Here be heathens

“Om Draken eller Lindormen: Mémoire till Kongl. Vetenskaps-Akademien” is an extremely entertaining work by Gunnar Olof Hyltén-Cavallius, unfortunately only available in somewhat archaic Swedish. The book was originally published in 1885. The author was relatively well known in his day. He served as a diplomat in Brazil, founded a museum, belonged to several learned societies and is one of the fathers of Swedish ethnology. Today, Hyltén-Cavallius is probably mostly remembered for his two-volume work “Wärend och wirdarne”, which details the local mythology and culture of Värend, a district of Småland in southeast Sweden. According to some speculations, Värend and its inhabitants, known as virdar, are mentioned in Roman and Byzantine chronicles. More clear is that Värend was also the birth place of Hyltén-Cavallius himself…

“Om Draken eller Lindormen” is also set in Värend, with some additional material from other parts of Sweden. The author sent it, unsolicited, to the Swedish Royal Academy of Science, but some believe that it may have destroyed his reputation. Be that as it may, the work is fascinating in its own right, and may be the first (and only?) example of Swedish crypto-zoology. Hyltén-Cavallius believed that ancient Norse myths about the dragon, sometimes called “lindorm” in Swedish, were based on a real animal. He hoped that the Royal Academy would offer a reward to anyone killing a dragon and bringing its body to competent scientists for investigation. He also hoped that the Academy would send a zoologist to Värend to interview eye-witnesses who claimed to have encountered a “lindorm”. The book contains sworn affidavits from people who claimed to have done just that!

The “lindorm” is described as an enormous snake-like creature, and some of its purported behavior is reminiscent of more regular serpents. It basks in the sun, nests underground, swims and is apparently never seen in winter. Sometimes, it's seen together with snakes (presumably vipers). Its color is said to be black with a white underbelly, reminiscent of some grass snakes. The “lindorm” is said to have an enormous head with rows of white teeth, a large forked tongue, and the ability to spew poison at a considerable distance. When doing this, the “lindorm” stands upright, a behavior also found in cobras. It also has an enormous mane or mane-like structure, and according to one eye-witness, something looking like mammal-like ears hanging down from its head. The “lindorm” is so poisonous that killing it can be dangerous, since its body odors can make a man sick for days. One eye-witness who claims to have killed a “dragon” and thrown its body onto an anthill, reports that all the ants were dead when he returned to the spot a few days later! Here, the Swedish dragon is strikingly similar to another mythological creature, the basilisk. Like the basilisk, the “lindorm” also has enormous eyes and an evil stare.

It's not always clear from the accounts when the “natural” ends and the “paranormal” begins. A person who tried to shoot the local dragon was paralyzed for the rest of his life in one leg, suggesting that the creature has abilities beyond the normal. Many witnesses report being inordinately scared when seeing the creature, or *not* being scared until afterwards, which may be normal reactions to a basiliskos in your backyard, but I suppose it could also indicate the “Oz effect”. The gaze of the creature could indicate a family relationship with the red eyes spouted by many paranormal entities. In local folklore, the “lindorm” was associated with mysterious luminescent phenomena in the skies, and was therefore believed to be able to fly (compare UFOs). Otherwise, what is most striking about the reports is that they mostly sound “physical”, and that some brave Virds even killed the boss snake, naturally after a prolonged fight!

The only modern commentary on Hyltén-Cavallius' book I've seen was written by a skeptic whose name escapes me at the present time, who claimed that many of the witnesses were stone drunk and reported seeing the “lindorm” during the silly season (i.e. August). Actually, only one account mentions the witness being heavily inebriated, and several specifically insist they were sober. The “orm” was seen during all months of the year, except the winter months. That being said, the accounts *are* difficult to take seriously, due to the paucity of any tangible corpus delicti. The author admits at one point that researchers went digging at a location where a dragon was supposedly buried by the heroic heathen who killed him, but found absolutely nothing. But why did Hyltén-Cavallius chose to believe these peculiar reports in the first place?

Apparently, Hyltén-Cavallius had a general tendency to interpret folklore in a literalistic fashion. Thus, he believed that the trolls were real people, related to the Sami (the “Natives” of Scandinavia), who were turned into slightly sinister fairy folk by the story-telling of later generations. The giants of Norse mythology were also real, perhaps the Goth ancestors of the Norsemen? The dragon was a real reptile, and our enthusiastic crypto-zoologist believed that such creatures were to be found all over Sweden. “Om Draken eller Lindormen” contains a report from Dalecarlia and mentions a case from Jämtland in the northern part of the country. I don't really know how the learned men of “Kongl. Vetenskaps-Akademin” reacted to this peculiar memorandum, and the intrepid researcher died only four years later. The dragon, as far as I know, haven't been heard from since.

The American publisher of this material should be thanked for reprinting this little gem of Swedish cultural history, and I note that the copy used for reprint purposes is stamped “Harvard College, 1895”, suggesting that somehow Gunnar Olof Hyltén-Cavallius' labors managed to reach that venerable institution, or at least its library.