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Grýla and the Yule Lads
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CHRISTMAS isn’t all joyful celebrations, carol singing and receiving presents from Santa.
In fact, the festive season has a more sinister side, with demons who sound more appropriate for Halloween seeking out naughty children to drag into the underworld, or monsters roaming the land to find people to eat.
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Here NATASHA WYNARCZYK rounds up some of the creepiest Christmas stories from around the world...
The Krampus Half-demon, half-goat, the Austrian Krampus is one of the best-known frightening festive figures, and was the subject of a 2015 film starring Toni Collette.
The sinister clawed Krampus, sidekick to the benevolent Saint Nicholas, is thought to roam the streets seeking out naughty children. When he finds them, he either kidnaps them and drags them back to the underworld or eats them.
On December 5, Austrians celebrate Krampusnacht, where revellers dress up at the beast and parade through the streets.
Mari Lywd
It sounds like something out of a nightmare... revellers turning up to your home with a horse skeleton dressed up in ribbons, bells and a sheet and demanding to be let in.
This is an old Christmas custom from south Wales, where the troupe will engage whoever answers the door in a battle of verses and insults.
If the troupe wins, they can come in for food and drink – and the ghostly-looking horse, which is called the Mari Lwyd, will scare away anything unwanted from the year.
Grýla and the Yule Lads
A monstrous ogress comes down from the mountains around Christmas time to kidnap, cook and feast on naughty children.
But the legend of the Icelandic Grýla was so scary that the government once reportedly stepped in to forbid the use of it as a parenting technique.
She is believed to be the mother of the 13 Yule Lads, who sound benevolent but are actually evil characters – with sinister names such as Meat Hook, Window Peeper and Doorway Sniffer, who also devour
misbehaving kids.
The Yule Cat Another big creepy Icelandic critter, the Yule Cat, or jólakötturinn, towers over houses to see if people got new clothes for didn’t, they w the monstrou Grýla’s pet.
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