ALT

Hey, y’all, it’s Weird Wednesday! Where on some Wednesdays, I blog about weird stuff and give writing prompts.

Today: The Brocken Spectre: Angel in the Clouds

Welcome on this Weird Wednesday! Today, we’re chasing our shadows.

A Brocken spectre or Brocken bow is a type of atmospheric phenomenon called a glory. A person stands in front of a light source and their shadow is thrown onto mist, fog, or clouds. When this happens, the person’s shadow is surrounded by what seems to be a halo: rainbow-colored concentric rings, caused by light refracting off water droplets in the air.

A Brocken spectre specifically is formed when a person stands in front of a light source (usually the sun) while at a great height, casting a shadow onto clouds below themselves. Not only is there a glory visible, but the shadow appears to be enormous. The size is an optical illusion caused by the person’s inability to gauge how close their shadow actually is: it seems to be quite far away, and thus looks huge compared to objects on the horizon. But in reality, the shadow is cast onto water droplets that are very close.

The phenomenon is named after the Brocken, the tallest mountain in the Harz range in Germany, which often has clouds below its summit. But the Brocken spectre can be seen from any suitably high place under the right conditions, including tall buildings and even airplanes.

To make the phenomenon even cooler, when the mist and clouds shift with the wind, the Brocken spectre often seems to dance or move. You can see a video of a Brocken spectre moving here.

Check out the blog post for the whole story and some writing prompts, such as:

Anointed leader. Let’s say your fictional society uses the Brocken spectre as a way of choosing political or military leaders. That is, folks march up to the top of the hill one by one, and when a candidate is seen in glory, that’s assumed to be the choice of the Mountain God or other deity. It would be spectacular to see one’s future leader illuminated in a rainbow glow. But is the phenomenon actually a divine decision or the randomness of weather? And could it possibly be faked?

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ The Vampire Haven erotic romance series ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers

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ALT

Hey, y’all, it’s Weird Wednesday! Where on some Wednesdays, I blog about weird stuff and give writing prompts.

Today: Corpse Roads and Coffin Stones

Welcome to Weird Wednesday! Today we’re wandering weird roads that go to graveyards. Sound fun? Let’s go!

Corpse roads are paths over which one carries a coffin to its final resting place. Like crossroads, corpse roads are physical places with metaphysical properties, according to folklore. Such pathways are found all over the world, but the origin of corpse roads in Great Britain is a little more political than you might expect.

Back in late medieval times, the population was growing, so people were building new churches and their associated graveyards. Some established churches insisted that new outlying churches were under their spiritual (and financial) control. Thus, they had to use the graveyards of the mother church, even though they were sometimes quite a distance away.

So how to get the dearly departed to their final destination? Unless you had money for transportation, you and a few friends had to carry the coffin. Thus, paths sprung up between far flung churches and central cemeteries. These paths were called corpse roads, funeral roads, coffin walks, lych ways (lych or lich is a Germanic word for corpse), and other similar names. Eventually, the outlying churches did break away and make their own cemeteries, so corpse roads ceased to be used, though some are still preserved today as footpaths.

Often, corpse roads were as straight as possible through rough terrain, because, well, coffins are pretty heavy. In fact, sometimes large stones along the way were used as places to rest the dearly deceased for a while. These are called “coffin stones.”

But there may have been other reasons for straight roads and resting stones. 

Check out the blog post for the whole story and some writing prompts, such as:

The long and winding road. Not all stories about a corpse road have to be creepy. You could have a family drama that takes place in one scene: the hours-long journey over a corpse road. Let the reader glean the family’s backstory: its loves, arguments, history, and future. All crystalized around the death of someone central to the family, and the difficult march where they share the burden of carrying the coffin.

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ The Vampire Haven erotic romance series ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers

Image credit

ALT

Hey, y’all, it’s Weird Wednesday! Where on some Wednesdays, I blog about weird stuff and give writing prompts.

Today: Corpse Roads and Coffin Stones

Welcome to Weird Wednesday! Today we’re wandering weird roads that go to graveyards. Sound fun? Let’s go!

Corpse roads are paths over which one carries a coffin to its final resting place. Like crossroads, corpse roads are physical places with metaphysical properties, according to folklore. Such pathways are found all over the world, but the origin of corpse roads in Great Britain is a little more political than you might expect.

Back in late medieval times, the population was growing, so people were building new churches and their associated graveyards. Some established churches insisted that new outlying churches were under their spiritual (and financial) control. Thus, they had to use the graveyards of the mother church, even though they were sometimes quite a distance away.

So how to get the dearly departed to their final destination? Unless you had money for transportation, you and a few friends had to carry the coffin. Thus, paths sprung up between far flung churches and central cemeteries. These paths were called corpse roads, funeral roads, coffin walks, lych ways (lych or lich is a Germanic word for corpse), and other similar names. Eventually, the outlying churches did break away and make their own cemeteries, so corpse roads ceased to be used, though some are still preserved today as footpaths.

Often, corpse roads were as straight as possible through rough terrain, because, well, coffins are pretty heavy. In fact, sometimes large stones along the way were used as places to rest the dearly deceased for a while. These are called “coffin stones.”

But there may have been other reasons for straight roads and resting stones. 

Check out the blog post for the whole story and some writing prompts, such as:

The long and winding road. Not all stories about a corpse road have to be creepy. You could have a family drama that takes place in one scene: the hours-long journey over a corpse road. Let the reader glean the family’s backstory: its loves, arguments, history, and future. All crystalized around the death of someone central to the family, and the difficult march where they share the burden of carrying the coffin.

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ The Vampire Haven erotic romance series ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers

Image credit

Hey, y’all, it’s Weird Wednesday! Where on some Wednesdays, I blog about weird stuff and give writing prompts.

Today: Superstitions About Death: Mirrors, Bees, and Open Windows

Welcome on this Weird Wednesday! Death is a natural part of life, and humans are naturally superstitious. A deathbed is a highly emotional and sometimes fearful place, so it’s not surprising we’ve developed a slew of superstitions about this inevitable event. So let’s take a look into a room with all the doors open and mirrors covered…

Superstitions about death fall into two main categories: actions meant to ease the passage of a dying person, and actions taken after the death to ensure the soul rests easy (and that death doesn’t visit others in the household).

At a Deathbed

Some superstitions about death work on the belief that physical things can hinder a metaphysical passage. For example, if the deathbed itself is lying perpendicular to floor boards or ceiling beams, it’s thought to keep the dying person from making an easy exit. Deathbeds may thus be moved so the bed is lying parallel to the boards and beams. (In fact, the floorboard thing is said to be so powerful that lying crossways can cause nightmares or even the death of a healthy person.)

Check out the blog post for the whole story and some writing prompts, such as:

Stay a while. The idea that you can prolong the dying process by placing the bed across the boards or closing doors is also creepy. What if you had a character who wanted to do that…on purpose? Maybe they hate the dying person. Maybe they want them to answer a question. Or maybe they just can’t bear to let them go.

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers

Hey, y’all, it’s Weird Wednesday! Where on some Wednesdays, I blog about weird stuff and give writing prompts.

Today: Superstitions About Death: Mirrors, Bees, and Open Windows

Welcome on this Weird Wednesday! Death is a natural part of life, and humans are naturally superstitious. A deathbed is a highly emotional and sometimes fearful place, so it’s not surprising we’ve developed a slew of superstitions about this inevitable event. So let’s take a look into a room with all the doors open and mirrors covered…

Superstitions about death fall into two main categories: actions meant to ease the passage of a dying person, and actions taken after the death to ensure the soul rests easy (and that death doesn’t visit others in the household).

At a Deathbed

Some superstitions about death work on the belief that physical things can hinder a metaphysical passage. For example, if the deathbed itself is lying perpendicular to floor boards or ceiling beams, it’s thought to keep the dying person from making an easy exit. Deathbeds may thus be moved so the bed is lying parallel to the boards and beams. (In fact, the floorboard thing is said to be so powerful that lying crossways can cause nightmares or even the death of a healthy person.)

Check out the blog post for the whole story and some writing prompts, such as:

Stay a while. The idea that you can prolong the dying process by placing the bed across the boards or closing doors is also creepy. What if you had a character who wanted to do that…on purpose? Maybe they hate the dying person. Maybe they want them to answer a question. Or maybe they just can’t bear to let them go.

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers

On this day in 1863, the US Civil War's Battle of Chickamauga began. The two-day battle had nearly 35,000 casualties—the second-highest in the US Civil War, after Gettysburg. The Confederacy won the battle, but ultimately lost the war.

If ghosts are created by trauma and tragedy, then battlefields would make for heavy hauntings. Civil War battlefields are no exception—Chickamauga’s got the usual phantom sounds of canons and fighting, ghostly lanterns of grieving family members come to find their dead soldiers, and even a White Lady searching for her lover. But then there’s one guy that just doesn’t fit.

Old Green Eyes is pretty much just that—green eyes, floating in the woods. Sometimes he’s got a body, and sometimes that body is human-like, but most of the time, he’s just a pair of glowing eyes. And nobody seems to know what the guy is doing there. What on earth does he have to do with the Battle of Chickamauga? Or anything else?

Check out the blog post for the whole story and some ghostly writing prompts, such as:

The blood cries out. When you think about disembodied glowing eyes in the woods, a human ghost is not what first springs to mind. So perhaps the trauma at Chickamauga attracted something else to the blood-soaked woods: a demon. There are a lot of ways to use this idea in a story. Perhaps the demon is an active malevolent presence that threatens people who live nearby, or at least those who walk through the woods. Or perhaps he’s just doing his own thing, enjoying the 160-year-old battlefield and ignoring present-day folks. Or maybe over 160 years, he’s become sorrowful at what happened in those woods and now he’s protective of the locals.

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers

This month in 1803 a man named Thomas Myers was born. His uneasy nocturnal habits would give rise to the story that 50 Berkeley Square in Mayfair, London, was haunted.

But Myers is not the only thing said to be in that house.

Read the whole story on my blog and get some ghostly writing prompts, such as:

Hold my beer. It’s funny how when you say things like “Nobody can spend a night in this house,” you get a long line of brave idiots volunteering to do exactly that. (There is a related trope, where they absolutely do not volunteer, such as in the story The Vampire and St. Michael, which I found when researching my post on vampires being compelled to count objects.) There are various possible motivations for a character willing to spend the night in a haunted house. It could be money or treasure (as in the movie House on Haunted Hill), bragging rights, an attempt to “cleanse” the house, overconfidence, or curiosity. The idea that someone can go from normality to complete terror in a very short amount of time is desperately fascinating. Some people are willing to risk death to find out what it is.

DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers