Sharks, especially great whites, were catapulted into the public eye with the release of the film Jaws in the summer of 1975. The film is the story of a massive great white that terrorizes a seaside community, and the image of the cover alone—the exposed jaws of a massive shark rising upward in murky water—is enough to inject fear into the hearts of would-be swimmers. Other thrillers have perpetuated the theme of sharks as villans.

But where did our fear of sharks come from, and how far back does it go? That and other shark-related inquiries below.

"The question implies they shouldn't be," says David Ropeik, a consultant on risk perception and author of the book