Superstitions and legends.

[Muravyets]

I haven't read the rest of the thread yet, so apologies if this was already touched on, but this is one of those examples of legend overtaking history. In fact, several people were rescued from the doomed Donner Party after the end of the winter, but the reality of the story is way weirder and more freak-worthy than the legends. In fact, the real story ends with almost a punchline, involving the allegedly most avid of the cannibals getting rescued, making it at last to California, and...opening a restaurant. I kid you not.

There's always one person who has to throw cold water on the ghost story

You ever see The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance? Great movie, and germane to the subject. There's a quote in there, at the very end, "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend."

Ah, but that non-ghostly reality did in fact generate a new legend. This one an old 19th-20th century urban legend about restaurants that serve human flesh. The basic form of the legend is always about a restaurant with a strong word of mouth reputation for being amazingly good and having the most talented chef in town. It's located in a seedy part of town and is very hard to find but well worth the effort. Its food is exotic, though, and the owners, chef and staff are all foreigners who don't speak English. People wait months to get a table there, and the most coveted privilege of all is to be offered a tour of the kitchen... only it's a privilege you wouldn't want if you knew how it would end.

This legend reached its fictionalized apex with the mystery writer Stanley Ellin's 1948 short story "The Specialty of the House." It's a legend about xenophobia and the fear of taboo, alien food. The original stories were all about the immigrant communities of San Francisco, where the guy from the Donner Party ended up opening his business, but over time spread out to other cities that saw waves of immigration. The Donner party member was from Germany, but later versions of the story got more race-oriented, adding racism to xenophobia.

[Agolthia]

Fionn Mac Cumhail SNIP

The version I was always told is slightly different (although basically the same) in that Fionn got scared when he saw how big Bennandonner was so he did the sensible thing and ran back to ask his wife for help. She dressed him up and put him in the crib so that when Bennandonner came a-knocking he saw this massive baby lying there. When he found out that this was Fionns child he took fright thinking that if this was how big the child was the father must be terrifying.

The rest is all the same though.

Edit : And I was also told that the Isle of Man was created when Fionn ripped up some land to throw at another giant

Aye, I think there is a couple of different versions floating round. As well as the whole stone in the gridlecake trick, I have a suspicion that the version I told has some other trcik as well but I can't remember what it was.

There is a story from Fermangh that I got told a while back about how this ice-cream that drove around the country late at night and when kids ran up to it for ice-cream, this clown would get out of the van, grab and stab the kids before driving off with the music playing.

I think its an urban myth but whats slightly distrubing was that there was a pair of shankil butchers in belfast who would drive their meat van into catholic areas in belfast, muder somone and then put them throw the mincer and sell them the next day. As far as I'm aware, the pair are still in prison.

[Reprocycle]

I think its an urban myth but whats slightly distrubing was that there was a pair of shankil butchers in belfast who would drive their meat van into catholic areas in belfast, muder somone and then put them throw the mincer and sell them the next day. As far as I'm aware, the pair are still in prison.

The Shankill Butchers were twisted but I don't think they managed anything quite that spectacular

[Agolthia]

I think its an urban myth but whats slightly distrubing was that there was a pair of shankil butchers in belfast who would drive their meat van into catholic areas in belfast, muder somone and then put them throw the mincer and sell them the next day. As far as I'm aware, the pair are still in prison.

The Shankill Butchers were twisted but I don't think they managed anything quite that spectacular

Intresting...maybe I've heard urban legends and the truth twisted together. You know I could have been responsible for starting a new myth and now you just ruined it !!

[Grave_n_idle]

That does exist... maybe not summon the devil... but it is certainly supposed to summon very powerful demons.
One of my friends had a copy... before I burned it...
I didn't believe him, and I thought he was unhealthfully obsessed, so I threw it in the fire

A book on necromancy would (theoretically) deal with raising the dead, not demons - for that, you'd need a book on demonology.

The Catholic Church has a lot of interesting books on demonology. Perhaps Kelewann can get a hold of one. Provided it isn't in the vaults of the Vatican.

I've seen some of the material that's out there. Like Johann Weyer's "Pseudomonarchia Daemonum" and "De Praestigiis Daemonum et Incantationibus ac Venificiis", and Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa's "De occulta philosophia libri tres". I've yet to see Pope Honorius III's fabled Grimoire.

It's interesting how demonology has been historically so closely tied to Catholicism (Johann Weyer was supported by Charles V, the Grimoire is attributed to an actual Pope).

[Brutanion]

A book on necromancy would (theoretically) deal with raising the dead, not demons - for that, you'd need a book on demonology.

The Catholic Church has a lot of interesting books on demonology. Perhaps Kelewann can get a hold of one. Provided it isn't in the vaults of the Vatican.

I've seen some of the material that's out there. Like Johann Weyer's "Pseudomonarchia Daemonum" and "De Praestigiis Daemonum et Incantationibus ac Venificiis", and Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa's "De occulta philosophia libri tres". I've yet to see Pope Honorius III's fabled Grimoire.

It's interesting how demonology has been historically so closely tied to Catholicism (Johann Weyer was supported by Charles V, the Grimoire is attributed to an actual Pope).

I suppose the answer to that is for the same reason that criminal psychology is so closely related to law enforcement. The Catholic church saw itself as a defender of man against such demons, so it had to know what it was up against.

[Grave_n_idle]

I've seen some of the material that's out there. Like Johann Weyer's "Pseudomonarchia Daemonum" and "De Praestigiis Daemonum et Incantationibus ac Venificiis", and Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa's "De occulta philosophia libri tres". I've yet to see Pope Honorius III's fabled Grimoire.

It's interesting how demonology has been historically so closely tied to Catholicism (Johann Weyer was supported by Charles V, the Grimoire is attributed to an actual Pope).

I suppose the answer to that is for the same reason that criminal psychology is so closely related to law enforcement. The Catholic church saw itself as a defender of man against such demons, so it had to know what it was up against.

I think there's probably some 'vested interest' in there somewhere, certainly. How can you keep the peasants scared of demons, unless you make sure that information is getting out there?

[Reprocycle]

I think its an urban myth but whats slightly distrubing was that there was a pair of shankil butchers in belfast who would drive their meat van into catholic areas in belfast, muder somone and then put them throw the mincer and sell them the next day. As far as I'm aware, the pair are still in prison.

The Shankill Butchers were twisted but I don't think they managed anything quite that spectacular

Intresting...maybe I've heard urban legends and the truth twisted together. You know I could have been responsible for starting a new myth and now you just ruined it !!

I prefer your version of the Shankill Butchers to the clown urban legend to be honest. An ice cream van with a psycho clown seems like it would announce it's approach a lot more so I could make myself scarce. A butchers van could totally sneak up on me way too easily. I can't even think of what the distinguishing features of a butchers van are

[Agolthia]

I
I prefer your version of the Shankill Butchers to the clown urban legend to be honest. An ice cream van with a psycho clown seems like it would announce it's approach a lot more so I could make myself scarce. A butchers van could totally sneak up on me way too easily. I can't even think of what the distinguishing features of a butchers van are

I think what is meant to make the ice-cream van story scary is that most people can remember hearing the ice-cream van and chasing off after it. The idea of doing that and then being confornted by a mad clown is a little creepy.

Where exactly are you from then?

[Reprocycle]

Where exactly are you from then?

Ballyhalbert. The arsehole of nowhere would be a more accurate name but also the most easterly point in Ireland. Yourself?

[Agolthia]

Where exactly are you from then?

Ballyhalbert. The arsehole of nowhere would be a more accurate name but also the most easterly point in Ireland. Yourself?

Born in Dublin, moved up to Belfast when I was two though. The parents were born and raised in Portadown so I've ended up with a bit of a weird accent. "Beflast with a hint of Culchie" is how its been explained.

[Reprocycle]

Where exactly are you from then?

Ballyhalbert. The arsehole of nowhere would be a more accurate name but also the most easterly point in Ireland. Yourself?

Born in Dublin, moved up to Belfast when I was two though. The parents were born and raised in Portadown so I've ended up with a bit of a weird accent. "Beflast with a hint of Culchie" is how its been explained.

I would have had that accent combination as a result of all the people from Belfast coming down to caravan sites in the summer but thanks to my mum i've ended up with just mild Culchie

[Nanatsu no Tsuki]

Legend of Islas Canarias:

The Canaries are seven islands... but an eigth isle is still searched! It is the ghost island, the mysterious one, the island of San Borondón. San Borondón is the Canarian name of Saint Brendan or Saint Brandan of Clonfert (480-576 d.C.), an Irish monk who plays the lead in one of the most famous legends of the Celtic culture: the voyage of Saint Brendan or Brandan to the Promised Land of the Saints, the Islands of Happiness and Fortune.

The Irish poem tells that Brendan was a monk of Tralee, County Kerry. He was ordained priest in the year 512 d.C.. He sailed with 14 other monks on a small vessel which went far away in the Atlantic Ocean. The legend tells about their adventures, how they took with them along their voyage three other monks, their encounter with fire-hurling demons, with floating crystal columns, with monstruos creatures as large as an island.

Brendan and his fellow travellers landed on island where they found trees and other sort of vegetation. They said mass, and suddenly the island started to sail. It was a gigantic sea creature and they were on its back. After many vicissitudes Brendan managed to go back to Ireland.

Many base on this legend the affirmation that Irish sailors reached possibly in the High Middle Ages the shores of North America or Newfoundland, Iceland and other Atlantic isles.

When the Canaries were conquered throughout the 15th century, stories were insistently told about an eigth island which sometimes was seen to the West of La Palma, El Hierro and La Gomera. When sailors tried to reach it and approached to its shores, mountains and valleys, the island was covered by mist and vanished. The island was obviously identified as mythical Saint Brendan's whale-island, and was called "San Borondón" in the Canary Islands.

People believed firmly in its existence, and there were even detailed accounts from an odd sailor or two who swore that they had landed on the island and explored it before the land had sunk again into the Ocean. In some international treaties signed by the Kingdom of Castille it was stated, concerning the Canary Islands, the Castilian sovereignty over *the islands of Canaria, already discovered or to be discovered*; just in case... The island was called "Aprositus", the Inaccesible, and in other versions of the legend is named "Antilia" or "Island of the Seven Cities", cities which were supposed to have been founded by seven legendary bishops.

The archives of the 18th century inform about official inquiries by the authorities of El Hierro, where tens of witnesses declared having seen the bewitched island from the summits of El Hierro's mountains. An expedition in search of the island sailed from Santa Cruz de Tenerife as a result of this inquiry.

The persistence of this legend in the islands' folklore is amazing. San Borondón is still alive in the islands' people imagination. There is probably no one islander of Tenerife, La Palma, La Gomera or El Hierro who sometime has not looked from the mountains of his island into the sea, searching the lost island of San Borondón in the western horizon where the sun sinks in the cobalt-blue waters of the Atlantic Ocean.

"Let the Guanche drums resound
and the conch shells blow,
for the mysterious island
is appearing in the midst of the waves;
here comes San Borondón,
showing up in the mist
like a queen
with the surf as suite..."
"San Borondón", Cabrera/Santamaría

[Heinleinites]

Ah, but that non-ghostly reality did in fact generate a new legend. This one an old 19th-20th century urban legend about restaurants that serve human flesh. The basic form of the legend is always about a restaurant with a strong word of mouth reputation for being amazingly good and having the most talented chef in town. It's located in a seedy part of town and is very hard to find but well worth the effort. Its food is exotic, though, and the owners, chef and staff are all foreigners who don't speak English. People wait months to get a table there, and the most coveted privilege of all is to be offered a tour of the kitchen... only it's a privilege you wouldn't want if you knew how it would end.

That is a good one. I'll have to remember that. It is camp-fire season, after all.

Merlin, who was rumored to be the son of the Devil and to have been groomed to be the Anti-Christ, turned his back on his heritage, and went his own way instead. He found Arthur Pendragon, and fostered him out to a good and noble knight, and saw that he was brought up in the finest traditions of chivalry and that his reign would exemplify all that was best and brightest in the British Isles.

But everything that might happen, does happen...somewhere. For every shining dream, there is a black and dreadful nightmare. For every helping hand, there is a kick in the face, and because of that, there is also the legend of Artor the Dragon and Sinister Albion. Where Merlin embraced his heritage, rather than rejecting it. Where he brought up Artor himself, and taught him to follow a path of the darkest Satanic evil. Instead of a shining symbol of justice, Excalibur was a pitted and blood-stained sign of oppression, in a kingdom where soulless knights wearing terrible armor feasted on good men. Where the knives of the Druids made the sacrificial stones run red with the blood of sacrifices, and the Wicker Men blazed from one end of the Isles to the other...

[Heinleinites]

Given some of the other threads on here today...what about the superstition/belief/legend that famous people die in threes? Looks like Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, and now(maybe)Michael Jackson.

[Milks Empire]

Given some of the other threads on here today...what about the superstition/belief/legend that famous people die in threes? Looks like Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, and now (maybe) Michael Jackson.

Pronounced dead at 3:15 PDT.

[Heinleinites]

Given some of the other threads on here today...what about the superstition/belief/legend that famous people die in threes? Looks like Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, and now (maybe) Michael Jackson.

Pronounced dead at 3:15 PDT.

See? There you go. Famous people die in threes.

[Muravyets]

Given some of the other threads on here today...what about the superstition/belief/legend that famous people die in threes? Looks like Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, and now (maybe) Michael Jackson.

Pronounced dead at 3:15 PDT.

See? There you go. Famous people die in threes.

I was just thinking of that one.

[Lacadaemon]

I think its an urban myth but whats slightly distrubing was that there was a pair of shankil butchers in belfast who would drive their meat van into catholic areas in belfast, muder somone and then put them throw the mincer and sell them the next day. As far as I'm aware, the pair are still in prison.

The Shankill Butchers were a subgroup of the UVF. They never did that. I think they got their name because one of them had been an apprentice butcher and he used butchers knives in one of the gangs killings. (Can't really recall, it was a long time ago).

In any case, they were just your run of the mill sectarian nutters. Bombings, murders, that sort of thing.

[Heinleinites]

The Shankill Butchers were a subgroup of the UVF. They never did that. I think they got their name because one of them had been an apprentice butcher and he used butchers knives in one of the gangs killings. (Can't really recall, it was a long time ago). In any case, they were just your run of the mill sectarian nutters. Bombings, murders, that sort of thing.

See, now, that's much less impressive that mysterious cannibals abducting people off the street and turning them into pies or what-have-you. Gangsters are a dime a dozen.

[Muravyets]

The Shankill Butchers were a subgroup of the UVF. They never did that. I think they got their name because one of them had been an apprentice butcher and he used butchers knives in one of the gangs killings. (Can't really recall, it was a long time ago). In any case, they were just your run of the mill sectarian nutters. Bombings, murders, that sort of thing.

See, now, that's much less impressive that mysterious cannibals abducting people off the street and turning them into pies or what-have-you. Gangsters are a dime a dozen.

I admit, I've been skipping some posts, so apologies if this was already mentioned, but wasn't "mysterious cannibals abducting people off the street and turning them into pies" the Sweeney Todd story? That's a true crime tale, you know. Supposedly, there were people-pies being sold by the dozen in London.

[JuNii]

Given some of the other threads on here today...what about the superstition/belief/legend that famous people die in threes? Looks like Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, and now (maybe) Michael Jackson.

Pronounced dead at 3:15 PDT.

See? There you go. Famous people die in threes.

David Carradine?

[Agolthia]

I think its an urban myth but whats slightly distrubing was that there was a pair of shankil butchers in belfast who would drive their meat van into catholic areas in belfast, muder somone and then put them throw the mincer and sell them the next day. As far as I'm aware, the pair are still in prison.

The Shankill Butchers were a subgroup of the UVF. They never did that. I think they got their name because one of them had been an apprentice butcher and he used butchers knives in one of the gangs killings. (Can't really recall, it was a long time ago).

In any case, they were just your run of the mill sectarian nutters. Bombings, murders, that sort of thing.

Yeah, I already had my bubble burst with that one....
I think there is some urban myths about them in Belfast and I heard one of them around the time I first heard of the Butcher and in my old age, must have got the truth and the myth conflated.

[Heinleinites]

I admit, I've been skipping some posts, so apologies if this was already mentioned, but wasn't "mysterious cannibals abducting people off the street and turning them into pies" the Sweeney Todd story? That's a true crime tale, you know. Supposedly, there were people-pies being sold by the dozen in London.

Someone else had conflated the Butchers with Sweeney Todd type cannibalism, that's what was being corrected by the other poster, and why I was commenting that gangsters were less impressive than cannibals.

While we're on the topic, though, Sawney Beane, anyone?

[JuNii]

... there was a saying...
if you sneeze once, then someone's talking about you.
if you sneeze twice, then that person who's talking is in love with you...

and if you sneeze three times, then you just have allergies...