Frau Perchta, aka the “Belly Slitter,” is a mythical figure of unclear origin who mainly inhabits the Alpine regions of Austria and southern Germany.
She has been variously described as a witch, a demon, and a goddess. She has a propensity to kill in the most brutal way those she believes have behaved badly. Perchta becomes visible during the Twelve Days of Christmas when she flies through the countryside, entering people’s homes.
The mysterious origins of Frau Perchta
Most of our knowledge about Frau Perchta comes from the work of two 19th-century experts in German and Norse mythology and folklore, academic Eugen Mogk and Jacob Grimm (of the Brothers Grimm Fairytales fame.) The consensus states that Perchta was most likely a pagan Goddess and was once considered a benevolent creature. The name Perchta (a variation of Berchte or Bertha) means the bright, luminous, glorious one, which suggests an entity very much airing on the side of good. However, Grimm claims that through the ages, Perchta turned from a minor ranking diety to an elf-like, spirit-type creature to the horrifying demon, witch-like monster she is today.
Perchta is thought to be the southern equivalent of Frau Holle, a pagan Norse/Northern Germanic goddess, who is believed to have been celebrated around the mid-winter solstice. Perchta is either related to Holle or could, in fact, be her. The former haunts Austria, Bavaria, Switzerland, Alsace, and parts of Bohemia(modern-day Czechia) and Slovenia, whereas Frau Holle sticks to northern Germany. As Christianity spread through central Europe, the legend of Frau Perchta remained and was likely adapted, leading her to become associated with the Twelve Days of Christmas, particularly with the Epiphany on January 6.
Descriptions of Frau Perchta can vary widely
Like so many female ghosts and ghouls, Perchta has two main guises: she can appear as a beautiful young woman dressed in a pure white flowing dress, or she can look like a wizened, haggard old woman with a mangled face with warts and scars. This likely gives her alternative powers: to allure and seduce or to horrify and cause revulsion.
One interesting attribute of Perchta is she is almost always described as having one human foot and one enlarged goose foot. Grimm suggests that the animal’s foot is a symbol showing she is a higher being and that she can probably shapeshift into different creatures.
Throughout the Twelve Days of Christmas (December 25- January 6), Perchta can often be seen as a poorly dressed old woman leaning on a stick and pulling a cart. She is sometimes accompanied by a group of children who died unborn or unbaptized. According to Mogk, she often asks passersby to help mend her cart, and if they oblige, she rewards them generously. (Some legends have Perchta riding in a carriage instead of pulling a cart.) However, on other occasions, especially the night before Epiphany, Perchta flies through the air as she enters people’s homes.
Frau Perchta punishes her victims with extreme violence
The horrific creature mostly appears on the night before her feast day, January 6. On this day, Perchta expects everyone to eat fish, especially herring, gruel, along with zemmede (a mix of flour, milk, and water). Fish is traditionally seen as an acceptable food on Christian fast days.
Perchta hates laziness and is very concerned that all servants and children have done their chores throughout the year. She is particularly obsessed with spinning and weaving and will visit the houses of spinners to make sure the women and girls have done their allotted amount of spinning. If she is unsatisfied with the amount of cloth that’s been spun or finds the people partying or relaxing, she will angrily throw a spinning reel into the room and demand a certain amount of cloth to be done within the hour. If Perchta’s wishes are not fulfilled, she will exact a vicious retribution on her victims.
If Perchta discovers the wrong food has been eaten or not enough cloth has been spun, she will slit the bellies of the culprits. She will then remove the stomach and intestines, replacing them with straw and pebbles. Perchta “sows” her victims back up using a plowshare for a needle and a chain for the thread. Another less horrific punishment involves blinding her victims by blowing on their eyes, but only for a period of one year, after which she restores their sight.
It’s not all bad, though. Those deemed well-behaved and hard-working will receive a shiny silver or gold coin placed in a shoe or a pail. On some occasions, she will even hand out multiple coins. Perchta seems to mainly focus her ire on children and servant women, which begs the question: Did the legend evolve purely to keep these two groups in line and behaving themselves?
Essentially, Perchta’s primary goal is to ensure that everyone upholds their communal responsibilities, performs their duties, and behaves according to societal norms. If all is well, Perchta can be surprisingly generous, giving gifts to the old and the needy. According to Mogk, Perchta will often bless a field with fertility, causing an abundance of crops. The lucky farmer will see a mysterious “fertilizing mist” drifting over the field, accompanied by Perchta flying by in a white veil.
Stories and tales of Frau Perchta
In one story narrated by Grimm, it becomes clear that Perchta could be fooled. One night, on January 5, in the village of Oppurg in Thuringia, Germany, Perchta visited a spinning room and was enraged to find it brimming with “merry-making guests.” She handed the offending spinners twelve empty spinning reels and demanded they be filled with cloth within the hour. After Perchta left, one “saucy girl” grabbed a roll of fiber and wrapped it around the empty reels. The others then helped her spin two or three thicknesses of thread over it so that the reels looked full. When Pertcha returned she was surprised to find the full reels and walked away shaking her head, apparently leaving the spinners unharmed.
In another tale, a miner was walking to Koenitz, Germany, one night when he stumbled upon the ghastly figure of Frau Perchta. She demanded with threats that he “put a wedge in her wagon.” The terrified man grabbed his knife and cut a wedge from wood, which he then fitted to the creature’s wagon. Perchta made a show of giving him the fallen wood chips as a present, which the miner carefully placed in his pockets before fleeing for his life. The following morning, the man awoke to find gold coins had replaced the chips in his pockets.
These stories became quite common as every year on the Twelfth Day of Christmas, Perchta would do her rounds punishing the lazy and feckless while rewarding those who agreed to help her. A word of warning comes in the tale of a man who tried to force an encounter with Perchta. One year, a man heard his employer talk of a strange meeting with the creature when he had helped fix her hatchet and awoke in the morning to find a gold coin. That man decided to wait twelve months and return to the same spot where his employer had stumbled upon Perctha. He waited for her to appear, hoping to fix her hatchet and gain a shiny gold coin. However, when she finally emerged, she angrily shouted, “What seekest thou here at this hour?” He stammered out his answer, to which Perchta responded, “I am better provided with tools this time, so take thou thy due!’ and she dug her hatchet into the man’s shoulder.
The perchten dance festival occurs every year in the Austrian mountains
The Perchtenlauf or perchten dance (perchten is plural for Perchta) is an ancient festival or parade that has been performed by villagers in Austria and Bavaria since the medieval era at the latest. Between Christmas Day and Epiphany, people dress up as Frau Perchta and dance or run through the streets. In the 16th century, there were two forms of the festival, the Schönperchten (beautiful Perchten) and the Schiachperchten (ugly Perchten). The former would involve bright and beautiful costumes with the aim of bringing good luck to the people of the town. In contrast, the latter would involve dark, evil-looking costumes, and the participants would go from house to house, attempting to drive out evil spirits.
This festival still takes place today and is particularly popular in the Salzburg region of Austria.
References
Goodwin, Grace Eliza. “Step aside, Krampus: Austria and Bavaria’s Christmas villain is a demon that disembowels children,” at BusinessInsider.com. Accessed December 11, 2024.
Grimm, Jacob. “Teutonic Mythology,” (1882), Volume 1, trans.: James Steven Stallybrass, Pub.: George Bell. Accessed December 11, 2024.
Krämer, Manuela. “Who is Mrs. Perchta?” at Federkunst.de. Accessed December 11, 2024.
Mogk, Eugen. “Mythologie,” (1891), Pub.: Trübner. Accessed December 11, 2024.
Morris, Stephen. “Perchta and the 12 Days of Christmas,” in Stephenmorrisauthor.com. Accessed December 11, 2024.