Storsjöodjuret
Is there a Storsjoodjuret? Despite more than 260 observations over the years, it has never been able to prove that the monster exists. Or that it does not ...
That a beast was in the Great Lake is mentioned in written sources as early as the 1600s.
figure above shows how the painter Harald Millgård experienced an encounter with the beast 1935. Jamtli has Storsjöodjuret own exhibition. Here you can listen to people who tell of their encounter with the beast. You can familiarize yourself with the company in 1894, was formed in Östersund to capture the beast, and you can read all about fridlysningen 1986. Jamtli archive has a large collection of stories, newspaper clippings and other things you want to know more about the mysterious creature.
http://www.jamtli.com/8169.storsjoodjuret.html
Here you can listen to some stories about encounters with the beast.
Kai Power interviewing harpoons author Ove >>
Kai Power interviewing Claus and Anna Andersson and Mrs. Emelia Svensson >>
Kai Power interview Alf Karlsson and Martina Dahlberg >>
Kai Power interviewing Esther Rehn >>
You can read Esther Rehn story here >>
Attempted Trapping
In this vast scissors trying to capture the Beast at the end of the 1800s. Trap was baited with a whole pig. The attempt failed, and the prevailing theory is that the beast exclusively feed on fish.
An ancient history
The monster (or cousin ...) is depicted on the runestone on Frösön, which was erected between 1050 and 1080
[This is actually Iorgomundr, the World Serpent and well-known in mythology]
http://www2.jamtland.se/index.php/sv/nyheter/redaktionen/item/storsjoeodjuret-3?category_id=198
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storsj%C3%B6odjuret
Storsjöodjuret
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Storsjöodjuret
(Hydogiganta Monstruidae Jemtlandicum,
Storsie (English)) |
|---|
"The Great-Lake Monster" |
| Creature |
|---|
| Grouping | Cryptid |
|---|
| Sub grouping | Lake monster |
|---|
| Data |
|---|
| First reported | 1635 |
|---|
| Last reported | November 2005 |
|---|
| Country | Sweden |
|---|
| Region | Storsjön, Jämtland |
|---|
| Habitat | Water |
|---|
Storsjöodjuret (
Swedish pronunciation: [ˈstuːʂøːuˈjʉːrɛ], literally "The Great-Lake Monster") is a
lake monster reported to live in the 300-foot-deep (91 m) lake
Storsjön in
Jämtland in the middle of
Sweden. The lake monster was first reported in 1635 and is the only one of its kind in Sweden. When the only city located by Storsjön,
Östersund, celebrated its 200 year anniversary in 1986 Storsjöodjuret along with its offspring and nest became protected by
law, a law which was revoked in 2005.
[1]
It is popularly referred to as Storsjöodjuret whereas
odjur is a
Swedish word for "monster", literally "unanimal" (a name first recorded in 1899), and
storsjö is a
compound of the Swedish words
stor (big, or great) and
sjö (lake) which would closest translate to "great-lake". Sometimes it's simply called
Storsjödjuret, which translates to "The great-lake animal" instead of unanimal.
In the local dialect,
Jamtish, it has been named
Storgläffs'n "the great yelper" by a locally known poet, this is however not a popularly used name. In the
English language Storsjöodjuret is usually called
Storsie, similarly to
Nessie, though the names
Storsjö Monster (also spelled
Storsjoe[2] where the character
ö is unavailable) and the literal translation
The Great-Lake Monster are used. Its
latin name is
Hydogiganta Monstruidae Jemtlandicum[3] roughly meaning "The Gigantic Jamtlandic Water Monster". It has also been called
Storsjöormen "The Great-Lake Serpent".
[4]
Description
Storsjöodjuret is described as a
serpentine or aquatic
reptile with fins across its back and the head of a
dog [or a horse]. It is reported to measure approximately six meters long [20 feet], and some accounts describe it as having several humps.[1 to 1.25 meters wide and 3 to 15 meters long generally: ten feet long and 3 feet wide, or up to as much as 50 feet long, rarely over 30 feet long]
History
Legends
The Frösö Runestone from the mid 11th century. In the legend from 1635 Storsjöodjuret is said to be the serpent depicted on the stone.
The first description of a sea creature in Storsjön was made in a
folklorist tale by
vicar Morgens Pedersen in 1635.
"A long, long time ago two trolls, Jata and Kata, stood on the shores of the Great-Lake brewing a concoction in their cauldrons. They brewed and mixed and added to the liquid for days and weeks and years. They knew not what would result from their brew but they wondered about it a great deal. One evening there was heard a strange sound from one of their cauldrons. There was a wailing, a groaning and a crying, then suddenly came a loud bang. A strange animal with a black serpentine body and a cat-like head jumped out of the cauldron and disappeared into the lake. The monster enjoyed living in the lake, grew unbelievably larger and awakened terror among the people whenever it appeared. Finally, it extended all the way round the island of Frösön, and could even bite its own tail. Ketil Runske bound the mighty monster with a strong spell which was carved on a stone and raised on the island of Frösön. The serpent was pictured on the stone. Thus was the spell to be tied till the day someone came who could read and understand the inscription on the stone."[5]
Another legend was written down by the prolocutor Andreas Plantin in an
inquiry in 1685.
"It is said that beneath this [rune]stone lies a dreadfully large head of a serpent and that the body stretches over Storsjön to Knytta by and Hille Sand where the tail is buried. The serpent was called a rå and therefore shall this stone be risen. Since no one peacefully could cross [Storsjön], the ferryman and his wife states, along with many others, that in the last turbulent time this stone was tore down and broken in two. As long as this stone laid on the ground many strange things occurred in the water, until the stone was risen and assembled anew."[6]
The runestone both texts refer to is the
Frösö Runestone, the northern-most raised runestone in the World. However while a large serpent is indeed pictured on the stone there is no reference about it nor "
Ketil Runske" in the text itself, which instead tells about Austmaðr, Guðfastr's son's christening of Jämtland. Though it has indeed been broken in two pieces.
Capture
Common interest in the creature was sparked first in the 1890s. After several sightings, an enterprise of locals was founded to catch the monster, even drawing the support from king
Oscar II. Since then hundreds of monster sightings have been made. No scientific results have been made, but the supporters have never lost their faith.
In August 2008 a group of filmers claimed to have captured Storsjöodjuret on film. The cameras showed red so it was something warm that was filmed.
[2][7]
Protected status
In 1986, the Jämtland county administrative board declared the Storsjöodjuret to be an
endangered species and granted it protected status. However, it was removed from the list in November 2005.
References
Notes
External links
The first link yields this description for
Appearance
What, then, does the monster look like?
Eyewitnesses speak of a long snake-like animals with humps and small dog like head with ears or fins pinned next to the neck {sometimes a large horselike head with horns and a mane]. The length varies between 3.5 and 14 meters, width from 1 to 1.25 meters.
Others who have seen the animal at close range, describing it as short and stubby, about 3 m long with short, thick feet, big head and round eyes. The skin is often described as smooth, shiny, slimy and sometimes scaly. The color varies. Gray, gray with black spots, dark green, brownish red with dark longitudinal streaks. Big Sea monsters have been observed. Storsjö sound has been described as hissing, whistling or rattling.
Storsjöodjuret is a heat lover. In fine, warm and clear summer weather, often becalmed, making the animal gladly rapid surges in the water. Speed has never been measured, but is expected by many observers to be very high.
The monster has a peculiar ability to stealthily disappear. Sometimes, however, eddies and foam have been observed at the site. These findings very similar to observations of sea monsters in other parts of the world.
And the last link (Unknown Explorers) gives this information:
Lake Storsjön, Located in Jamtland County Sweden, was formed over 9,000 years
ago at the end of the last ice age. With a surface area great than 287 miles and
a depth of up to 250 feet Lake Storsjön is Sweden’s 5th largest lake, and the
reported home of a large persumably amphibious creature the locals call Storsie.
The first docutmented sighting of the creature was made by a vicar in 1635,
during which the creature was known for raiding local farm crops. Descriptions
of the beast tend to vary with the majority describing the creature as being
serpentine in appearance with multiple humps on its back, a canine like head and
greyish skin. Other reports say the creature is short in stature and is morbily
obese with a roundish skull. The creatures limbs are also a topic of
controversy, some eye wittnesses claim that they resemble the large flippers
common to aquatic animals and other lake monsters, while some insist that
Storsie is equiped with more terrestrial looking feet, consisting of strong back
legs and short forelimbs. All accounts seem to agree that the creature has large
eyes, a prodigious mouth and is between [1]0 and 30-feet in length.
Since the first documented sighting of Storsie literally thousands of people
have claimed to have seen the creature, some have even taken pictures of what
they believe is the legendary beast. Perhaps the most incredible piece of
evidence uncovered to date is a carcass believed by some researchers to be that
of a Storcie embryo. The carcass was discovered on the shore of Lake Storsjön on
June 18, 1984; it was remarkably well preserved and is now housed in a glass jar
at the Jamtli, museum of Jamtland.
In August of 1998, as a result of several resent eye witness reports, Storsie
became the subject of an intense, two and a half week international expedition
known as G.U.S.T. 98. The Team, led by G.U.S.T. founder Jan Ove Sunberg,
unfortunately was unable to obtain any concrete evidence of the existence of
Storsie. G.U.S.T. or Global Underwater Search Team is still in operation today
as one of the worlds leaders in the search for lake monsters. That very same
year Adrian Shine, famed Loch Ness naturalist and monster hunter, led his own
expedition to uncover the secrets of Storsie but came up empty handed. In the
summer of 2000, four observation platforms were erected on the shores of Lake
Storsjön, in 2001 an additional four platforms where constructed, giving both
locals and tourists plenty of oppertunitys to enjoy the natural splender of the
area and perhaps a chance to have a sighting of the legendary Storsie.
The Evidence
The only physical evidence of Storsie,
though inconclusive, is the proposed Storsie Embryo discovered in 1984. Eye
witness reports and several photographs are our best evidence that something
dwells in the depths of this lake.
The Sightings
73 year old Ragnar Bj, a fisheries officer,
was navigating the lake in his 12 foot row boat in order to check fishing
permits. He claims the placid waters of the lake suddenly broke astern of his
vessel revealing a gigantic serpentine tail. Moments later the rest of the
gigantic creature emerged directly next to his boat. Ragnar described the animal
as being over 18-feet long, with a grayish-brown spine and a yellow underbelly.
Frightened by the creature Ragnar grabbed his oar and beat the creature along
the neck, causing the beast to become angry and lifted its massive tail from the
water bringing it crashing down next to the row boat. Ragnar then reports that
this action by the creature sent his boat soaring 9 feet in the air.
The Stats – (Where applicable)
• Classification: Unknown, possibly reptilian
• Size: [1]0 to 30 feet
•
Weight: Unknown
• Diet: Unknown most likely fish
• Location: Lake
Storsjön, Sweden
• Movement: Primarily swimming with some reports of land
based movement.
• Environment: Lake
Storsjöodjuret
FRESHWATER MONSTER of Sweden.
Etymology: Swedish, “Storsjö monster.”
Variant names: Storsie, Thelma.[=Selma?]
Physical description:
Serpentine. Length,
10–45 feet. Width, 3–4 feet.
Shiny skin, greenish
to grayish.
Round head like a cat’s or a dog’s,
body 3 feet wide.
Reports from the nineteenth century
describe a horselike head with a long, white
mane.
Large, dark eyes. Long, sail-like ears (or
dorsal crest) that it presses back against its neck.
Long, flickering tongue.
Neck [or forepart], 8–10 feet long.
Multiple humps.
Two pairs of stumpy legs or
fins. Powerful tail.
Behavior: Most active in the summer. Swims
swiftly, perhaps as fast as 45 miles per hour.
Said
to make a wailing or a rattling noise.
Distribution: Storsjön Lake, Jämtland County, Sweden. Sightings have primarily been
in the narrow arms of the lake south of Frösön
Island.
Significant sightings:
Around 1839, Aron Andersson
and others at Hackås watched a red-gray
animal with a head like a horse’s and a white
mane swimming away from the shore.
Marta and Karin Olsson were washing clothes
on the beach near Sörbyn on October 13, 1893,
when they saw an animal’s head rising and falling
in the water. After Karin threw some stones at it,
it swam swiftly toward the shore. The women ran
but saw the animal submerge eventually.
In 1894, amusement-park owner Maria
Helin and other citizens of Östersund formed a
company to try to capture the animal. Even
King Oscar II made a financial contribution.
They constructed a jetty into the lake and hired
a Norwegian whaler, harpoons at the ready, to
watch for any activity. A huge trap was set under
the jetty, and large hooks were baited and
placed at various points around the lake, but the
company met with no success. The trap and
other equipment are in the Jämtland Museum.
On July 14, 1931, Anders Bergqvist and
Jonas Hansson saw two humps in the water at
Myrviken.
Anna Rahm observed a gray animal, 9 feet
long and with a powerful tail and large ears, at
Åssjön on August 12, 1947. Its tongue moved
up and down threateningly, and its eyes rolled.
On August 10, 1983, Carina Johnsson took
photographs of a large, swiftly moving animal in
the bay of Brunfloviken.
An alleged embryo of Storsjöodjuret was
found on the shore on June 18, 1984. It has
been at the Jämtland Museum since 1985.
Gun-Britt Widmark took a video of a 33–39-
foot animal in July 1996 while he was boating
off Östersund.
On August 8, 1997, Elin and Cecilia Hemreus
saw the animal’s head and one arched loop
of its body from only 30 feet away while they
were swimming near Tippskar Island. The head
was horselike, with two black eyes on the sides;
the neck was about 6 feet long. The body had
large, round scales like armored plates.
A woman in Brunflo saw a serpentine monster
swimming 90 feet offshore in July 2000. It
was 20–25 feet long and golden with a blackish
back.
Possible explanations:
(1) A floating log.
(2) Ducks or other waterfowl swimming in
a row.
(3) A large fish, possibly a Wels catfish
(Silurus glanis), which grows up to 16 feet
and is found in Scandinavia, Russia, and
Eastern Europe. The largest wels in Sweden
weighed 132.5 pounds and was caught in
1981.
(4) A misidentified boat wake
(5) An unidentified species of seal is unlikely,
since the lake freezes over in the winter.[Seals DO live under ice cover at times, though]
Sources:
Peter Olsson, Storsjöodjuret:
Framställning af fakta och utredning
(Östersund, Sweden: Jämtlandspostens Boktryckeri, 1899);
Arvid Enqvist, “Runstenen
på Frösön och den bundna sjöormen,” Rig:
Tidskrift Utgiven av Föreningen för Svensk Kulturhistoria 21 (1938): 157–168;
Knut
Svedjeland, Storsjöodjuret (Östersund, Sweden:
S-förlaget, 1959);
Tim Dinsdale, The
Leviathans (London: Routledge and Kegan
Paul, 1966), pp. 40–43; Peter Costello, In
Search of Lake Monsters (New York: Coward,
McCann and Geoghegan, 1974), pp. 197–207;
Jan-Ove Sundberg, Storsjö Odjuret,
Seljordsormen, Nessie och andra sjömonster
(Täby, Sweden: Larsons Förlag, 1995), pp.
11–93;
“Monster Machinations,” Fortean
Times, no. 92 (November 1996):18;
John
Kirk, In the Domain of Lake Monsters
(Toronto, Canada: Key Porter Books, 1998),
pp. 233–234;
Ulla Oscarsson, Storsjöodjuret:
The Great Lake Monster (Östersund, Sweden:
Jämtland County Museum, 2000);
Global
Underwater Search Team (GUST), Our Search
for Unknown Animals, http://www.bahnhof.
se/~wizard/cryptoworld/index3a.html;
Storsjöodjurets Officiella Hemsida,
http://www.storsjoodjuret.jamtland.se
I think there is clear evidence for at least two different sorts of creatures (Leaving out the large pikelike fish and possibly a giant salamander): one is the standard Water Horse which is the one shown at the beginning of this blog posting. It has a blunt snout with overhanging lip, rough whiskers, big round nostrils at the end of a blunt horselike snout; prominent black eyes (Red-Rimmed if the creature is very fearful), a mane, a beard, large drrping ears with also a hairy fringe and what look pretty definitely like moose (elk) antlers with the forward prongs and more palmate rear part. This type has a prominent hump on its shoulders and frequently has a trail of smaller humps also, although the better estimates still only say it is 12-18 feet long. When it comes out on land it looks like a horse and it even gallops.The head-neck region is 4-6 feet long and the body (trunk) is twice that length, broad and barrel-shaped. The entire body is hairy or shaggy but especially at the spine.
The "V-shaped tail" is an interpretation of the wake also, only very rarely alleged.
The other, more interesting creature is evidently some kind of a very large otter. It can look elongated and sepentine when it is stretched out and swimming fast, or fat and clumsy when it is hunched up on itself on land or at the shoreline. It is definitely amphibious also.
Witnmess drawing above and monster mock-up on the lake's shore below.
I take all of these depictions of this later series to be getting at the idea of a large otterlike creature: the projections on the back are probably due to the locks of fur sticking togeter again. It has a fairly long neck, a big doglike head with "pricked-up" ears,four webbed feet (not flippers although they are interpreted as flippers at times) and a tail with a flattened fringing "Fin" along its sides.
 |
Two essays of reconstruction for Storsie by Morelock on Deviant Art,
scale reduced because we are talking about average sizes and not necessarily maximum estimates |
Two photographs of what seem to be large solid moving objects on Storsjon
Closeup of purported Storsie photo showing its back in a diving roll,
And below an underwater video of a really big pike . The video is part of a playlist and it keeps going on after this one ends.
Some of the videos possibly show eels but there is no way to know how big they might be.
Celtic
Aquatic
Deadly
