Tiddy Mun
Ringkasan
Tiddy Mun adalah roh rawa legendaris di Inggris yang dipercaya mengendalikan air dan kabut di rawa Lincolnshire dan Isle of Ely, digambarkan seperti lelaki tua kecil berjanggut putih.
Tiddy Mun was a legendary bog spirit in England believed to control the waters and mists of the Lincolnshire and Isle of Ely fens, described as a small old man with a white beard.
Kisah dan tradisi
Tiddy Mun adalah roh rawa legendaris di Inggris yang dipercaya mampu mengendalikan air dan kabut di rawa-rawa South Lincolnshire, The Carrs di North Lincolnshire, dan rawa Isle of Ely. Kepercayaan ini pertama kali didokumentasikan pada Juni 1891 dalam artikel M. C. Balfour di jurnal Folk-Lore. Balfour menggambarkannya tidak lebih besar daripada anak tiga tahun, tetapi berpenampilan seperti lelaki tua berambut putih kusut dan berjanggut putih kusut. Ia dikatakan memakai jubah abu-abu sehingga sulit terlihat saat senja, dan tawanya menyerupai panggilan burung peewit. Dalam teks dialek yang dicatat Balfour, ia tinggal di lubang-lubang air rawa, dan penutur lamanya mengaku pernah melihatnya berjalan pincang di kabut, abu-abu dan putih, menjerit seperti peewit. Dalam sebuah cerita dari Lembah Ancholme, Tiddy Mun menjatuhkan kutukan wabah pada sebuah desa karena marah atas pengeringan Fens oleh orang Belanda di bawah Cornelius Vermuyden pada abad ke-17. Ia akhirnya reda setelah penduduk berkumpul senja saat bulan baru, menuang ember air ke parit, dan meminta maaf atas kerusakan itu. Ia tidak sepenuhnya jahat: bila rawa banjir dan air mencapai desa, orang keluar malam hari dan memanggilnya sampai terdengar teriakan peewit, dan keesokan paginya air surut. Darwin Horn menafsirkan kutukan-kutukannya sebagai kemalangan dan penyakit akibat pengeringan lahan rawa. Penutur dialek menduga Tiddy Mun telah ketakutan dan pergi oleh cara-cara baru sehingga orang tak lagi mengenalnya.
Tiddy Mun was a legendary bog spirit of England, thought to hold sway over the water and fog of the South Lincolnshire Fens, the North Lincolnshire Carrs and the Isle of Ely fens. M. C. Balfour put the belief on record for the first time in an article in the journal Folk-Lore, published in June 1891. Balfour describes him as small, no larger than a toddler of three, yet resembling an old man whose long white hair was tangled and whose white beard was matted. A grey gown reportedly made him hard to see at dusk, and his laughter resembled the call of the peewit. In the dialect text Balfour recorded, he dwells in the water-holes of the fen, and the old teller claims to have seen him limping through the fog, grey and white, screeching like a peewit. In a story from the Ancholme Valley, Tiddy Mun laid a plague-curse on a village, furious that the Dutch under Cornelius Vermuyden were draining the Fens in the seventeenth century. He calmed down in the end once the villagers met at dusk at the new moon, emptied buckets of water into the dyke and said sorry for the harm done. He was not exclusively malevolent: when the fen flooded and the waters reached the villages, people went out at night and called him until they heard the cry of a peewit, and by morning the waters had receded. Darwin Horn reads his curses as the misfortune and disease brought by draining the fenland. The dialect teller guesses he has been frightened away by new ways, so that people no longer know him.
Fakta utama
- Budaya / Culture
- Tradisi Inggris
- Kawasan / Region
- Eropa
- Negara / Country
- England
- Era
- First documented in June 1891; the curse story is linked to the draining of the Fens in the seventeenth century
- Klasifikasi / Classification
- Spirit
- Habitat
- Water
- Kemampuan / Abilities
- Mengendalikan air dan kabut, Kutukan wabah