Messed Up Myths and Legends

At the dawn of humanity, our ancestors would’ve gathered around fires, sharing stories from their faith. But these days, myths have been too watered down for my liking. Let's delve into the darkest, creepiest, and downright weirdest myths and legends people actually once believed in!

Messed Up Greek Myths

Most of you Greek mythology nerds out there know that the head honcho of the gods is Zeus. Except, he’s not the wise sage you’d expect for someone with such a big white beard. He’s actually an idiot. Let me prove it with a myth first recorded in Theogony by Greek poet Hesiod, around 700 BC.

One day, Zeus heard a prophecy that any son born from his wife Metis, the goddess of wise counsel, would be even more powerful than him. This worried him, because she was currently pregnant. So, being an idiot, Zeus did the only logical thing he could think of, he ate his pregnant wife whole.

Only, shortly after, he got a splitting headache. The throbbing pain grew until there was a sudden crack and the top of his head broke open like an egg. Out popped Athena, goddess of war and wisdom. Though she wasn’t born a baby, instead she was fully grown and dressed in armor ready for battle. It turns out, Metis had lived on inside Zeus and dressed their daughter up herself before releasing her.

Despite breaking his skull open, Zeus loved the child, after all, she was a daughter, not a son, and she was instantly his favorite. How sweet. But don’t be fooled, though gods can be stupid, they’re rarely forgiving. Take the myth of Erysichthon. According to the version by Ancient Roman poet Ovid, he was a pompous king who cared little for the gods.

He wanted timber to build a fine feast hall for his palace. So, he took his woodsmen into the forest where they came across a grove. This place was sacred to Demeter, or Ceres in Roman mythology, goddess of agriculture and the harvest. However, this mattered little to Erysichthon, and he ordered the woodsmen to chop down a mighty oak adorned in wreaths, prayers dedicated to Demeter.

Fearing the gods’ wrath, the woodsmen refused. Seething with anger, Erysichthon grabbed an axe himself, and spat out ‘There are no GODS!’ before chopping away at the tree trunk. But he’d made a terrible mistake, for inside that tree was a dryad, a Nature spirit. And once the tree fell, she too was gone.

The other grieving nymphs of the grove begged Demeter to unleash a terrible vengeance upon Erysichthon. The goddess heard their mournful pleas and complied; calling upon the twisted spirit of Hunger to possess the belly of the godless king.

The following morning, Erysichthon awoke with a gnawing feeling in his gut. So he ate, but the feeling stayed. He tried eating great banquets, but that only seemed to make him hungrier. He ate enough to feed a large family. He ate enough to feed a city! But he was never satisfied.

Over time, he squandered all his wealth on food, so started selling his possessions, his palace and even his own daughter into slavery. It wasn’t long before Erysichthon was living in abject poverty, and still so hungry he began to eat his own limbs. Eventually, there was nothing of him left.

That was pretty grim. Why don’t we have something more romantic? Only, it’s not exactly what Greek mythology is known for. There’s Pan, the goat-legged faun, who chased the poor nymph Syrinx through the forest until she was forced to turn herself into a reed to escape him. Not romantic.

And then there's Hades, god of the Underworld, who kidnapped Persephone and dragged her down to Hell to be his wife. Imagine explaining that at the wedding. But long ago in the 5th century, Greek playwright Euripides told a beautiful tale of misunderstood love. Maybe it will change your minds.

The old king Asterius had passed away on the island of Crete, leaving no solid heir. The young Minos, Asterius’s stepson, wanted to prove he was fit for the throne. So, he prayed to the sea god Poseidon to send a sign that he was the man for the job. In turn, the god sent a beautiful white animal bursting from the sea depths, the Cretan Bull!

The crowds were astonished and Minos was pronounced king. Minos had promised Poseidon that he would sacrifice the bull, returning the divine creature back to the god. But the king was so taken by it that he sacrificed a different bull in its place. Poseidon was furious, but he knew just how to take his revenge, he cursed Minos’s wife Pasiphaë. Deep within her, Pasiphaë suddenly felt feelings for the Cretan bull, and fell madly in love with it!

She wanted to be with the bull so badly that she had a hollow wooden cow built for her, and hid inside it until the Cretan Bull got a bit frisky with her! After this, Pasiphaë became pregnant and gave birth to a monstrous hybrid of cow and human with an insatiable appetite for human flesh, the minotaur! Greek mythology can be really romantic!

Messed Up Norse Myths

Thor, the Norse god of thunder, dates way back to Viking age Scandinavia, around 790 to 1050 AD, though today we know him as the golden-haired hero from the Marvel movies. To be fair, there’re some similarities between the two. They’re both strong, greedy, and not too bright. However, one myth you won’t get in Avengers comes from the Poetic Edda, a collection of ancient Norse myths compiled in the 13th century.

The story begins in Asgard, home of the gods. Thor woke up one morning to find his precious hammer, Mjölnir, missing. Frantic, he turned to Loki, the trickster god, for help. Loki found out that it was Thrym, chief of the Jötnar, a race of giants or ogres, who stole the hammer and hid it deep underground.

Thrym promised Loki he’d return the hammer only if Freyja, the beautiful goddess of fertility, agreed to marry him. So, Loki returned to the other gods and told Freyja the news. Thrym was considered ugly even by Jötnar standards and Freyja was so furious that the whole of Asgard shook!

It was then that Heimdall, the watchman god, suggested Thor don a wedding dress and pretend to be Freyja in order to trick the ogre into handing back Mjölnir. Despite his protests, the hulking Thor squeezed into a wedding dress with a veil to cover his hairy face!

Accompanied by Loki, who was dressed as a bridesmaid, they travelled to Jotunheim, the land of the Jötnar. Thrym was thrilled to meet his new bride and, for the most part, bought the disguise. He had a great feast laid out in his hall for all his Jötnar guests. The only thing that raised the ogre’s eyebrows was the speed at which his new bride wolfed down an ox, eight salmon, and a whole barrel of mead.

Clever Loki explained that Freyja was so excited to marry Thrym that she hadn’t eaten in eight days. Heartened, Thrym lifted Thor’s veil and went in for a big sloppy kiss, but recoiled at seeing his bride’s glaring face! Loki smoothly reassured him that Freyja yearned for Thrym so much that she hadn’t slept for eight days.

Fully convinced, Thrym brought out a wedding gift and placed it on “her” lap, it was Mjölnir. Thor took the hammer in his hand and, well, let’s just say Thrym became ex-Thrym, alongside all the other giants in the hall. Once he'd finished, Thor went home with Loki, his belly full and hammer back.

That was a nice ending. Hopefully you enjoyed it because there’s only a few in this whole article.

Messed Up Arthurian Legends

Legends of this King Arthur date back to 6th century Wales, with the story of his birth later recorded in the pseudo-historical History of the Kings of Britain by Welsh chronicler Geoffrey of Monmouth in the 1130s. It begins with Uther Pendragon, the King of Britain. At his court was the Duke of Cornwall, along with his wife Igraine, the most beautiful woman Uther had ever seen. He was immediately besotted by her.

Seeing the lust in Uther’s eyes however, the Duke locked Igraine away in Tintagel castle, which you can still visit today! Desperate to see Igraine, Uther waged war upon the Duke’s country and besieged his castle. But after getting nowhere, he turned to his sage and prophet. You might be familiar with his name, Merlin.

Using powerful magic, the wizard altered Uther’s shape, transforming him into the Duke. That night, Uther strolled inside Tintagel unencumbered, where he came upon Igraine. Believing the man was her husband, they spent the night together.

So Merlin helped Uther deceive and assault a woman? He’s less of a whimsical old wizard and more of a pervert! Their night together resulted in the birth of a baby boy, Arthur. But, Igraine didn’t get to enjoy him for long. In return for helping Uther with his disgusting scheme, Merlin demanded Arthur as payment and tore him away from his mother’s arms.

That’s horrible! Did things get any better for Arthur once he’d grown up? Over the centuries, these Welsh legends made their way to France where writers added their own twists, culminating in the seminal work Le Morte D’Arthur in the 15th century by English writer Thomas Mallory.

Our story continues with Arthur now fully grown and king of Britain. One day, the king of Orkney’s wife, Morgause, came to visit his court dressed to the nines. Arthur was at once mesmerized by her beauty and convinced her to stay! This usually doesn’t end well! The pair became lovers, unaware that they were in fact, brother and sister!

Turns out, Morgause was the daughter of the Duke of Cornwall and Arthur’s mother, Igraine, making her Arthur’s half-sister! As Arthur lay next to Morgause after their first night together, his dreams were filled with dark visions of mythical beasts terrorizing his lands.

When he awoke, he decided to speak to Merlin. The wizard denounced Arthur’s sin and foretold that Morgause would give birth to a child who would bring about his doom! So, Arthur, ever the hero, ordered that all babies born on May Day be boarded on a rudderless boat, sent out to sea, and left to drown. Miraculously, Arthur and Morgauses’s child survived and grew up to become Mordred, Arthur’s greatest nemesis.

Who’s to blame for all the incest varies from story to story. In some versions Morgause is portrayed as a conniving witch who deliberately seduced Arthur, fully aware he was her brother. Either way, bye-bye childhood.

Messed Up Japanese Legends

I envy kids who get to grow up with Spirited Away. Every frame is packed full of imagination and creatures weird and wonderful. It’s no wonder when you take a look at yokai, an umbrella term for Japanese ghosts, ghouls, and other oogly-booglies. My favorite yokai myth seems to have been popularized by manga artist Shigeru Mizuki.

His version of the myth begins with a samurai walking through Kyoto at night when suddenly he notices a stranger in the shadows ahead of him. The stranger walked in a slow, stilted rhythm, then stopped dead and began taking off his kimono! With horror, the samurai saw that he had no eyes, mouth, or features at all! More horrifying still, the stranger bent over and the samurai saw that instead of where the wazoo should’ve been there was a giant, glowing eye!

This yokai is called a shirime, which translates to ‘butt eye’. While the shirime may be nightmarishly weird, it’s actually quite harmless, it just likes scaring people. The same can’t be said for all yokai though. In one strange urban legend dating back to the 1930s, a student was working late after school. Nature called, so he hurried to the nearest toilet he could find and went into the fourth stall. It was old and a bit dilapidated, but it’d have to do.

Just as he was doing his business however, he heard a creak at the door. Slowly, it opened, revealing a ghostly figure dressed in a red cloak and a theatre mask, it was the yokai, Aka Manto. The student screamed with all his might, but the creature continued to step inside. Then, it offered him two toilet rolls: one red, one blue.

Overcome with nerves, the student picked the blue one. The next day, his body was found, his face blue as if he’d been choked, and twisted into a terrified scream.

It didn’t matter which roll he’d picked though, his fate was sealed. If he chose red, Aka Manto would’ve given him a much more gruesome fate. And if he’d tried to outsmart the spirit by picking a different colour, say yellow, the creature would’ve plunged his face into the filthy toilet water. No matter what you pick, Aka Manto will always get you.

Messed Up Aztec Myths

If we travelled back to 15th and 16th century Mexico, we’d witness the great Aztec Empire, a place rich with myths of creation, destruction, and rebirth. One such story follows Cōātlīcue, an earth goddess of birth, war, and agriculture. Her tale was compiled in the Florentine Codex, a record created in the 16th century by Franciscan friar Bernardino de Sahagún in collaboration with Indigenous writers and artists.

By the time our story begins, Cōātlīcue was already mother to Coyolxauhqui, a lunar goddess, as well as 400 Centzonhuitznahuas, gods of the southern stars. One morning, Cōātlīcue was sweeping her shrine on top of Coatepec Mountain, when she noticed something fall from the sky.

It looked like some sort of ball, except it was as soft as a cloud. Cōātlīcue plucked the object from the air and started to inspect it, it was made of hummingbird feathers! At that moment, the goddess felt a heavy stone drop in her stomach and swell, becoming heavier with every moment. Before she knew it, she was pregnant!

She told her daughter Coyolxauhqui, but rather than be joyed or astounded, the daughter was disgusted. She believed the conception brought disgrace to the family and, on telling her 400 brothers, they felt the same. Together, the siblings plotted a vile plan to end their mother and her freaky baby once and for all.

Wielding clubs, bows, swords, and spears, they charged up Coatepec where they met their horrified mother. Coyolxauhqui was about to land a deadly blow when something erupted from their mother’s stomach. It was Huitzilopochtli, the god of the sun, war and sacrifice!

He was fully grown, towering above the others, and wielded a sword made from a snake. With it, he swiftly ended Coyolxauhqui before decimating his brothers, chasing them across the sky where they became stars.

Huitzilopochtli is one of the most important gods in Aztec religion, his name combining the Nahuatl words for “hummingbird” and “left”. The Aztecs viewed the south, where Huitzilopochtli led them from their mythical northern homeland, as the left side of the world. They also believed that warriors who died in battle or as sacrifices to the god would eventually be reborn as hummingbirds! Therefore, the name means “resuscitated warrior of the south.”

As for Cōātlīcue, she’s usually depicted not with a human head but with two snakes bursting from her neck! We’re not 100% sure why, but clues point to another freaky myth.

Weird Iroquois Folklore

Let’s head up from Mexico to North America, where we find the Iroquois confederacy, a union of six native American tribes that once roamed across upper New York. One truly spooky story from Iroquois folklore tells of a wicked betrayal and the dreadful consequences that followed.

Long ago, a nameless tribe were caught in a never-ending famine. The earth was barren, the birds had left the skies, and the fish had fled the rivers. Facing starvation, the young men of the tribe decided that they’d need to migrate to survive, but the elders flatly refused them. They believed that the famine was a divine punishment and insisted that the tribe stay put and atone for whatever sin they’d committed.

Shocked at the elders’ stubbornness, the young men decided that if the old wanted to perish, they would oblige them. After doing the dirty deed, the young men removed their heads and prepared to throw them into a lake.

Just as they were about to finish their grisly work though, one of them became tangled in the heads’ hair and was pulled into the water. From the depths rose a group of misshapen, bloated things, taller than men. They were the Kanontsistóntie’s, giant flying heads with gaunt faces and long black hair. They swooped down on the young men, relishing their delicious revenge, and apparently have feasted on humans ever since.

Strange Slavic Mythology

Most myths date back thousands of years, and sadly, not all of them have survived. Much of Slavic mythology, once practiced across northern Eurasia, was lost when Christianity barged in between the 8th and 13th centuries. Luckily, some folklore managed to survive. Take the kikimora, a household spirit that lurks in dark, hidden corners, like the attic.

At night, the kikimora was said to lie down on a person’s chest, pinning them to the bed and making it impossible for them to move. The shape of the creature varied; sometimes, it took the form of a beautiful woman, other times a monstrous mish-mash of human and animal.

Today, people put the kikimora down to sleep paralysis, a state where you’re awake but unable to move or speak and feel like something is pressing down on you. But that was not the case back then. The kikimora has long been shown as an old woman or witch, and over time, became linked with another legendary figure: Baba Yaga.

This witchy ogress has become an icon of Slavic folklore. She’s often found inside her home, a hut with chicken legs that walk about on their own! If not there, she flies over her forest home in a giant pestle and mortar. And, like all good witches, she eats children.

Depictions of her in art date back to the 17th century, and she was also illustrated riding a pig. Even today, some Slavic children are brought up believing in the tales of this cackling hag, where she flits between being a malicious villain, a sly trickster, and sometimes even helpful! Her best-known appearance however comes from Vasilisa the Beautiful, a story collected in Russian Fairy Tales by Alexander Afanasyev, compiled in the 19th century.

Once upon a time, there was a young girl called Vasilisa, who lived happily with her mother and father. But sadly, her mother grew very ill. When the day came for them to say goodbye, Vasilisa’s mother gave her a ragged old doll. She told Vasilisa that it was magical, and that she had to keep the doll a secret, but if she was ever in trouble, she should offer it a bit of food and drink.

Vasilisa, heartbroken, accepted the doll and her mother’s last words. After her mother’s passing, Vasilisa’s father remarried, and her new stepmother turned out to be evil. When her father left on a long journey, the stepmother ordered Vasilisa to fetch fire from the hut of Baba Yaga, knowing it would likely be the end of her. Vasilisa, ever obedient, and a bit dim, did as she was told.

Before darkness fell, Vasilisa reached a fence lined with human skulls that surrounded a hut perched on chicken legs, it was Baba Yaga’s home. The young woman knocked on the door and was met by the hideous crone, to whom she explained her story and how she was in desperate need of fire.

Baba Yaga agreed, but only if Vasilisa would complete an impossible task. She needed to remove the grains of dirt from a massive pile of seeds before dawn. When Baba Yaga wasn’t looking, Vasilisa offered what little food she had to the doll, and at once it sprang to life, organizing the pile at lightning speed.

Morning came and, on seeing the seeds, Baba Yaga cried furiously. She asked, ‘How were you able to complete the task, girl?!’ Vasilisa replied, ‘It must be my mother’s blessing.’

Repulsed by anything blessed, Baba Yaga quickly handed her a skull filled with fire and pushed Vasilisa out the door. When she returned home, her father and stepmother were waiting. She held up the skull to show them, but suddenly, the fire leapt out, striking her stepmother and reducing her to ash. Vasilisa decided to pack her doll and set out for the big city, where she became a master seamstress, married a king, and lived happily ever after.

Peculiar Polynesian Mythology

You may love Disney’s Moana, but there’s a few differences between the movie and the Polynesian mythology it’s based on!

First off, Polynesia has over 1,000 islands and each one has its own version of the same myths and legends, so the movie is actually a mash-up of stories from all over. There is a sea goddess called Moana in the Hawaiian myths, but she doesn’t appear much. Instead, let’s look at Maui, the trickster, and his encounter with the goddess of death, Hine-nui-te-po.

In this Māori legend, retold in the 1929 collection The Maui Myths, the eponymous hero wished to gain immortality for all humankind. To do this he needed to challenge Hine-nui-te-po, so he called upon his father, Ira-whaki, to perform a protective charm. But as the spell was cast, something went wrong. Ira-whaki tried to warn his son he’d made a mistake and that meeting the goddess would bring his destruction, but his warnings fell on deaf ears.

Accompanied by his five friends, Maui journeyed into the underworld and found Hine-nui-te-po, a giantess with glowing eyes and seaweed hair, sleeping on her back. Now, in order to gain immortality, Maui needed to complete a reverse birth and pop out the goddess’s mouth.

Little did he know that the goddess had a rather unique feature. Those of you who’ve watched the movie Teeth will understand. As Maui attempted this bizarre task, his friends couldn’t help but laugh at the ridiculous sight. This stirred the goddess and, like a bug caught in a flytrap, she ended Maui’s life.

Weird Aboriginal Mythology

In Aboriginal mythology, everything began in the Dreamtime, a mythical era where everything was created by the Aboriginal Ancestors, sort of God figures. For the Yolngu people of northern Australia, there’s one grizzly myth that comes straight from the dark side of Dreamtime. It begins with Ngalindi, a pale, fat, lazy man who had the power to soar through the sky. Not that he ever did.

His wives, fed up with his slovenliness, decided to help him shed a few pounds. Though, not through exercise! While he was lying around as usual, they leapt on him armed with axes and made him significantly lighter. Barely alive, he took to the skies, escaping his family’s wrath. Nevertheless, he was exhausted and collapsed in the branches of a tree. With his final breath, he cursed all of creation, declaring that while he would always come back to life, everything else would perish.

The Yolngu believed that before this all things were immortal. True to his curse, after three days, Ngalindi came back to life, and quickly grew just as round as ever! But, after two weeks, his wives hunted him down and attacked him again, starting the cycle all over.

So, can any of you guess the meaning behind this story? Why, it’s the phases of the moon! Ngalindi began as a big round full moon, waned over time, disappeared with the new moon, only to come back to life and repeat the process.

I hope you were amazed at these messed up myths and legends from around the world! Thanks for reading.