Human Sacrifice in Legends and Myths

Translated and/or edited by

D. L. Ashliman
Copyright 1997
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------Contents
1. The Entombed Child (Germany, Friedrich Panzer).

2. The Entombed Child (Germany, A. Haas).

3. The Name Greene (Germany, A. Kuhn and W. Schwartz).

4. An Infant Speaks (Germany, Karl Bartsch).

5. The Secured Foundation Stone (Germany, J. W. Wolf).

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------The Entombed Child

Germany
In the small village of Vestenberg, 2 1/2 hours from Ansbach, there is a large
hill, surrounded by a deep moat. Traces of ancient towers are still visible
there. Remnants of grave containers can be found just below the earth's surface.
A beautiful oak forest lies adjacent to the hill. The names of some of the
places in this forest are Himmelreich, Helgraben, and Grndlein.
By the beginning of the middle ages Vestenberg was already the seat of the noble
family by the same name. The Vestenbergs were among the most widely spread and
wealthiest families of Franconia.
The narration of an eighty-year-old woman:
When Vestenberg Castle was being built, the mason built a seat into the wall. A
child was placed on the seat to be sealed into the wall. The child cried, so to
pacify it, they gave it a beautiful red apple.
The unmarried woman, whose child it was, had given it up for a large sum of

money.
After the mason had finished mortaring the child into the wall, he gave the
mother a hard slap on the face, saying: "It would have been better if you had
begged your way throughout the country with your child."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------* Source: Hans Sponholz, Drei Frauen und zwei Riesen: Sagen aus Bayern um
Burgen, Schlsser und Kapellen (Hof [Saale]: Oberfrnkische Verlagsanstalt
und Druckerei GmbH, 1978), p. 59.
* Sponholz's source: Friedrich Panzer, Bayerische Sagen und Bruche: Beitrag
zur deutschen Mythologie (Verlag Christian Kaiser, 1855), II/184.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The Entombed Child
Germany
When Christianity was introduced to Rgen, they wanted to build a church in
Vilmnitz. However, the builders could not complete their task, because whatever
they put up during day was torn down again by the Devil that night. Then they
purchased a child, gave it a bread-roll in one hand, a light in the other, and
set it in a cavity in the foundation, which they quickly mortared shut. Now the
Devil could no longer disrupt the building's progress.
It is also said that a child was entombed in the church at Bergen under similar
circumstances.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------* Source: A. Haas, Rgensche Sagen und Mrchen (Stettin: Johs. Burmeister's
Buchhandlung, 1903), no. 195, p. 173.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The Name Greene
Germany
It is said that in ancient times they once sacrificed a child on the mountain
above Greene. It is no longer known what the occasion was. The child grinned
beneath the butcher-knife, and one of the executioners said: "It is still
grinning!" (Es greint noch!) From that they named the place that was soon built

at that location "Greine" or "Greene."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------* Source: A. Kuhn and W. Schwartz, Norddeutsche Sagen, Mrchen und Gebruche
(Leipzig: F. A. Brockhaus, 1848), no. 276, p. 247.
* Greene is a village on the Leine River, not far from Gandersheim.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------An Infant Speaks
Germany
Ages ago the cruel custom ruled of entombing infants in the foundations of
castles and fortresses in order to provide protection against storms, weather,
and the dangers of war. The infants were purchased from their mothers for large
sums of money. Once a fortified castle was to be thusly built in the Stargard
region. An infant had already been purchased. Before committing the cruel deed,
the masons who had been engaged for the construction were talking with one
another: "What is sweeter than a mother's nipple?"
The answer came to them from the infant's mouth: "The grace of God!"
Taken aback, the workmen laid down their tools and refused to proceed with the
wicked building.
The castle was never completed.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------* Source: Karl Bartsch, Sagen, Mrchen und Gebruche aus Meklenburg (Wien:
Wilhelm Braumller, 1879), vol. 1, no. 372, no. 283.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The Secured Foundation Stone
Germany
High water and ice on the Haun River so damaged a miller's spillway every winter
that he was no longer able to raise the funds to repair it.
Dismayed, one day he was standing at the spillway when he was approached by a

drunkard who offered him advice. He promised to make the spillway so secure that
it would never again be damaged, but the miller would have to pay him well.
The miller agreed, and the drunkard said, "Find a boy for us. We will bury him
alive beneath the foundation stone, and I guarantee the durability of the
spillway."
The miller shuddered, but when the drunkard offered to provide a boy for fifteen
pecks of groats, he entered into the agreement, and forthwith they dug the
grave.
The next day the child cried in vain. The two men pushed him into the pit, threw
stones in on top of him, and soon the spillway was ready.
Soon thereafter the drunkard's corpse was pulled from the Haun River. The
miller's conscience so gnawed at him that he wasted away and then died.
From that time forth the miller wanders about, attempting to pull passersby into
the river. Every year he must lure at least one person into the river. Usually
they are drunkards. He is on the lookout for them, because it was one of their
kind who brought misfortune upon him.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------* Source: J. W. Wolf, Hessische Sagen (Gttingen, Dieterichsche Buchhandlung,

1853), no. 218, pp. 136-137.