MELUSINA by Laketempest 2010/11/09 12:32
Melusina Luxembourg!
Melusina is said to have been the wife of the founder of Luxembourg, Count Siegfried. When they married, she had one particular request, namely that Siegfried must leave her alone for one full day and night every month, and that he should not ask or try to find out what she was doing. Of course, Melusina was such a beautiful girl, that Siegfried could not refuse her this one small wish, and all went well for years and years, when on the first Wednesday of the month, Melusina would retire into her chambers in the "Casemates," a network of caverns underneath the city, not to be seen again until early light on Thursday.
But one day, Siegfried's curiosity got the better of him. Wondering what on earth she might be doing alone all the time, he peeped through the keyhole, and was shocked to see that Melusina was lying in the bathtub, with a fishtail hanging over the rim. As you all know, mermaids like Melusina, have a very keen sixth sense, which tells them instantly that they are being watched, and thus she recognized her husband through the door, and jumped out of the window into the river Alzette below, never to be seen again. Except every now and then, some people say they have seen a beautiful girl's head pop out of the river, and a fishtail rippling the calm waters of the river Alzette.
Melusina Germany!
In Baden there is a forest named Stollenwald, and in this forest, atop Stollenberg Mountain, are the ruins of an old castle. Stauffenberg Palace stands nearby. In this palace there once lived a magistrate's son who took great pleasure in capturing birds. One day he went into the woods to trap titmice. There he heard a beautiful voice descending from Stollenberg mountain. Following it, he saw the most lovely image of a woman, which called out to him:
Redeem me, redeem me!
Just kiss me three times three!
"Who are you then?" called the youth, and the specter said:
Melusina is my name,
The daughter of heavenly song!
Early in the ninth hour,
Fearlessly kiss my mouth and my cheeks,
Then I shall be redeemed,
And be with you, my beloved bridegroom!
Looking at the miraculous being more closely, the youth saw that Melusina had a marvelously beautiful face, blue eyes, and blond hair. Her upper body too was wonderfully proportioned, but not her hands and feet. Her hands had no fingers, resembling instead small open bags, and she had no feet at all, but rather a snake's body. Nonetheless, the youth fearlessly gave the specter the first three kisses. She expressed joy in this, like the maiden in the heathen's cave with her first kiss, and then she disappeared.
The next morning the lover returned and followed the seductively sweet song that sounded toward him. Finding her, he saw that she now had wings. Her snake's body was speckled green and ended with a dragon's tail. But Melusina's eyes and face emanated such beauty, and her mouth was so seductive, that he was overcome by desire, and he again gave her three kisses. She quivered with lust and desire, flapping her wings about his head.
That night the youth could scarcely close his eyes. All his thoughts were with the glowing, sensuously beautiful figure. Before daybreak he went into the woods and followed the sweet songful voice. But alas! Where was the lovely angel face? It was transformed and looked just like the maiden on the toad-chair, for Melusina now had a toad's head, and the lover was supposed to kiss it as though nothing had happened. But instead, he turned his heels and ran away as fast as he could. Behind him he heard a rushing sound and cries of anguish.
He never again went to Stollenberg Mountain. On the contrary, he became engaged to a girl who, although not as magically beautiful as Melusina, nonetheless did not have a toad's head and a snake's body.
The wedding feast at Stauffenberg Palace was ready, and everyone was celebrating, when a small crack opened in the ceiling. A dew-like drop fell into the serving dish, but no one saw it. And anyone who took a bite onto which the drop had fallen fell down dead. And from above a small snake's tail emerged through the crack in the ceiling.
That was the end of the wedding celebration.
On another occasion Melusina appeared to a shepherd girl. At length she led the girl into Stollenberg Mountain. Showing her underground treasures, she told the shepherd girl that they would be hers if she could bring about her disenchantment. The girl was unable to keep this secret, and the priest threatened her with church sanctions if she continued to commune with the specter. This silenced the shepherd girl, and the disenchantment was not fulfilled.
A double fir tree growing from a single root still stands near the place they call "the twelve stones." It is called "the Melusina tree."
In keeping with this Swabian legend, the name Melusina refers not only to water sprites but to mountain and forest sprites as well.
Melusina France!
Elinas, King of Albania, to divert his grief for the death of his wife, amused himself with hunting. One day, at the chase, he went to a fountain to quench his thirst. As he approached it he heard the voice of a woman singing, and on coming to it he found there the beautiful fay Pressina.
After some time the fay bestowed her hand upon him, on the condition that he should never visit her at the time of her lying-in. She had three daughters at a birth: Melusina, Melior, and Palatina. Nathas, the king's son by a former wife, hastened to convey the joyful tidings to his father, who, without reflection, flew to the chamber of the queen, and entered as she was bathing her daughters. Pressina, on seeing him, cried out that he had broken his word, and she must depart. And taking up her three daughters, she disappeared.
She retired to the Lost Island, so called because it was only by chance any, even those who had repeatedly visited it, could find it. Here she reared her children, taking them every morning to a high mountain, whence Albania might be seen, and telling them that but for their father's breach of promise they might have lived happily in the distant land which they beheld.
When they were fifteen years of age, Melusina asked her mother particularly of what their father had been guilty. On being informed of it, she conceived the design of being revenged on him. Engaging her sisters to join in her plans, they set out for Albania. Arrived there, they took the king and all his wealth, and, by a charm, enclosed him in a high mountain, called Brandelois. On telling their mother what they had done, she, to punish them for the unnatural action, condemned Melusina to become every Saturday a serpent, from the waist downwards, till she should meet a man who would marry her under the condition of never seeing her on a Saturday, and should keep his promise. She influenced other judgements on her two sisters, less severe in proportion to their guilt.
Melusina now went roaming through the world in search of the man who was to deliver her. She passed through the Black Forest, and that of Ardennes, and at last she arrived in the forest of Colombiers, in Poitou, where all the fays of the neighborhood came before her, telling her they had been waiting for her to reign in that place.
Raymond having accidentally killed the count, his uncle, by the glancing aside of his boar-spear, was wandering by night in the forest of Colombiers. He arrived at a fountain that rose at the foot of a high rock. This fountain was called by the people the Fountain of Thirst, or the Fountain of the Fays, on account of the many marvelous things which had happened at it.
At the time, when Raymond arrived at the fountain, three ladies were diverting themselves there by the light of the moon, the principal of which was Melusina. Her beauty and her amiable manners quickly won his love. She soothed him, concealed the deed he had done, and married him, he promising on his oath never to desire to see her on a Saturday. She assured him that a breach of his oath would forever deprive him of her whom he so much loved, and be followed by the unhappiness of both for life. Out of her great wealth she built for him, in the neighborhood of the Fountain of Thirst, where he first saw her, the castle of Lusignan. She also built La Rochelle, Cloitre Malliers, Mersent, and other places.
But destiny, that would have Melusina single, was incensed against her. The marriage was made unhappy by the deformity of the children born of one that was enchanted. But still Raymond's love for the beauty that ravished both heart and eyes remained unshaken. Destiny renewed her attacks. Raymond's cousin had excited him to jealousy and to secret concealment, by malicious suggestions of the purport of the Saturday retirement of the countess. He hid himself; and then saw how the lovely form of Melusina ended below in a snake, gray and sky-blue, mixed with white. But it was not horror that seized him at the sight, it was infinite anguish at the reflection that through his breach of faith he might lose his lovely wife forever.
Yet this misfortune had not speedily come on him, were it not that his son, Geoffroi with the Tooth [a boar's tusk projected from his mouth], had burned his brother Freimund, who would stay in the abbey of Malliers, with the abbot and a hundred monks. At which the afflicted father, Count Raymond, when his wife Melusina was entering his closet to comfort him, broke out into these words against her, before all the courtiers who attended her, "Out of my sight, thou pernicious snake and odious serpent! thou contaminator of my race!"
Melusina's former anxiety was now verified, and the evil that had lain so long in ambush had now fearfully sprung on him and her. At these reproaches she fainted away; and when at length she revived, full of the profoundest grief, she declared to him that she must now depart from him, and, in obedience to a decree of destiny, fleet about the earth in pain and suffering, as a specter, until the day of doom; and that only when one of her race was to die at Lusignan would she become visible.
Her words at parting were these, "But one thing will I say unto thee before I part, that thou, and those who for more than a hundred years shall succeed thee, shall know that whenever I am seen to hover over the fair castle of Lusignan, then will it be certain that in that very year the castle will get a new lord; and though people may not perceive me in the air, yet they will see me by the Fountain of Thirst; and thus shall it be so long as the castle stand in honor and flourishing . especially on the Friday before the lord of the castle shall die."
Immediately, with wailing and loud lamentation, she left the castle of Lusignan, and has ever since existed as a specter of the night.
Raymond died as a hermit on Monserrat.
Melusina Germany!
In Bäringen during a wind storm they say that "Melusina is crying for her children." This must be true, because otherwise on Christmas Eve, at which time one is supposed to eat nine kinds of food, they would not shake the leftovers from the tablecloth onto a bush so that Melusina, sometimes also known as St. Melusina, might also have something to eat.
Melusina Luxembourg!
Melusina is said to have been the wife of the founder of Luxembourg, Count Siegfried. When they married, she had one particular request, namely that Siegfried must leave her alone for one full day and night every month, and that he should not ask or try to find out what she was doing. Of course, Melusina was such a beautiful girl, that Siegfried could not refuse her this one small wish, and all went well for years and years, when on the first Wednesday of the month, Melusina would retire into her chambers in the "Casemates," a network of caverns underneath the city, not to be seen again until early light on Thursday.
But one day, Siegfried's curiosity got the better of him. Wondering what on earth she might be doing alone all the time, he peeped through the keyhole, and was shocked to see that Melusina was lying in the bathtub, with a fishtail hanging over the rim. As you all know, mermaids like Melusina, have a very keen sixth sense, which tells them instantly that they are being watched, and thus she recognized her husband through the door, and jumped out of the window into the river Alzette below, never to be seen again. Except every now and then, some people say they have seen a beautiful girl's head pop out of the river, and a fishtail rippling the calm waters of the river Alzette.
Melusina Germany!
In Baden there is a forest named Stollenwald, and in this forest, atop Stollenberg Mountain, are the ruins of an old castle. Stauffenberg Palace stands nearby. In this palace there once lived a magistrate's son who took great pleasure in capturing birds. One day he went into the woods to trap titmice. There he heard a beautiful voice descending from Stollenberg mountain. Following it, he saw the most lovely image of a woman, which called out to him:
Redeem me, redeem me!
Just kiss me three times three!
"Who are you then?" called the youth, and the specter said:
Melusina is my name,
The daughter of heavenly song!
Early in the ninth hour,
Fearlessly kiss my mouth and my cheeks,
Then I shall be redeemed,
And be with you, my beloved bridegroom!
Looking at the miraculous being more closely, the youth saw that Melusina had a marvelously beautiful face, blue eyes, and blond hair. Her upper body too was wonderfully proportioned, but not her hands and feet. Her hands had no fingers, resembling instead small open bags, and she had no feet at all, but rather a snake's body. Nonetheless, the youth fearlessly gave the specter the first three kisses. She expressed joy in this, like the maiden in the heathen's cave with her first kiss, and then she disappeared.
The next morning the lover returned and followed the seductively sweet song that sounded toward him. Finding her, he saw that she now had wings. Her snake's body was speckled green and ended with a dragon's tail. But Melusina's eyes and face emanated such beauty, and her mouth was so seductive, that he was overcome by desire, and he again gave her three kisses. She quivered with lust and desire, flapping her wings about his head.
That night the youth could scarcely close his eyes. All his thoughts were with the glowing, sensuously beautiful figure. Before daybreak he went into the woods and followed the sweet songful voice. But alas! Where was the lovely angel face? It was transformed and looked just like the maiden on the toad-chair, for Melusina now had a toad's head, and the lover was supposed to kiss it as though nothing had happened. But instead, he turned his heels and ran away as fast as he could. Behind him he heard a rushing sound and cries of anguish.
He never again went to Stollenberg Mountain. On the contrary, he became engaged to a girl who, although not as magically beautiful as Melusina, nonetheless did not have a toad's head and a snake's body.
The wedding feast at Stauffenberg Palace was ready, and everyone was celebrating, when a small crack opened in the ceiling. A dew-like drop fell into the serving dish, but no one saw it. And anyone who took a bite onto which the drop had fallen fell down dead. And from above a small snake's tail emerged through the crack in the ceiling.
That was the end of the wedding celebration.
On another occasion Melusina appeared to a shepherd girl. At length she led the girl into Stollenberg Mountain. Showing her underground treasures, she told the shepherd girl that they would be hers if she could bring about her disenchantment. The girl was unable to keep this secret, and the priest threatened her with church sanctions if she continued to commune with the specter. This silenced the shepherd girl, and the disenchantment was not fulfilled.
A double fir tree growing from a single root still stands near the place they call "the twelve stones." It is called "the Melusina tree."
In keeping with this Swabian legend, the name Melusina refers not only to water sprites but to mountain and forest sprites as well.
Melusina France!
Elinas, King of Albania, to divert his grief for the death of his wife, amused himself with hunting. One day, at the chase, he went to a fountain to quench his thirst. As he approached it he heard the voice of a woman singing, and on coming to it he found there the beautiful fay Pressina.
After some time the fay bestowed her hand upon him, on the condition that he should never visit her at the time of her lying-in. She had three daughters at a birth: Melusina, Melior, and Palatina. Nathas, the king's son by a former wife, hastened to convey the joyful tidings to his father, who, without reflection, flew to the chamber of the queen, and entered as she was bathing her daughters. Pressina, on seeing him, cried out that he had broken his word, and she must depart. And taking up her three daughters, she disappeared.
She retired to the Lost Island, so called because it was only by chance any, even those who had repeatedly visited it, could find it. Here she reared her children, taking them every morning to a high mountain, whence Albania might be seen, and telling them that but for their father's breach of promise they might have lived happily in the distant land which they beheld.
When they were fifteen years of age, Melusina asked her mother particularly of what their father had been guilty. On being informed of it, she conceived the design of being revenged on him. Engaging her sisters to join in her plans, they set out for Albania. Arrived there, they took the king and all his wealth, and, by a charm, enclosed him in a high mountain, called Brandelois. On telling their mother what they had done, she, to punish them for the unnatural action, condemned Melusina to become every Saturday a serpent, from the waist downwards, till she should meet a man who would marry her under the condition of never seeing her on a Saturday, and should keep his promise. She influenced other judgements on her two sisters, less severe in proportion to their guilt.
Melusina now went roaming through the world in search of the man who was to deliver her. She passed through the Black Forest, and that of Ardennes, and at last she arrived in the forest of Colombiers, in Poitou, where all the fays of the neighborhood came before her, telling her they had been waiting for her to reign in that place.
Raymond having accidentally killed the count, his uncle, by the glancing aside of his boar-spear, was wandering by night in the forest of Colombiers. He arrived at a fountain that rose at the foot of a high rock. This fountain was called by the people the Fountain of Thirst, or the Fountain of the Fays, on account of the many marvelous things which had happened at it.
At the time, when Raymond arrived at the fountain, three ladies were diverting themselves there by the light of the moon, the principal of which was Melusina. Her beauty and her amiable manners quickly won his love. She soothed him, concealed the deed he had done, and married him, he promising on his oath never to desire to see her on a Saturday. She assured him that a breach of his oath would forever deprive him of her whom he so much loved, and be followed by the unhappiness of both for life. Out of her great wealth she built for him, in the neighborhood of the Fountain of Thirst, where he first saw her, the castle of Lusignan. She also built La Rochelle, Cloitre Malliers, Mersent, and other places.
But destiny, that would have Melusina single, was incensed against her. The marriage was made unhappy by the deformity of the children born of one that was enchanted. But still Raymond's love for the beauty that ravished both heart and eyes remained unshaken. Destiny renewed her attacks. Raymond's cousin had excited him to jealousy and to secret concealment, by malicious suggestions of the purport of the Saturday retirement of the countess. He hid himself; and then saw how the lovely form of Melusina ended below in a snake, gray and sky-blue, mixed with white. But it was not horror that seized him at the sight, it was infinite anguish at the reflection that through his breach of faith he might lose his lovely wife forever.
Yet this misfortune had not speedily come on him, were it not that his son, Geoffroi with the Tooth [a boar's tusk projected from his mouth], had burned his brother Freimund, who would stay in the abbey of Malliers, with the abbot and a hundred monks. At which the afflicted father, Count Raymond, when his wife Melusina was entering his closet to comfort him, broke out into these words against her, before all the courtiers who attended her, "Out of my sight, thou pernicious snake and odious serpent! thou contaminator of my race!"
Melusina's former anxiety was now verified, and the evil that had lain so long in ambush had now fearfully sprung on him and her. At these reproaches she fainted away; and when at length she revived, full of the profoundest grief, she declared to him that she must now depart from him, and, in obedience to a decree of destiny, fleet about the earth in pain and suffering, as a specter, until the day of doom; and that only when one of her race was to die at Lusignan would she become visible.
Her words at parting were these, "But one thing will I say unto thee before I part, that thou, and those who for more than a hundred years shall succeed thee, shall know that whenever I am seen to hover over the fair castle of Lusignan, then will it be certain that in that very year the castle will get a new lord; and though people may not perceive me in the air, yet they will see me by the Fountain of Thirst; and thus shall it be so long as the castle stand in honor and flourishing . especially on the Friday before the lord of the castle shall die."
Immediately, with wailing and loud lamentation, she left the castle of Lusignan, and has ever since existed as a specter of the night.
Raymond died as a hermit on Monserrat.
Melusina Germany!
In Bäringen during a wind storm they say that "Melusina is crying for her children." This must be true, because otherwise on Christmas Eve, at which time one is supposed to eat nine kinds of food, they would not shake the leftovers from the tablecloth onto a bush so that Melusina, sometimes also known as St. Melusina, might also have something to eat.
I like it 
it is a -fairy- tale but 
end
EloraM23 2010/11/09 13:51
Why not condense the two stories into one topic so they are together?
Good stories though.
Why not condense the two stories into one topic so they are together?
Good stories though.
Laketempest 2010/11/09 22:00
Quote: EloraM23: Why not condense the two stories into one topic so they are together?
Good stories though.
good idea, i've done it.
Good stories though.
#34 Myth&Mystery
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