Horror legend about a gruesome sight – children walled up?

Old belief

Horror legend from Bremen: Were children sacrificed and walled up?

In Bremen, people used to tell each other many legendary stories. However, one of them is particularly scary. Were children actually sacrificed in the city?

It’s an old legend that sounds outrageous, but was haunted in Bremen a long time ago. The Bremen writer Friedrich Wagenfeld wrote them down in the second volume of his work “Bremen’s Folk Legends” from 1845.

“The ancient people of Bremen believed that they could make their fortifications insurmountable by walling up an innocent child, just as the remains of a child were actually revealed when the bridge gate was demolished a few years ago,” the book says. This legend is called “Old Belief”.

The fortifications refer to the former Bremen city wall, which enclosed the old town. From 1803 it was gradually demolished and today’s ramparts were created. Ten city gates made it possible for residents and guests to enter and leave Bremen in a controlled manner. Part of the old city wall can still be seen today at the back of the Christmas shop (Marterburg 45) in the Schnoorviertel. There are also remains at the GOP Theater in Überseestadt.

But is there actually any traditional evidence that children were sacrificed and their bones were found in the masonry? The answer is: no.

The story must obviously be an unprovable legend, a spokesman for the Bremen Senate Chancellery tells t-online. This conclusion was reached after consultation with the state monument preservation department and the state archives.

“Experts assured me that the curiosities reported in Wagenfeld’s folk tales were mostly unsubstantiated – one could also say: fictitious,” the spokesman continued.

In fact, Friedrich Wagenfeld, who died in Bremen in 1846, was not considered a trustworthy writer. He himself made no secret of the fact that his folk tales were not necessarily based on facts. In the preface to his work he writes that he sometimes “heavily embellished” his material and distanced himself from the “scientific collector of legends”. He interpreted the legends from a “majority point of view,” which probably means that he liked to let his imagination run wild.