabit it, who speak about the granthu like humans speak about the Earth, are firmly of the belief that the beast is not unique, and that there are more out there bearing their own cities on their backs.

Pathfinder: The Aspidochelone is present as a high level monster; absolutely massive whales, often more than 500ft across, with rocky hides, they spend most of their lives hibernating between periods of ravenous hunger where they'll consume so much sea life — from schools of fish to giant sea monsters to ships — that they'll devastate the ecosystem for leagues around. While they sleep, dense jungle develops on their back. The 2nd Edition bestiary mentions rumors of dragon turtles — a type of dragon resembling massive, heavily armored chelonians — of immense size, who spend centuries drifting across the seas while soil, vegetation and even small villages accrete on their backs. One of the Plane of Water's settlements, City-on-Lure, is built on the back of the absolutely tremendous anglerfish that gives it its name. The brine dragons of the Plane of Water sometimes reach such tremendous sizes that, when some are forced to take up nomadic lives for whatever reason, they often carry their entire kingdoms on their backs.

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

Webcomics

70-Seas: Played for laughs in this comic, where, due to some tricky perspective at sea, what appeared to be a Turtle Island turns to be an entirely regular-sized turtle with a small shrub on its shell.

comic, where, due to some tricky perspective at sea, what appeared to be a Turtle Island turns to be an entirely regular-sized turtle with a small shrub on its shell. Dominic Deegan: Seen here with a gigantic mollusk-like creature with a mountain-like shell.

with a gigantic mollusk-like creature with a mountain-like shell. Sinfest: Here , what at first appears to a small hillock in the swamp turns out to be the coils of a sleeping dragon.

Web Original

Microsoft Windows: This Windows 7 wallpaper, with flying for added awesome.

Windows 7 wallpaper, with flying for added awesome. SCP Foundation SCP-169 ("The Leviathan") is a sea creature 2,000-8,000 kilometers long that has spent at least the last few millenia just below the surface of the ocean. The rock-like plates protruding from it constitute an archipelago of islands. SCP-1585 ("Red Queen Island") is a giant jellyfish 544 meters across. It secretes calcium carbonate, which creates a rigid surface over the upper portion of its bell and causes it to appear to be an island. Many creatures and plants live on its top layer.



Western Animation

Real Life