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The Utburd of Børholmen and Erika Larsdatter Bogen: A Haunting and Scam That Reached the Courtroom

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In 1852, the alleged psychic Erika Larsdatter Bogen, arrived at Børholmen, a small island in western Norway. She claimed that she had found the ghost and corpse of the dead child, and she named the mother who allegedly buried it. But what was the truth?

In Norwegian folklore, few spirits are as disturbing as the utburd, the ghost of an unwanted child left to die and denied a proper burial. These beings were said to cry, whisper, and wander restlessly, demanding justice or release. Sometimes in these stories, they would come back and accuse their parents for murder. 

Read More: Check out all ghost stories from Norway

Most utburd stories belong to legend and oral tradition, but one case from western Norway in the mid-1800s went far beyond fireside storytelling. It ended not with prayers or exorcism, but in a courtroom.

Børholmen: Børholmen lies right out to sea just south of the entrance to the Sognefjord. The islet lies between Kversøy to the west and Grima and Lomannsøy to the east. Despite its close contact with the North Sea, the islet is sheltered from most winds and is sheltered from the sea swells. On the east side of Børholmen we find the old trading and inn. Børholmen was not registered until 1838, but had been a trading and innkeeper’s town since the late 17th century. Here they received fish that was put into barrels and sent on to Bergen.

Crying of an Utburd Beneath the Floor

In 1852, people living on Børholmen in Eivindvik on the windy west coast, reported something deeply unsettling at the small island with less than 20 living there. At night, they claimed to hear crying and faint whining sounds coming from beneath the floor of the living room. The noises were described as those of a child, soft yet persistent, impossible to ignore. In a society where belief in spirits was still widespread, the explanation came quickly. Many believed the sounds were caused by an utburd that had returned to lament its fate. But what was the truth behind the rumours, and exactly who were they who claimed to hear it?

Utburd: The word utburd comes from Old Norse útburðr, meaning “that which is taken outside.” In traditional rural Norway, this term referred to a child who had been abandoned or left to die in the wild because the family could not care for it or because it was born out of wedlock, a deep social stigma at the time. In the old folk imagination, these children did not pass peacefully into the afterlife. Many were left unbaptized and were buried outside consecrated ground. Because they never received Christian rites, their souls were believed unable to enter heaven or find peace. Instead, they became something darker: a ghost driven by need and grievance.

Into this tense situation stepped Erika Larsdatter Bogen, a young woman from Lindås, an island not too far from Børholmen, who was known locally for claiming clairvoyant abilities. Born in 1828, she was only in her early twenties when she announced that she could communicate with the spirit beneath the floor.

She was described by the priest responsible for her confirmation as poor and the youngest of six siblings from a farm. She was also said to have been vain, and would always have a mirror she could check herself with and not interested in the words of God at all. After her confirmation she was sent out to work, but by Christmas 1951, she was back with her parents with too many people to feed. This is when her alleged gift revealed itself. 

She claimed to have started hearing knocking sounds in the walls of her parents room and passed out and claimed that an angel had visited her and given her the gift of sight. She fell ill and had to stay in bed for weeks.

A Ghost Names its Parents as Killers

After she had come to herself, she started to travel around with her gifts as far as Bergen. People wanted to talk to her about her abilities. She never asked for payment during her travels, but never refused when it was offered. She wasn’t met without controversies, although she became popular. A priest said about her so-called angel who told her about stuff:

“If something supernatural revealed itself to her, it is no good angel, but either Satan, the lord of darkness himself or some of his angels.” – Priest Holtermann

This is how she ended up at Børholmen. She had tired the locals on Lindås, and she moved to Eivindvik, where she was given housing at the vicarage. When she arrived she looked tired and her clothing was torn. Her grand tour of being psychic hadn’t been too lucrative.  

Strange things started to happen over the next months, but only when Erika was present and this happened when she moved into the house of Peder Jakobssønn at Børholmen who wanted to have her around to talk about ghosts and angels she claimed she got the information from.. 

The Inn: After the inn and trade ended, the people on Børholmen became fishermen and small farmers. Agriculture was more or less shut down in the 1950s. Up until today – March 2001, there have been people who have made a living from fishing. Now five people live here.

According to Erika, the crying came from an utburd that revealed not only its suffering, but also its identity. The spirit allegedly named its parents as Kristine Kværnøen and Knut Stevnebø, accusing them of having killed the child and buried it in secret. Kristine was a 30 year old woman who had given her clothing and kindness when Erika first arrived. Knut was a man Erika knew from Bergen, and she claimed that Kristine had gone there five years ago and gotten pregnant. Kristine and Knut had served at a house together six years ago. 

Erika further claimed that the ghost told her exactly where its remains could be found. The Utburd didn’t say if it was stillborn or killed at birth. It was also claimed that Kristina was after Peder Jakobsønn’s 18 year old son, Knut, whom she had seen talking in church at times. Erika claimed that she wanted to protect Knut from Kristine’s clutches.

She reportedly dug at the indicated spot and produced a piece of cloth containing two bones. If her story had been true, it could have led to a serious criminal case for infanticide, one of the most feared and morally charged crimes of the time. Rumors spread quickly, and suspicion fell heavily on the accused parents as well as Erika.

Doubt and Investigation of Erika Larsdatter Bogen

However, not everyone was convinced and Kristine took the accusations with surprisingly calmness. But when Erika didn’t want to back down with the haunting and claims that Kristine’s Utburd ghost was haunting the area, she reported Erika to the police. Erika didn’t show up at her hearing and an officer was sent out to investigate this strange case. 

The cloth Erika presented appeared with the bones appeared new, not five years old and buried, and the bones did not seem to belong to a newborn child. These inconsistencies raised serious doubts about the entire story more so than the question of the ghost did.

During Erika’s interrogation, events took an even stranger turn. A thin, piping voice suddenly interrupted the questioning, seemingly defending Erika. Some present believed this to be the voice of the ghost itself. The sheriff could not be certain where the sound came from, but he noticed something telling. Each time the voice was heard, Erika moved her head from side to side, and just before the sound appeared, she brought her fingers to the corners of her mouth.

From these observations, the sheriff reached a conclusion. Erika was not speaking with a ghost. She was practicing ventriloquism and was a fraud.

From Haunting to Fraud

The case shifted dramatically. What began as a terrifying ghost story became an accusation of deliberate deception. The authorities concluded that Erika Bogen had fabricated the entire haunting and had falsely accused two innocent people of a crime that could have destroyed their lives.

The county governor, Amtmann Landmark of Nordre Bergenhus, ordered that Erika be prosecuted. She initially avoided trial by claiming to be too weak and frail to appear in court. During this period, she married Knut Børholmen, the man who she had tried to keep away from Kristine, and the couple moved to Bergen, where they opened a small business and attempted to start anew.

On 31 May 1854, Erika was finally brought to justice as she couldn’t keep a low profile and again started to claim she could talk with ghosts, starting a ruckus in a house in Bergen as well. The district court in Ytre Sogn sentenced her to seven months of hard labor. She appealed the verdict, but the case reached the Supreme Court, which took an even harsher view. The court ruled that her serious and unfounded accusations against Kristine Kværnøen warranted no less than one year of hard labor, along with legal costs. The prosecution was led by Bernhard Dunker, a prominent legal figure of the time.

Apparently, Knut had sent her a letter, saying that he bore Erika no warm feelings. Many speculate though that Knut was one of her helpers with the haunting. Still, when Erika was imprisoned, she was pregnant with her own child, a daughter that Knut came to pick up after she gave birth in prison. And according to records, it looks like they had seven children in total. Locally, she has been remembered as Rikke Bokken.

And a case of accusing someone of burying children, ended up with her having some of her own. 

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References:

Børholmen – Wikipedia

Utburd – Wikipedia

Erika Larsdatter Bogen : gjengangerhistorier fra Bergenskanten i 1850-Aarene

Kremmarleiet på Børholmen | Kringom

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Spiritism and the Religion of Spirit Communication

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Spiritism or Kardecism is a philosophy and religion of spirit communication. After being inspired by the Spiritualist movement, the French Allan Kardec developed the loose movement of seances, mediums and communicating with the dead into something people still practice today. 

There is a debate about whether or not we should call the spiritism movement a religion or not, but it certainly was a movement together with Spiritualism that impacted the western world and how they view death, the afterlife and ghosts and the paranormal.

The Spiritism Movement was started by the French author and teacher Allan Kardec and is also called Kardecist spiritism or Kardecism. A simple way of explaining the difference between Spiritualism that grew in popularity in North America was that Spiritism was mainly in Europe and although much alike was much more organized and had a stricter doctrine. Today, the word spiritism is used for most of the religious and doctrines believing that the spirits go on after the body dies. 

He believed in physical reality and that alongside that, there was another spirit world. This world, he believed, could be accessed through mediums and that spirits exist separately from human bodies. 

Most of the practice of Spiritism is around the mediumship and communicating with the dead. It can manifest in automatic writing or drawing among other psychographic ways. 

Read More: Spiritualism and the Occult: Automatic Writing and When Ghosts Slide Into Your DMs 

The spiritists also believe in reincarnation and that the spirit is constantly trying to achieve intellectual and moral perfection. 

The Spiritism Movement as we know it today started in Europe in the 1850s, but soon spread, becoming very popular in the USA, Brazil and in the French colonies. 

Allan Kardec and the Founding of Spiritism

Allan Kardec’s real name was Léon-Dénizarth-Hippolyte Rivail and was really the one that organized the loose movement in Europe to a path with a certain doctrine and way of thinking. He was born in 1804 in Lyon in France and studied in Switzerland. When coming back to Paris he purchased a school for boys in 1928 and was a teacher.

Read More: Check out the story of the haunted Paris’ Haunted Père Lachaise Cemetery, were Kardec is buried.

He was in his 50s when he became interested in séances and started researching them and compiling the consistent things the mediums talked about into a philosophy he called Spiritism. The name Allan Kardec was a name picked out by a spirit called Truth. 

Table Tipping and Communicating with the Dead

A very popular pastime in Europe at the time was animal magnetism, mesmerising and what would eventually be called Table Tipping. This was equally seen as pure fun as well as a séance. Although a skeptic at first, Kardec became interested in the phenomenon and started to explore it as well. 

Table Tipping: Table levitates during Palladino’s séance at home of astronomer Camille Flammarion, France, 25 November 1898. There are two women seated at the table. Palladino sits at the far short end.

Kardec studied the phenomenon and concluded in The Book on Mediums that some communications were caused by an outside intelligence, as the message contained information that was not known to the group.

Read More: Table Turning: When Spirits Spill the Tea Through Furniture

Skeptics and those exposing the truth behind the table turning chucks it up to the ideomotor effect, not ghosts trying to communicate through furniture. The movement experienced in the seances was due to involuntary and unconscious muscular reactions. This scientific explanation was published in the Medical Times and Gazette in 1853, but that didn’t stop its popularity or people believing in it, it only made the hoaxes more elaborate. 

Spiritualism and the Fox Sisters

In addition to European dabbling in the occult already, Kardec became increasingly more interested in Spiritualism from the USA. It was a popular movement that had started with communication with the dead’s spirits. This movement is often connected with the popularity of Margaret and Catherine Fox who kicked off the Spiritualism movement in the USA with their table rapping. 

The Fox sisters: Kate (1838–92), Leah (1814–90) and Margaret (or Maggie) (1836–93). They were famous mediums in Rochester, New York. Taken around 1852

Since childhood they had been famous ever since they communicated with spirits in 1848 with the spirit haunting their home in New York. They later came to Europe to hold public séances.

Read More: The Spiritualist Movement: The Fox Sisters Who Started a Ghostly Revolution as a Prank

Allan Kardec was definitely directly inspired by this, but narrowed the belief system down to one doctrine. For example, Spiritualists do not necessarily believe in reincarnation but this part was important for the Spiritists. He worked to distance himself from fortune-tellers, mediums and magicians from the movement of the time, many of those often ending in trouble when discovered as a fraud.

The Spiritist Codification

Kardec’s first of five foundational Spiritist texts was 1857’s The Spirits’ Book. More than a book on ghosts, it’s a collection of philosophical questions Kardec asked mediums around in Europe. This was also an effort to bridge both religion, science and philosophy to one thing that he himself called a “Positive Faith”. More books followed and collectively, they are called the Spiritist Codification. 

Spiritists believe all humans are spirits, and the body is only a temporary vessel. After you die, the spirit crosses into the spirit world where it resided around the same time it was alive last before being reincarnated. 

It also adheres a lot to the Christian belief in one god as well as the rules science dictates. When Kardec developed his idea, it was definitely through the lens of a christian. Spiritists often cite biblical events to make their claim of how spirits exist, like how Moses consulted the dead, how Saul heard the spirit of Samuel. 

After Kardec died in 1869, medium and writer Léon Denis who had met Kardec many times, continued with his legacy and furthered its popularity. 

Backlash Against the Movement of Spiritism

Although the Spiritism Movement became popular and came from a place of Christianity, it wasn’t without controversy. Critics saw the movement as evil and devil worship. Many of the mediums were also accused of being frauds and charlatans, profiting on people’s grief and fear of the afterworld. 

Read More: Spiritualism and the Occult: The History of Ectoplasm and Gooey Ghosts

In Europe, this type of mediating and communication with spirits have been prosecuted since the middle ages, mostly because it was seen as blasphemous behavior. British witchcraft laws used against mediums were not repealed until the 1950s when the last woman was convicted for witchcraft.

Helen Duncan: Born in Scotland in 1898. In 1926 Duncan claimed to have developed her mediumistic powers. She was around 29 years old at the time. But long before that she had scared her fellow pupils at with her dire prophecies and hysterical behavior. Eventually, Duncan claimed to be able to produced fully-formed physical materialization of spirits by emitting them as ectoplasm through her mouth.

Also scientists attacked the movement, calling it madness, hysteria and fanciful without root in science and the real world. The Roman church condemned it, Brazil even banned it. Counter-movement to expose mediums, like Harry Houdini did for years, started as well. 

What Happened to Spiritism?

Freud: Although said to not believe in the paranormal, Freud once wrote: “Though I am a man of science, I cannot dismiss the idea that ghosts might embody our suppressed desires and unfulfilled wishes.”

With so much hype and popularity that only seemed to be growing at the turn of the century, it begs the question of why Spiritism isn’t a bigger movement today as before. The answer to that might be as boring as timing. 

Two big factors happened at the time that fought against the Spiritism Movement of Spiritualism. One of them was the discipline of psychology that started to take hold of people, especially modern and well read people in Europe. The very same group that a couple of decades ago would probably have turned to Spiritism or some sort of Spiritualism.

Sigmund Freud, who denied all existence of ghosts, was a leading voice going forward, and although some of the earlier psychologists played around with the idea of a spirit world, their voices weren’t strong enough. Although his official stance on ghosts have been to not believe in them, he had some interesting musings and discussions of the concept of ghosts and the supernatural.

The other thing happening in Europe at the time was World War 1 and had a big impact on culture. The war and fear of war stopped a lot of new ideas and thinking that flourished in more peaceful times. Who knows how the movement would have progressed if not for the European wars that century?

Were are the Spiritists Today?

But did Spiritism completely die? Through French colonialism the texts and ideas spread to the colonies in the 19th century to the mid-20th century, especially in Vietnam. Here, the movement and idea was crucial for the Cao Dai religion that started in Vietnam in 1926. The age-old traditions was a mix of Asian divination and mediumship from Vietnamese folk religion with ancestor worship, Confucianism, occult practices from Taoism, theories of karma and rebirth from Buddhism.

Caodaism: Cao Dai monks inside Cao Dai Holy See, Tây Ninh, Vietnam. Priests are dressed in red, blue and yellow, followers in white. The full name of the religion is Đại Đạo Tam Kỳ Phổ Độ (大道三期普度) ‘The Great Faith for the Third Universal Redemption’.

French Spiritists Mediums travelled to Saigon, which today is Ho Chi Minh City and interacted with the Cao Dai mediums. They then began to mix with the new traditions of European Spiritism with the old. Some of them even claimed they had been visited by the spirit of Kardec. 

In addition to the French Colonies, the Spiritism Movement spread to Latin America as well, where it had a big impact on Brazil, even though they banned it in 1890. Today it is the third most popular religion in Brazil. 

The mediums also channel spirits for healing purposes and in Brazil they had around 13000 Spiritists centers that are a sort of physical or mental aid facility in 2022. This can be various ways, often a “laying of hands” much like they do with Reiki to heal energy.

Laying of the Hand: In Christian churches, chirotony or “Laying of the Hand”, is used as both a symbolic and formal method of invoking the Holy Spirit primarily during baptisms and confirmations, healing services, blessings, and ordination of priests, ministers, elders, deacons, and other church officers.

Although the Spiritism Movement didn’t have the hold of people as it used to, there are definitely still practitioners today throughout the world. Today, the International Spiritist Council claim that they have over 13 million followers in 36 countries.

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References:

Allan Kardec – Wikipedia

Séance | Spiritualism, Mediumship & Clairvoyance | Britannica

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Table Turning: When Spirits Spill the Tea Through Furniture

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One of the earliest ways of communicating with the dead in the modern era was through Table Turning or Table Tipping. For many it was nothing more than a fun parlor trick and game, but for others it became a lifestyle and the foundation of a new spiritual movement.

When it comes to contacting the dead, humanity has tried just about everything—from scribbled seances and Ouija boards to full-blown ghost-hunting TV shows with night vision cameras, spirit boxes and EMF readers. But before the high-tech ghost gadgets and Hollywood dramatics, there was a simpler (and much wobblier) method: table tipping. Known also as table turning or table tilting, this Victorian-era parlor game blurred the line between a quirky party trick and a deep dive into the supernatural. 

Table Turning: Image published in the magazine l’Illustration in 1853 to illustrate an article entitled: History of the week

A Wobbly Beginning: The History of Table Tipping

The roots of table tipping dig deep into the mid-19th century, during the spiritualism boom that gripped America and Europe. The year was 1848, and the infamous Fox Sisters of Hydesville, New York, had the world spellbound with their “spirit rapping” escapades. They claimed they could communicate with the dead through a series of knocks and taps—a revelation that sent Victorian society into a frenzy of séance-hosting and ghost-chasing.

The Fox Sisters: Leah (April 8, 1813 – November 1, 1890), Margaretta (also called Maggie), (October 7, 1833 – March 8, 1893) and Catherine Fox (also called Kate) (March 27, 1837 – July 2, 1892). The Fox sisters were three sisters from Rochester, New York who played an important role in the creation of Spiritualism.

It wasn’t long before people wanted more…action than what the Rochester Rapping from the Fox sisters provided. Why settle for a few spooky knocks when you could have an entire table dance across the room?

Read More: The Spiritualist Movement: The Fox Sisters Who Started a Ghostly Revolution as a Prank

Enter Table Turning, which came to Europe from America in the winter of 1852 when Maria B. Hayden came to London as a medium and quickly became a popular Victorian parlor game and show. The arrival 

of the steamer ‘Washington’ at Bremen in March 1853 is said to have first brought these ‘spiritual gymnastics’ to Germany. The art of table tipping became even more popular in France when it came to Paris in April the same year that had a strong tradition of mesmerism and animal magnetism.

Magnetism: Mesmerists saw Table Turning as a sign of animal magnetism, while fundamentalists condemned it as a work of Satan. Animal magnetism, created by German doctor Franz Mesmer in the 18th century, suggests that all living things have an invisible natural force. This force, known as Lebensmagnetismus, could produce physical effects, including healing. Pictured above: Drawing room scene with many people sitting and standing around a large table; a man on a crutch has an iron band wrapped around his ankle; others in the group are holding bands similarly; to the left, a man has hypnotized a woman.

Participants would sit around a small table, fingertips lightly resting on the surface, and—after a bit of concentration and maybe a dramatic chant or two—the table would begin to rock, tilt, and sometimes even levitate. Supposedly, this was the work of spirits answering questions or simply showing off. Think of it as a supernatural form of charades, except the stakes included possible possession.

Earlier Versions of Table Turning

Although thought today to be a Victorian fad, the art of some sort of divination around a table is much older than when Spiritualism brought it to the masses as a popular game and show. In ancient Rome tables were used for divination called Mensa Divinatoriae.

In fourth-century Ammianus Marcellinus (325-391), a Roman historian, describes a table that had a slab on it with all the letters of the alphabet. Above it was a ring in a thread swinging over the letters and spelling out the words. 

A Message from Satan: Evangelical clergymen claimed that table turning was associated with Satan. Revs. N. S. Godfrey, E. Gillson, and others held séances where the “spirits” admitted to being either bad people or devils. These confessions led the clergymen to condemn table-turning altogether. As they said: ‘Table-moving tested and proved to be the result of Satanic agency’.

Even older examples are from the Christian writer, Tertullian (155-222) who mentioned some sort of table turning when he said to pagans: Do not your magicians call ghosts and departed souls from the shades below, and by their infernal charms represent an infinite number of delusions? And how do they perform all this but by the assistance of angels and spirits, by which they are able to make stools and tables prophecy

There are also those claiming that Jews in the 17th century practiced turning in a work published. Although it was said to be magic, Sabbatai Zevi tried to defend the practice, claiming it was a sacred ritual as singing psalms to God.

The Rules of Table Turning

Gather your friends, Light some candles because, of course, spooky ambiance is crucial, rest your fingertips lightly on the table. No heavy-handed shoving allowed—at least not officially. Ask questions and wait for the table to tip, tilt, or tap in response.

The first such sign was often a quivering motion under the sitters’ hands; it increased until the table pulsated with a mysterious energy. Many sources claim that this usually takes around 10 minutes, perhaps longer, perhaps not at all. After the vibratory stage the table might jerk, tilt, stumble about, spin and eventually become entirely levitated. 

Effect on literature: Eusapia Palladino the table appeared to be somehow alive like the back of a dog. In one of his stories a similar phenomenon occurred during the mediumship of medium D. D. Home induced Alexander Dumas to fantasize the table as an intelligence itself. The conception of a spirit entering furniture became a favorite idea with French authors afterward.Table levitates during Palladino’s séance at home of astronomer Camille Flammarion, France, 25 November 1898. There are two women seated at the table. Palladino sits at the far short end.

Spirits would allegedly answer “yes” or “no” questions by lifting certain legs of the table or tapping out coded messages, often said to be from a deceased close to someone around the table or a well known person. The messages would often take a long time to write down, and tools like the Ouija Board were made to make the communication with the dead easier and faster later.

Read More: The Dark Origins of the Ouija Board: A Mysterious History of Spirit Communication 

The color or type of table wasn’t very important, nor was the type of wood it was made of for most mediums. Many mediums said they preferred that no metals like nails were used as they claimed to be very sensitive to metals. Many also liked to cover the table with a cloth. 

Table Tipping Inspiring a Spiritualist Movement

Table Turning wasn’t just confined to dimly lit living rooms. It caught on with spiritualist circles, prominent mediums, and even some of the intellectual elite. Allan Kardec studied the phenomenon and concluded in The Book on Mediums that some communications were caused by an outside intelligence, as the message contained information that was not known to the group. He eventually went on to kick off the Spiritism movement and religion after this.

Even after the Fox sisters came out and said that it had all been a hoax, the tradition of spiritualism and table turning continued to grow in popularity. But here’s the twist: even when exposed, people still wanted to believe. After all, isn’t it more fun to think a ghost is tilting the kitchen table from the afterlife than to admit your friend is just really bad at keeping his fingers still?

Exposing the Truth Behind the Table Turning

But it wasn’t only inspiring for some, and people started to devote their time to expose the hoax behind table turning. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the writer of Sherlock Holmes was a staunch believer in the practice. Ironically, his fictional detective would have debunked it faster than you can say “elementary.” Even though he wanted to believe it, he spent a lot of time debunking mediums and the hoaxes behind them. 

Table Turning as a Hoax: The magician William Marriott demonstrating a fraudulent method to levitate a table. From On the Edge of the Unknown. Pearson’s Magazine, March-October 1910.

Harry Houdini, the world’s most famous escape artist and part-time ghostbuster, spent much of his later career exposing fraudulent mediums as well. He attended séances incognito, calling out tricksters who used hidden wires, magnets, and even sneaky footwork to get tables dancing. So what was the trick behind the magic?

Harry Houdini: On the stage of the New York Hippodrome, Houdini exposes techniques used by fraudulent mediums in 1925. Some of the methods he exposed was the mechanics behind Table Turning.

Skeptics and those exposing the truth behind the table turning chucks it up to the ideomotor effect, not ghosts trying to communicate through furniture. The movement experienced in the seances was due to involuntary and unconscious muscular reactions. This scientific explanation was published in the Medical Times and Gazette in 1853, but that didn’t stop its popularity or people believing in it, it only made the hoaxes more elaborate. 

This was the case from well meaning people wanting to believe or there would also be those who just performed plain fraud, often looking for money and fame. 

One of these fraudulent methods was described by The magician Chung Ling Soo, or William Ellsworth Robinson that was his real name, involved a pin driven into the table and the use of a ring with a slot on the medium’s finger. Once the pin entered the slot, the table could be lifted.

The Italian spiritualist and medium, Eusapia Palladino, who used custom-made boots with soles that extended beyond the boots’ edges in order to lift tables.

Table Turning: An alleged table levitation of the medium Eusapia Palladino in 1909.

The Paranormal Legacy: Why We Still Love a Good Table Flip

Though Table Turning eventually fell out of fashion—replaced by flashier tools like the Ouija board and EVP recorders—it left a lasting impression on the way we view spirit communication. It tapped into a fundamental human desire: the need to believe that death isn’t the end.

In modern paranormal circles, table tipping has made a bit of a comeback. Some ghost hunters use it in investigations, while others see it as a quaint relic of the spiritualist era. Table Turning sits at that strange intersection of human psychology and the supernatural. It’s a little bit spooky, a little bit silly, and entirely captivating. 

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References:

Table-turning – Wikipedia

Table-turning (or Table-tipping) | Encyclopedia.com

Animal magnetism – Wikipedia

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Kardecist spiritism – Wikipedia