The Wild Hunt

It all begins with the sunsets in the fjords, when the abundant clouds in the Scandinavian skies, illuminated by the reddish-purple flashes of the setting sun, fed the grim imaginations of the Varangians—that's when the Wild Hunt emerged. The myth of the Wild Hunt most likely originated in the eighth to tenth centuries CE, although it is difficult to speak of the accuracy of dating in such cases. It was first mentioned in literature as a very ancient and widespread story in Jacob Grimm's work German Mythology (1835).

Pareidolia is the phenomenon by which meaningful images are sometimes perceived in the random interplay of light, color, and lines. It has sparked the human imagination to see shapes in billowing clouds (‘That third cloud looks like a bear!’). For the warrior, the son of the earth, engulfed in battle, the blood-red skies were undoubtedly reflections of earthly passions.

Originally called Odin's Ride or Odin's Hunt, the Scandinavians believed that the Wild Hunt was the procession of supreme god riding his eight-legged steed Sleipnir, accompanied by his brothers, the valkyries iValkyrie: A maiden warrior on a winged horse who gathered the fallen from the battlefield and delivered them to Odin's heavenly abode. , and the Einherjar heroes, racing between heaven and earth during storms in flashes of gold and crimson. For anyone who encountered this divine cavalcade, even by chance, things did not end well. They would either be struck down by lightning, trampled to death by animal hooves, or torn to pieces by the valkyries' claws.

With the spread of Christianity in Scandinavian lands, Christians immediately denounced Odin and his associates, renamed Valhalla ‘Hell’, and Ragnarok ‘the Apocalypse’. However, Christianity did not strongly oppose this myth. On the contrary, it fed it by proclaiming that Christless souls were subjugated by the evil spirits who flew over the land seeking to capture and drag ungodly people (including infants) to Hell. These spirits even snatched their prey from hiding places, from their beds, crying with demonic laughter before taking them away through the chimney. Not even the grave provides refuge, for the black horse tramples the sinner’s tombstone, and the pale corpse is thrown across the saddle. This legend, no doubt, contributed to the increase in the number of people who were baptized. It is also unsurprising that many countries also used it to their advantage in different ways; although Rome never officially endorsed the Wild Hunt, nor did it particularly argue against it.

With the name ‘The Wild Hunt’, the myth spread through Europe: from the British Isles to the Slavic lands, where it received the name ‘The Black Hunt’, an allusion to which can be found, for example, in Vasily Andreyevich Zhukovsky's work A Ballad, Which Describes How an Old Woman Rode on a Black Horse with Someone Sitting in Front.

The famous flight of Woland's entourage over Moscow at night in Bulgakov's work The Master and Margarita is also a direct reference to the myth of the Wild Hunt. If we bring all the beliefs about this myth together, we will learn that occasionally (on certain calendar days, such as Walpurgis Night or Halloween, or on full moon nights or before some global tragedy) malevolent spirits break out of hell and fly over the land on black horses, searching for prey. They are led by the devil himself, witches fly alongside the horses screaming, and the night's offspring, Hecate, stares into the ground through bony eye sockets. Denny Devil rides on a raven horse, leading a pack of hellhounds, black dogs with red eyes.

People captured by the Wild Hunt don't see anything at first. They only hear the barking of dogs in the distance, strange whistles and laughter, the sound of hooves, and they feel gusts of wind as if from an invisible cavalcade racing past them. However, if you spend too long out in the open and have many sins, such as drunkenness and debauchery, on your conscience, then in one beautiful moment, the night clouds will break apart, vague shadows will take shape, and you will see the Wild Hunt in all its glory. And guess who its fiery spears will be aimed at?

They hunt the unbaptized, the sinners, and even people traveling late at night who are not burdened by excessive holiness. Each of the phantom hunters has their own specialization. Some love to chase maidens who have not preserved their virginity through the forest (the hunt is conducted in such a way that the frightened young lady is forced to run through the wooded area, leaving shreds of clothing on the prickly branches until she is naked in front of the pursuers). Others drive drunkards insane. The third group targets unjust judges. The fourth indifferently impale any mortals they come across on their long spears.

The Dark One himself may lead the cavalcade, but sometimes local celebrities take charge of the Wild Hunt. For example, in some French fairy tales, Gilles de Rais iGilles de Rais (died 1440). Marshal of France, alchemist, and companion of Joan of Arc, the national heroine of France during the Hundred Years' War. Accused of serial murders and executed. Prototype of Bluebeard. , the infamous lord-turned-serial-killer, ruled it. Similarly, notorious bandits sometimes became characters in these folk tales in the areas they once terrorized. In the novel King Stakh's Wild Hunt (1964) by Belarusian writer Vladimir Korotkevich, the king Stakh, the leader of an ancient uprising, murdered by traitors, is the leader of the Hunt (although, according to the standards of socialist realism, all the mysticism in the story is eventually explained as the machinations of real villains). The leader always has a group of accomplices, usually silent and faceless, and various demons and evil spirits also participate in the hunt. The hunters are often accompanied by hellhounds. The hunt may also have harbingers in the form of ghosts and spirits, who appear at graves, abandoned churches, and similar places before the Hunt, either to warn the living of impending danger or revel in advance.

It isn’t only demons and ghosts that take part in the hunt. According to fans of this myth, invitations are also extended to human villains, and sometimes even to the living. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries CE, the French and English were convinced, for example, that the famous pirate Sir Francis Drake had a season ticket to the Hunt and raced alongside riders on a black catafalque. According to various ballads, the French knight Roland, King Arthur, and the king of Denmark Valdemar IV were also among the hunters. In the early nineteenth century CE, numerous eyewitnesses reported a certain diminutive gentleman wearing a characteristic tri-cornered hat galloping on a phantom horse through nocturnal Europe iIn other words, Napoleon Bonaparte.. In Poland in the 1950s, there were several instances of frightened peasants claiming to have seen with their own eyes skeletons in half-rotted Nazi uniforms galloping through the sky.

The most reliable way is not to leave your home after sunset on days when the evil spirits are allowed to roam the earth. This is especially true for 30 April, Walpurgis Night, and 31 October, which is Samhain or All Saints' Day. And if on a particular day the sunset is very red, then one should be suspicious, regardless of the date. However, even staying at home is not a reliable form of protection against these hunters, so it is worth putting a plate of milk at the threshold to appease them and hanging an iron horseshoe on the door to ward them off.