Folklore
Nicaragua is a country
rich with culture and folklore. Many of the tales in Nicaraguan folklore
come from a tradition of oral story telling and tell of mysterious or
even scary characters that are known to all Nicaraguans. Here are a
couple of myths from Nicaragua’s folklore.
 Probably
the scariest character from Nicaraguan folklore is called La Cegua. La
Cegua is a witch who lives in the woods, but who is said to have many
different appearances. All of her depictions, however, portray her as a
ghastly and corpse-like figure. It is believed that she walks through
the woods naked awaiting her victims and it is believed that men are
attracted to her ghost-like silhouette. La Cegua speaks to men in words
that are so terrible that the victim goes insane and never are able to
recover. She also possesses super natural qualities and is able to walk
through solid objects, lift off the ground and even fly in her attempts
to attract men and then torture them. The way to avoid her is to carry
mustard seeds and throw them in front of her, at which point she will
apparently stop to attempt to pick up the seeds. The point of this
particular tale is to make sure that men do not wander off and instead
come straight home after work.
Another prominent folkloric character is that
of La Carretanagua.
La Carretanagua is a very typical character in Nicaraguan folklore, and
the tale is a blend of historical truth and the imaginative oral
tradition. The story comes from the presence of the Spaniards in the 16th
century and the caravans that moved through the land as the Spaniards
conquered various indigenous territories in the country. The Spaniards
would plunder the settlements, taking their gold and supplies as well as
taking human slaves that were then chained and brought along on these
raids. The legend therefore says that La Carretanagua is a man who
travels from town to town in the middle of the night making noise with
is ox-pulled cart full of dead souls. The legend goes that when people
in the town hear this noise made by La Carretanagua, that the next day
someone from the town is dead. The cart is supposedly in the shape of a
cross and therefore is unable to turn corners, only being able to
disappear when it reaches the end of a road. *
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Updated: 8 May
2008
*Source: (www.nicaragua.com) |
