Imagine seeing a giant fissure open up, fire erupting into the sky as smoke and ash billow along the winds. You might think that this explosion was nothing else but the gates of Hell opening onto the earth. Well, that is exactly what the people in Iceland thought back in 1104: our first written record of a volcanic explosion from Hekla.
Hekla is a volcano in the south of Iceland. However, in 1104 when the volcano erupted there was quite the panic, especially from Christians who saw Hekla as one of the doorways into Hell. Now, the volcano is known for throwing lava bombs — up to twelve tons in size! — from its fire fountains, and as they travel into the cold night air, they begin to hiss due to the cooler temperatures. Well, when people had seen these projectiles, they believed them to be escaped spirits screaming in agony. Birds flying nearby would be accused of being souls circling the gates while others claimed that witches gathered around the crater to meet the devil and practice dark magic.
Today, however, the volcano has become quite the tourist attraction. Hekla is still active, and people travel from all over just to see the fire fountains explode into the night. Though you might be kept at a safe distance from the volcano, it isn’t hard to imagine why early European thought that Hekla was a gate into hell — especially when one witnesses the fire fountains erupting themselves.
For more reading on Hekla (sources):
http://volcano.oregonstate.edu/hekla-gateway-hell
http://volcano.oregonstate.edu/book/export/html/1015
Folk medicine is comprised of rituals and medicines, herbs and crystals and stone. Even as a child, my mother would prepare an herbal tea when I was sick and it would go away within the day. And though it sounds a lot like ancient methods and miraculous magic, some people still use these techniques today. In fact, in the Ozarks there are those who still practice a lot of these rituals today. One such practice is the stopping of the flow of blood and the people who practice it are called “blood stoppers.”
However, in order to cure something more debilitating, the power doctor would stop the “unnatural” flow of blood by reciting bible verses — usually from the Book of Ezekiel. The belief that these people could stop the flow of blood was so powerful, that a story of a man who challenged a blood stopper traveled around in which he told the doctor to “try your luck on this beef.” According to the story, the skeptic went hungry as he killed the cow which never bled a single drop, ruining the meat in the end. Similar stories of blood stoppers helping those in need can be found in abundance, from a woman who went into a barn and prayed for three minutes while a man bleeding to death in a wagon just stopped bleeding altogether and was saved, all the way to a man who suffered a nosebleed and placed a chip beneath to catch the blood, keeping the chip in a safe place so that it would go undisturbed and he wouldn’t get a nosebleed again.
Imagine this: you are entering the underworld through the River Styx, and as you make your way towards the gates you see a three-headed dog guarding the entrance. He allows you to pass through, though you will never leave again. This is Cerberus, the three-headed watchdog who guards the gates of the Underworld.
One of the most famous stories regarding Cerberus was the twelfth labor of Heracles. Heracles was charged with capturing Cerberus and bringing him back from the Underworld. There are several versions of this story, however one of the famous ones involves Hades telling Heracles he could have Cerberus, so long as he defeated the animal using only the weapons he had carried with him. According to this version of the myth, Heracles uses his lion-skin shield to defend against two of the heads as he chokes the third, ending with Cerberus submitting to him. Hades says Heracles still could not take the creature, and so Heracles shoots Hades with a stone-tipped arrow and he concedes. In other accounts, the two do battle and Heracles wins.
Imagine going against a witch with iron teeth who rides on a mortar and pestle, lives in a house that stands on chicken legs, and eats people. Not a very pleasant thought. However, Vasilisa the Beautiful wasn’t alone when she was forced to face the witch Baba Yaga. For Vasilisa was given a doll by her mother who helped her along the way.
