“Any haunted houses in the family or an ancestor who is supposed to be haunting one? Let your imagination run with this one! Feel free to post your links and stories in the comments.” prompt by Amy Johnson Crow for 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks.
Neither myself nor my husband could think of any ghost stories or haunted houses in our families. Not to say there aren’t any but no one told us if there were. I decided to go with our heritage and see if there are any memorable ghost stories from the countries of our origin. Of course there are plenty from each, now to narrow it down.
I love the Icelandic tradition of everyone getting a book on Christmas Eve. It is called Jolabokaflod or “Christmas book flood,” you unwrap your book and snuggle up with some chocolate and your family to read around the fire. I make sure everyone gets a new book each year, on Christmas Eve, since I learned about this tradition.
The Icelandic Sagas are a great place to start. Believe it or not they are manna for genealogists. They were written about life in Iceland beginning in the 9th Century. The accurate descriptions were so well written many can trace their family history all the way back to these times. The Sagas give descriptions of what Iceland was like when it was first discovered, catastrophic events such as volcanic eruptions and glacier floods. Of course there may be a bit of embellishment as well but the main premise is based on truth. They have tales of extraordinary people and many are about the women of Iceland. There are of course tales of witchcraft and ghosts. You can be part of Jolabokaflod and learn about Iceland and get your ghost stories all at once. They were of course originallly written in Icelandic but are now available in multiple languages.
Both my husband and myself have roots in Germany. In searching for German ghost stories maybe the most famous inspired the writing of Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. She was summering on the shores of Lake Geneva with quite a few inspirational people. The weather was bad that summer so they spent a great deal of time inside. Lord Byron suggested they each try to write a supernatural tale. The book they were all reading at the time was called Fantasmagoriana, a german book of ghost stories. I have never read Fantasmagoriana but I have read Frankenstein and Dracula, which has inspiration from The Vampyre which was written from this challenge.
According to the latest DNA update on Ancestry my ethnicity results say I am 32% Irish. I discovered a podcast called “Chilling irish Ghost Stories” on Amazon music. I listened to the first one and in the first half she tells a true Irish ghost story. In the second half of her podcast she tells a ghost story of her own. Listen if you dare! If you want to continue along the lines of the Icelandic Sagas here are three ghost stories from medieval Ireland. Here are Irish ghost stories brought to you by the Emerald Isles. It even includes a map so you can see which of these stories occured where your ancestors lived.
Last but not least I will include some Scottish ghost stories. My ethnicity results say Scotland is at 39%. If you are lucky enough to take a trip, Scotland Trip Advisor recommends a ghost tour in Edinburgh. There are actually a variety of haunted tours day or night, walking or bus, you chose which one appeals to you the most. We did a haunted graveyard tour in Boston a number of years ago that was a lot of fun, so I think I would like this.
The Scotsman has an article about 10 of Scotland’s spookiest forgotten ghost stories. They are about specific places in Scotland under the care of the National Trust for Scotland. They take care of Scotland’s historic buildings and locations. If you are a member you can visit their locations free of charge.
I do have a few other countries I could add but the ones I mentioned above make up the majority of both of our ethnic backgrounds. It would be interesting to have a few ghost stories in my own family. So gather your family and friends and see which stories inspire you to write your own ghost stories.
My Tree in the Forest 