The following guest blog is from one of our regular readers who uses the name “T”.
Stan connected one of the aspects of bigfoot or a hairy man creature that has resonated in literature and history that, while not being scientifically evident, presents a strong historical and philosophical case for a bigfoot creature. And that is a similar figure in “mythâ€- the troll.
Let me stray with an example- a very real “myth†that as young kids we grew up with when we were young.
At Halloween time, in scary movies or recordings of old, what sounds did a ghost make?
Darn right, those sounds made years ago on 45 or 78 rpm vinyl sound like the Ohio Howler, Columbiana 1994.
Are all the boogeyman stories traced to the single premise of parents trying to scare their kids so they would not go out at night? Some will try to convince you of that. Solutions so simplistic rarely provide the truth.
Let’s be practical, and logical. Pre-1900, all the world lived in the dark once the sun went down- especially in northern hemisphere winter. Doesn’t mean work outside stopped… just meant the people were outside still in mainly an agrarian world whose populace dwelt close to nature.
What sounds might they have heard in the woods? Was Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Puritans in “Young Goodman Brown”spooked of devils in the woods?
Here’s where biological science cannot reach- where the literature of old agrarian or plain old savage nature culture reached with its writings, where Grendel in the Beowulf epic still holds modern society’s fascination.
These accounts are not proof; they are not hard evidence; but circumstantial evidence back then was good enough to give a few persons a suspended sentence— gallows style, where there was no video or photos of the crime and no DNA to trace the crime back to the culprit. Maybe, the judgments of jurors got it wrong sometimes. But, they probably got it right often enough.
Point is that in this technologicallty advanced age, I am unwilling to say we are any smarter, or anymore knowledgeable than those who preceded us in history. Take all the people on Facebook and see how many could track the stars, the seasons, the earth, and nature as the ancients used to do.
And by ancient peoples, I do not mean time. I mean those who still recognize that in their genes, the DNA of all humanity is still as alive as it was in their progenitors hundreds, and thousands, of years ago.
There still are trolls underneath bridges.
Stan: Very well written and interesting piece. Addresses something that is very logical to wonder about. It has been my experience that deep inside many myths and bits of folklore there are always some grains of truth that are hard to dismiss.
Certainly makes a reasonable person curious.
Thanks! Les
I suppose you know that besides trolls, there are other 'mythic' European creatures which could be tied to sasquatch. The god Pan of Greek mythology lives in the forest, plays pipes (whistles) and causes panic among humans when he is nearby. Read E.M. Forester's :"The Story of a Panic" which was no doubt written with no thought of sasquatch,, but sounds very much like some of the accounts of contemporary people in North America. Another mythical creature is the Banshee in Irish folklore.. According to legend the Banshee is a female spirit which can be heard screaming/crying in the night before the death of an important person. Think how many contemporary accounts there are which describe hearing sceams like "a woman being attacked." And I believe there is a stream in Canada named Screaming Woman river/creek. Similar to the Banshee is the Hispanic (possibly European) legend of La Llorona, who is said to search for her drowned children along rivers in Mesico and our Soutwest. Hispanci children are cautioned not to go out at night because La Llorna might grab them up to replace her lost babies. And of course there is the 'green man' so often seen on illuminated manuscripts. Taken together all those mythical creatures pqint a pretty clear picture of the sasquatch we know from contemporary accounts.