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The Danish ghostly horse spirit Helhest is said to roam around St. Canute’s Cathedral in Odense, Denmark. It is believed seeing the three legged horse is an omen of imminent death.
The Danish ghostly horse spirit Helhest is said to roam around St. Canute’s Cathedral in Odense, Denmark. It is believed seeing the three legged horse is an omen of imminent death.
The name Odense dates back to the pre-Christian era and means “Odins Vi.” and was a place where Odin was worshipped. It is also the site of one of older churches in the country, with a Christian history dating back 900 years.
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Some of the stories have long lines back to the pre-Christian era, like the story of the haunting Helhest that we find traces from the Viking Age and are said to haunt some of the most famous cathedrals in Denmark.
St. Canute’s Cathedral
The church, also called Odense Domkirke or Sankt Knuds Kirke has in one form or another been on Abbey Hill for over 900 years, named after Knud den Hellige, or Canute IV.
The earliest known church on the present location was a travertine church which was reported under construction by Aelnoth of Canterbury, a Benedictine monk at the nearby St. Alban’s Priory in 1095. The foundations of the travertine church can still be seen in the crypt of the present building.
In all it took approximately two hundred years to complete the cathedral, which was finally dedicated on 30 April 1499. The single tower was completed in 1586 over the west entrance in the same style as the rest of the cathedral.
The Helhest in St Knud
The first mention of a “helhest” in Odense dates to 1673, where it is mentioned by Jens Hansen Odense, but if we are to believe the legends, the legends are much older. A helhest, or horse of Hel, in Norse mythology was the horse used by the goddess of death, Hel, to bring the dead to her realm.
Helhest: Gunnar Utsond’s sculpture “Helfærd”, originally from 1890, in front of the former Sjømannsskolen in Oslo . The work depicts Nanna and Balder descending to the realm of the dead Hel on the back of the Hel horse. In Danish folklore, the Hel horse is also a kind of “horse ghost” that can act as a omen of death.
In Odense, it is said there is a “Helhest”, a hel horse. A Helhest is said to be a horse buried alive in a churchyard for good luck before any humans were. According to the legend, it walks on three legs. From the Danish Folklorist, Evald Tang Kristensen it was said that: “In St. Knud’s parish in Odense, a three-legged horse will walk in the cemetery at night like a ghost. In another parish, a sheep with a lamb will walk.”
These particular Church Grimms from early Christianity in Denmark could be either a horse, a lamb or a pig. All animals which were also used as sacrifices in the Viking Age, and particularly horses have been found buried together with people in their graves.
Horse Burial: Equestrian burial was one of the earliest forms of Viking-Age burial to be found in Denmark in the 19th century, although the excavations were often unprofessional and documentation of it is now lacking. But in most viking societies people buried with horses as well as horse sacrifices seems to have been common, as they were connected with the norse Gods as well as fertility. It is said this practice continued in a changed fashion post-christianity, when horses were said to have been buried for good luck when opening a new cemetery. // Illustration from the Birka grave Bj 581 in Sweden.
The Virgin Ghost Haunting the Cathedral
The story of the Helhest is not the only ghost said to haunt the old Cathedral. In the pavement in front of Sankt Knuds Kirke, a stone with a small hole has been preserved. According to the legend, a young woman was once chased through the cathedral, up the church tower by Swedish soldiers invading Odense. Some say that it was during the war of Carl Gustav of Sweden in 1658-60 and that her name was Karen Jørnsdatter.
To save her virtue, she threw herself from the tower to her death. The mark in the stone is said to be the imprint of her foot and called Jomfruspringet, or the Virgin Leap. The stone was once right before the church, but was moved during redirection of the road and can now be found on the corner of Munkemøllestræde. She is sometimes said to have come back to haunt the church.
Image: Claus Thøgersen, Stadsarkivet
The Brothers in the Ghost Carriage
In the church there is a tomb chapel where two brothers from the Glorup Manor are buried. Although their ghosts are not said to haunt the church itself, the legend ties it to their grave.
Legend has it that every night at midnight, they are seen driving in a black carriage with four horses from Odense to Glorup. Arriving in Birkum though, it drives off the road and into the fields, as the roads they once drove on have now moved. But their ghosts don’t realize this, and still drive down the old road they remember.
The Danish ghostly horse spirit Helhest is said to roam around St. Canute’s Cathedral in Odense, Denmark. It is believed seeing the three legged horse is an omen of imminent death.
According to old legends and Danish folklore, there are stories of three legged horses haunting the churches and graveyards in the country. in Saint Olaf’s Church, the spirit of the helhest is said to be the omen of death.
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Moon Mausoleum
