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Ghosts Around the World
By Mark Sunlin
FATE :: October 2002
Ghosts, or ghost beliefs, are more cosmopolitan than many would believe. Some foreign spirits have even invaded the English language: Germany gave us the term poltergeist, meaning “noisy ghost,” for spirited things that go bump (or whoo! or whatever) in the night (or day), while the ancient Romans’ lar was a household ancestral spirit who protected their home and descendants, from which we take the word “larva” for those white, newly hatched insects resembling miniature pillow-case ghosts. What other haunting mysteries lie in global ghost-lore?
The world’s center for ghost lore is probably England. Fully 44 percent of Brits believe in ghosts, while 14 percent, or one in seven, say they have been haunted, according to University of Iceland psychologist Erlendur Haraldsson. Some of such cases have occurred at England’s famed race course, the Derby, which is reputedly haunted by “a specter nicknamed Amy by employees,” reported the Racing Post in 1996. Amy “is believed to be a nurse who worked at Epsom when the building was used as a hospital during the First World War.” One eyewitness, Marilyn Watkinson, recalls that she “got the fright of my life one night when I saw a shadowy shape of a woman moving down the stairs.” Then she “heard a noise like the whistling of the wind. I froze when I saw her; but when I told the workmen, they weren’t at all surprised. They’ve all seen Amy.”
At London’s 130-year-old Royal Albert Hall, the English traditions for ghosts and theater have merged. The building is reputedly home to two ghostly ladies, called “the girls,” who were first sighted in the 1930s and are said to appear each November 2 (two days after Halloween) between 1:30 and 2 a.m. They are said to wear fancy Victorian dresses with ruffles and lace. Even when no specters are seen at the theater, night workmen have complained of “a feeling of unease” and strange noises and drops in temperature. In 1989, theater manager Rivers Howgill saw two ladies dressed in such Victorian clothes. Nothing unusual in a theater. But there was more to it, as he explains: “I heard giggling and female talk, so I went into the corridor where I saw these two women heading towards the kitchen. I said, ‘Excuse me, you can’t go in there.’ They just faded into blackness.” ...
Read the rest of this article in the October 2002 issue of FATE
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