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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hi, my name is Robert Lamman. This is the Monster Fact,

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Speaker 2: a short form series from Stuff to Blow Your Mind,

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Speaker 2: focusing on mythical creatures, ideas and monsters in time. I

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Speaker 2: love to cover at least one holiday creature or monster

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Speaker 2: this time of year. The season is rife with them,

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Speaker 2: after all, from Crampus and the Yule Lads to the

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Speaker 2: child eating ogris Grilla. The last two I have benefited

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Speaker 2: from some more recent pop culture love on the excellent

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Speaker 2: animated family series Hilda, based on the Luke Pearson graphic

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Speaker 2: novel series. It makes great use of Nordic folkloric creatures,

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Speaker 2: including the house spirit known as a nissa in Danish

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Speaker 2: tradition and the Tomdar in Swedish tradition. The nissa, according

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Speaker 2: to folkloress Carol Rose and spirits varies, leprechauns and goblins,

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Speaker 2: tends to household chores and accepts only a bowl of

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Speaker 2: porridge as a reward if slighted it all. However, they

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Speaker 2: can prove quite mischievous and even cruel. The Tomtar Rose explains,

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Speaker 2: seems to reveal darker shades of the tradition. She shares

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Speaker 2: that they were believed to be the remnants of a

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Speaker 2: previous race of people displaced by invading Vikings, who were

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Speaker 2: then forced to occupy ancient forts, ruins, and other lonely

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Speaker 2: places of the country, and maliciously harassed the victorious humans

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Speaker 2: who now ruled over their former kingdom. But eventually humans

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Speaker 2: learned to appease these spirits and make use of their talents,

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Speaker 2: getting them to do farm and domestic work during the night.

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Speaker 2: The trick once more was a gift of porridge on

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Speaker 2: Christmas morning, accompanied by bread and maybe a little tobacco.

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Speaker 2: Rose writes quote. To give the tomtar any better gift

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Speaker 2: during the year would be sure to offend him, and

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Speaker 2: he would do no more work in trolls in the mill.

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Speaker 2: The supernatural stakes of water power, Academic Merril Caplin makes

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Speaker 2: an interesting argument about the possible connection between this and

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Speaker 2: other Scandinavian traditions and the use of water mills. This,

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Speaker 2: of course, is vital technology that harnesses the power of

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Speaker 2: running water. Such hauntings, if you will, are sometimes described

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Speaker 2: concerning specific water mills, which may tell us much about

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Speaker 2: how the people who use them thought about the powerful

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Speaker 2: and sometimes fickle natural resource they harnessed and depended upon them.

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Speaker 2: The argument I think aids us in considering various accounts

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Speaker 2: of helpful and sometimes harmful household spirits, supernatural entities for sure,

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Speaker 2: and important folklore motifs, but stand ins for forces of

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Speaker 2: chance and chaos, partially or even largely outside of our control.

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Speaker 2: While they serve other purposes, they also stand as cultural

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Speaker 2: tools used by pre modern societies to manage social anxiety

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Speaker 2: and economic risk. So as you're leaving cookies and milk

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Speaker 2: out for Santa this year, and maybe a carrot for Rudolph,

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Speaker 2: do consider an additional helping of porridge, bread and tobacco

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Speaker 2: for the top Tar. Tune in for additional episodes of

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Speaker 2: The Monster Fact, The Artifact, or Animalius to Pindium each week.

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Speaker 2: As always, you can email us at contact at stuff

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Speaker 2: to Blow your Mind dot com.

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Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For

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Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,