Glorious and rich is the city of Hameln.

In the main square, the towers of the town hall are propped up against the sky. Even higher, the spiers of the Cathedral of St. Boniface stretch to the sky. In front of the town hall there is a fountain decorated with a stone statue of Roland. The valiant warrior Roland and his famous sword are covered with small splashes. The bells of Saint Boniface rang out. A motley crowd floats out of the high lancet doors of the cathedral, spreads along the wide steps. There are rich burghers 2, one thicker than the other. Gold chains shine on velvet clothes. Plump fingers are studded with rings. Merchants lure in, lure buyers. There is a market right on the square. The mountains are piled with food. The fat is whiter than snow. The oil is yellower than the sun. Gold and fat - that's what the glorious, rich city of Hameln is like! The city is surrounded on all sides by a deep moat, a high wall with towers and turrets. There are guards at every gate. If the purse is empty, there is a patch on the knee, there is a hole on the elbow, the guards drive from the gate with spears and halberds 3.

Every city is famous for something. Hameln is famous for its wealth, the gilded spiers of its cathedrals. And the Hamelnites are famous for being stingy. They know how, like no one else, to take care of their reserves, to multiply goods, to take away the last money from the poor man.

A dry, lean year has come. Famine began in the district. And the Gamelnians don't care about that. Their barns are full of last year's grain, tables are bent from food. Already in the fall, crowds of hungry peasants were drawn to the city. The cunning merchants decided to hold back the grain until spring. By the spring hunger will press the peasant, it will be even more profitable to sell grain. Throughout the winter at the walls of Hamelin, at the closed gates, crowds of hungry stood. As soon as the snow melted in the fields, the burgomaster ordered 4 to open all the city gates and let everyone through without hindrance. The merchants stood at the doors of the shops, their hands behind their belts, their bellies protruding, their brows sternly frowned so that they would immediately understand: you can't buy anything cheap here.

But then an unprecedented thing happened. While the weakened people dragged themselves into the city, suddenly rats poured into Hamelin from all around, from hungry villages, from empty fields. It seemed at first: the trouble is not so great. By order of the burgomaster, the draw bridges were raised, all the gates were tightly closed and filled with stones. But the rats swam across the moat and through some passages, holes penetrated into the city. Open, in broad daylight, rats walked along the streets. The inhabitants looked in horror at the terrible rat procession. Hungry creatures scattered to barns, cellars and bins full of selected grain. And the rat feasts began!

The burghers thought hard. Gathered for a council in the town hall. Although the burgomaster of Hamelin was rather fat and clumsy, you won’t say anything - he is strong in his mind. Sometimes the Gamelnites just shrugged off their hands: how clever, cunning! And so, on reflection, the burgomaster ordered: to save Hameln from an unexpected misfortune, to bring cats and cats from all around the city. Carts creak along the roads to Hameln. On carts hastily knocked together wooden cages. And in the cages, not fat geese and ducks for sale, but cats and cats. All stripes and breeds, thin, hungry. The carts drove into the square in front of the town hall. The guards opened the cages. Cats, gray, red, black, striped, ran in all directions. The burghers sighed with relief and, having calmed down, slowly went home.

But nothing came of this wise venture. The cats were frightened by such an abundant treat. They fled in fear from the hordes of rats. They hid in all directions, climbed onto the peaked tiled roofs. A thin black cat climbed onto the roof of St. Boniface's Cathedral and meowed all night long. The next morning an order was posted: to lure cats into the city with weasel and fat, and not to let out a single one from the city. But where there! Within three days, not a single cat remained in Hameln. Well, one thing didn’t help - we have to come up with another. Do not sit with folded hands, looking at how good is dying, lovingly accumulated, saved, counted so many times! Above Hamelin, the ringing of bells floats. In all churches, prayers are held against the dominance of rats. On the porches, monks sell amulets. Whoever has acquired such an amulet - live in peace: a rat will not come even a hundred steps away. But nothing helped: neither prayer services, nor amulets.

In the morning on the square, the heralds blow trumpets, summon the rat king to the court. People flock to the city hall. There are merchants with servants and households, craftsmen with their apprentices. The whole city gathered in front of the town hall. Today is the rat trial. They are waiting for the rat king himself to arrive at the town hall. They say he has fifteen heads and one body. Each head is of the finest workmanship with a golden crown the size of a hazelnut. There are so many people in the town hall - there is nowhere for an apple to fall. One by one, the judges entered and sat under a canopy on gilded chairs. In black velvet robes, in black caps, everyone's faces are important, stern, incorruptible - the rat king and all the rat brothers are trembling! The scribes sharpened the feathers. Everyone was waiting. The slightest sound, even the rustle of a fallen glove, turned all heads at once. They did not know where the criminal king would appear from: from the door, from a dark corner, or from behind the judge's chair. We waited until evening. The faces of the judges turned yellow from the heat and stuffiness. But the rat king never showed up. Nothing to do. Immediately outside the door they caught a huge mustachioed rat. They put him in an iron cage, and put the cage in the middle of the table. The rat, having swept around, calmed down in submissive melancholy. Huddled into a corner. Chief Justice Kaspar Geller rose from his seat. He wiped his wet face with a handkerchief. Five barns with grain plundered his rats clean and emptied all the cellars. Judge Kaspar Geller denounced the rat tribe for a long time in a thunderous voice. Stretching out his hand over the cage with the rat, he listed all the crimes, atrocities and intrigues of the damned rats. After him stood Judge Gangel Moon, looking like a fat fox: a long nose, oily eyes. He was the most cunning in Hameln. Everything that he owned was kept in chests lined with iron, inaccessible to a rat's tooth. And now he looked at everyone slyly, hiding gloating under sympathy.

Ah, most merciful judges! - said Gangel Moon in a sweet and sad voice. - A judge should glorify himself by his severity towards the guilty, mercy towards the innocent. Therefore, we should not forget that rats are also God's creatures, and besides, they are not endowed with a human mind ...

But Chief Justice Kaspar Geller cut him off abruptly:

Shut up, Judge Gangel Moon! Everyone knows that fleas, rats, toads and snakes were created by the devil.

The judges deliberated for a long time. Finally Kaspar Geller got up and pronounced the verdict in a loud voice:

“We, by the grace of the judge of God in the city of Hameln, are universally glorified for our incorruptible honesty and justice. Among all the other burdens, which are a great burden on our shoulders, we are also concerned about the atrocities perpetrated in our glorious city of Hameln by the vile creatures bearing the godless name - the rats Mus rattus. We, the judges of the city of Hameln, find them guilty of violating order and piety, as well as theft and robbery. It is also very regrettable to us that His Majesty the Rat King, violating our strict order, did not appear at the court, which undoubtedly testifies to his malice, bad conscience and baseness of his soul. Therefore, we order and command: all the rats mentioned, as well as the king of the entire rat tribe, by noon tomorrow, on pain of death, leave our glorious city, as well as all the lands belonging to it.

Then the rat, having set its tail on fire, was released so that it could convey to its entire family the strict order of the Hameln court. The rat flashed like black lightning and disappeared. And all again, having calmed down, went home. The next day, in the morning, no, no, yes, and residents came up to the windows. They were waiting for the rats to move out of the city. But they only waited in vain. The sun had already begun to decline, and the damned tribe did not even think to carry out the sentence. And then suddenly the terrible news flashed! Unheard of! On the night of the trial, the rats ate the judge's robes and a hat in addition to the chief judge Kaspar Geller. They just opened their mouths from such impudence. The fat is in the fire! And in fact, the rats in Hamelin kept coming and coming. Candles flickered in many windows at night. One candle burns out - they lit another from the cinder, and so on until the morning. The burghers sat on high down jackets, not daring to take their feet out of bed. Already without fear of anyone, rats were prowling everywhere. Attracted by the aroma of the roast, they made their way into the kitchens. They looked out of the corners, wiggling their noses, sniffing: "What smells here?" They jumped onto the tables, strove to steal the best piece right from the dishes. We even got to the hams and sausages suspended from the ceiling. Whatever you grab - they ate everything, damned. And already at the doors of many houses hunger knocked with a bony finger. And then the burgomaster had such a dream: as if the rats were kicked out of the houses of the previous owners. He, the venerable burgomaster of the city of Hameln, wanders with a beggar's bag. His wife and children are behind him. Timidly knocked on the door of his house. The door swung open - a rat the size of a man was on the doorstep. On the chest there is a golden burgomaster's chain. She waved her paw - other rats in helmets with halberds attacked them: “Get out of here! Beggars! Hungry people! " The next morning the burgomaster gathered all the advisers in the town hall, told his dream. The burghers looked at each other anxiously: "Oh, this is not good!" Although there were one burghers more stingy than the other, they decided not to spare anything, just to save the city from a terrible misfortune. Heralds passed through all the streets of Hamelin. They walked, disrupting the formation and order, huddled in a heap, closer to each other. The city went extinct. On deserted squares, on deserted streets, on bridges, in complete silence, the trumpets and voices of heralds sounded strange and ominous:

Whoever will rid the glorious city of Hameln from the rats will receive from the magistrate as much gold as he can carry! But three days passed, and no one showed up at the town hall. On the fourth day, the bell again gathered all the burghers in the town hall. The burgomaster shook his sleeves for a long time, picked up the edges of his cloak - had a rat climbed in? The burgers turned pale, the burgers turned pale, black circles under the eyes. Where did the blush and thick cheeks go? If the promised reward does not help, it is clear that there is nowhere else to wait for salvation. Unable to bear it, the burgomaster covered his face with his hands and sobbed deeply. That's it, the end! Good old Hamelin is dying! And suddenly everyone heard some kind of voices, noise and movement below, in the square. A guard ran into the hall and shouted:

Pied Piper!

A strange man limped through the door. The stranger was tall and thin. The face is dark, as if they had thoroughly smoked it over the fire. The look is piercing. From such a look, a cold ran down my spine. A short cloak on the shoulders. One half of the camisole is black as night, the other is red as fire. A rooster's feather is stuck into the side of the black cap. In his hand the stranger was holding an old pipe, which had darkened with time. At other times, of course, the cautious burghers would have been wary of such a strange guest: they did not trust the skinny vagrants. But now everyone was delighted with him, as himself to the welcome guest... The burgomaster, calling him "my dear lord," himself pulled up a chair for him. Judge Kaspar Geller even tried to slap him on the shoulder. But then, with a loud cry, he pulled back his hand - the palm was as if burned by fire.

The servants went down to the cellars and brought bottles of Malvasia, Rhine and Moselle. The stranger grabbed a bottle of Malvasia, pulled out the wax plug with his teeth, and threw back his head and drank the precious wine in one gulp. Without stopping, he emptied nine bottles in a row.

And the burgomaster, already unable to contain his impatience, asked the stranger bluntly:

Tell me, can you take the rat tribe out of our city?

I can, - the rat-catcher grinned. - These creatures are subject to me.

How? Every single one? .. - The burgomaster even got up from his seat.

I will cleanse your city of rats. My word, rat-catcher, is strong. But you will keep yours too. In return, give me as much gold as I can carry.

As thin as a pole and chrome to boot. Such a lot will not take away ... - whispered the burgomaster to judge Kaspar Geller. And then, already, turning to the rat-catcher, he said loudly and importantly: - Everything is as agreed, our honorable guest. There will be no deception.

So look, don't try to break your word, - said the rat-catcher and left the town hall.

The sky suddenly turned gray and gloomy. Everything was covered with a cloudy fog. The crows, which had stuck to the spiers of the Cathedral of St. Boniface, rose, whirled, and covered the whole sky with an ominous croak. The Pied Piper raised a pipe to his lips. Lingering sounds poured out of the pipe. I heard in these sounds the tickling rustle of grain flowing in a trickle from a hole in the sack. Cheerful clicking of butter in a frying pan. Crackle crunch under sharp teeth. The burgers at the windows gasped and involuntarily moved back. Because rats began to run out of all houses to the sound of a pipe. We crawled out of basements, jumped from attics. The rats surrounded the rat-catcher on all sides. And he indifferently walked, limping, from the square. And every one of the rats ran after him. As soon as the pipe fell silent, the whole innumerable horde of rats stopped. But again the pipe began to sing. And again the rats obediently rushed after the rat-catcher. A rat catcher walked from street to street. There were more and more rats.

Following the rat-catcher, all the rats moved to the city gates. The guards barely had time to hide in the towers. The rats left the city and stretched out along the road with a black ribbon. The last, stragglers, ran across the drawbridge - and in pursuit of the rat-catcher. Everything was covered with dust. Several times the black cloak of the rat-catcher, a hand with a pipe, a cock's feather flashed ...

Moving away, the pipe sounded more and more quietly. An hour later, the shepherds came running to the city. Interrupting each other, they said:

The Pied Piper went to the banks of the Weser River. He jumped into the boat, which was swaying right there along the coast. Without ceasing to play the pipe, the rat-catcher swam to the middle of the Weser. The rats threw themselves into the water and swam after him, and they swam until every one of them drowned. And there were so many of them that the mighty Weser emerged from the banks.

The city freed from rats rejoices. Bells sound joyfully at all cathedrals. Cheerful crowds are walking along the streets of the townspeople. Glorious Hameln has been saved! The rich Hameln is saved! In the town hall, servants pour wine into silver goblets. Now it's not a sin to have a drink. Suddenly a rat-catcher appeared from around the corner and walked across the square straight to the town hall. He also had a pipe in his hand. Only he was dressed differently: in a green hunter's suit. The burghers looked at each other. To pay? Uh no ...

This rat-catcher is wiry and strong, - the burgomaster whispered to the judge Kaspar Geller, - although he is lame, he will take away the entire treasury ...

The Pied Piper entered the Town Hall. Nobody even looked in his direction. The burgomaster turned away, Kaspar Geller stared out the window. But, apparently, the rat-catcher was not so easy to embarrass. With a grin, he pulled out a bag from his bosom. This bag seemed bottomless to burghers.

I kept my word. Now it's up to you, said the Pied Piper. - As agreed. As much gold as I can carry ...

My dear ... - The burgomaster threw up his hands in confusion, looked back at Gangel Moon.

How is it? Not a purse, not a purse - a whole bag of gold? .. - Judge Gangel Moon giggled and widened his eyes in mock fright.

Sly Gangel Moon, glancing warily at the rat-catcher, bent to the burgomaster's ear:

Maybe pour him a handful of gold? So ... a little, for the sake of appearance ... And then impose a tax on the poorer people, who did not suffer from rats at all, because they did not own anything anyway.

But the burgomaster dismissed him. He cleared his throat and in an important, but fatherly gentle voice said:

It is done. We must, as promised, pay off. By labor and wages. A purse of silver and exit from the city through any gate.

And the stranger immediately showed himself to be a complete ignoramus. He did not take the purse and, without even bowing, turned his back and left the hall. After him there was a faint cloud of sulfur smoke.

At this point, the burghers were completely amused. It turned out nicely: we got rid of both the rats and the rat-catcher at once. The bells of Saint Boniface are ringing loudly. All the burghers with their wives and servants went to the cathedral for Sunday mass. And none of them hears that the pipe is singing again in the square.

"Can! Can! Can! - the pipe sings. - Today everything is possible! I will lead you to green groves! To honey flooded meadows! Barefoot through the puddles! Bury yourself in the hay! Can! Can! Can!"

The stomp of little shoes on wooden stairs, on stone steps ...

Children run out of all doors. Throwing the game, throwing the spinning wheel, pulling up the stocking on the run, the children run after the rat-catcher, eagerly catching the sounds of the pipe. Children from every house. There are children on every street. They fall, break their knees, rub, blow and run on. Merry, with sticky fingers, sweets behind their cheeks, a handful of nuts in their fist - children, Hamelin's treasure.

Already the city gates. The children stomped across the drawbridge. And the rat-catcher takes them along the road, past the heather hills, farther, farther ...

edited news LAKRIMOzzzA - 11-02-2011, 00:57

There are cities whose world fame has been brought by legends and fairy tales. Our Murom, for example, is known for the fact that the hero Ilya was born near him, the German city of Bremen is famous for the fairy tale of the brothers Grimm, and Hameln gained notoriety for the legend of the Pied Piper.

Gloomy Hameln is located just ten kilometers from the city of Baron Munchausen - Bodenwerder. An inscription is made on its town hall: « In the year 1284, on the day of Saints Peter and Paul on June 26, the Motley Piper lured 130 children to Mount Coppen in the vicinity of Hamelin, where they disappeared » . Around 1375, the description of the “exodus of children” was included in the chronicle of the city, and the street along which the children left Hameln is still called Silent and it is forbidden to play musical instruments on it.

RATS FROM GAMELN

"Who is there in a raincoat walks motley,
Drilling passers-by with a sharp gaze,
Whistling on a black pipe? ..
Lord save my child! "

Great anxiety in Hamelin.
There are so many rats with passion,
Already in the houses there are countless losses
The magistrate was alarmed.

And suddenly the magician - the inveterate rogue -
He appeared, dressed in a feathery cloak,
On a marvelous pipe, the march played
And he drove the rats straight into the Weser.

Completed the work of the magistrate.
The wizard asked: "Where is the payment?"
And they play this way and that:
"Why pay for something? For a trifle?

Is it great work - playing the pipe?
Isn't this a joke?
Go away without further ado! "
And slammed the door of the rat-catchers.

Meanwhile, freed from rats,
The revived city rejoices,
In cathedrals - Praise the Lord! -
Bells are ringing all day!

A feast for adults, kids have fun ...
But suddenly at the northern outpost
The wizard has reappeared
I played my pipe ...

And at the same moment to these sounds
Children ran from all the houses.
And a stranger in a crowd
He took them to the Weser with him.

Nobody remembers them from now on,
Disappeared forever in the abyss.
The river runs, the water flows, etc.
At what price the bill was paid! ...

Everyone needs to remember this story,
To protect children from poison.
Human greed is poison
Who killed the Hameln guys.

From the poetry of the vagantes
Lane Ginzburg

German ballads deduce a simple and unambiguous moral from the legend:

"Human greed is poison,
Who killed the Gamelin guys. "

That is, the legend is most often perceived as a moralizing parable. But what if the legend is based on historical reality? Could it be that some man really took - with the help of cunning or witchcraft - the children from the city?
They say that the story of the rats in the legend appeared much later, and at first there was a story only about a wandering musician who, with his playing on the devil's flute, lured children while their parents were at a church service. The earliest version of the legend is set out in the chronicles of the city of Hameln for 1375 in several lines: “In 1284, on the day of John and Paul, which was on the 26th day of the month of June, a flutist dressed in colorful clothes led out of the city one hundred and thirty people born in Hameln children on Koppen near Kalwaria, where they disappeared. " And that's all.

William Manchester, in his book "A World Illuminated Only by Fire" (1992-1993), suggested that the rat-catcher was in fact a maddened pedophile who managed to lure 130 children out of the city and then "use them for perverse pleasures." Manchester suggests that some of the children then disappeared without a trace, while others were found crippled or "suspended in trees." The author does not provide any evidence of this.

Another highly exotic theory is that the speckled piper was a UFO who, for some unknown reason, became interested in the Hamel children.

I am inclined to the version of the Soviet ethnographer Vladimir Yakovlevich Propp. Analyzing the tale "Cunning Science", Propp sees in it not just a story young man, given to the teachings and returned as an experienced artisan, but signs of some very ancient rite - older than the reality of the 19th century, when the tale was first recorded.

“The teacher to whom the boy falls is a deep old man, a sorcerer, a goblin, a sage. Sometimes he comes out of the grave if you say "oh". He appears if you sit on a stump. This is the “grandfather of the forest”. These examples show that the teacher comes from the forest, lives in another kingdom, takes and takes children away from their parents to the forest for three years (for one year, for seven years) ”.

What can a young man learn from his "forest" grandfather?

He learns to turn into animals or begins to understand their language. “They gave him to study in different languages ​​to one sage al too knowledgeable person, so that he knows in every way - whether the bird will sing, whether the horse will laugh, whether the sheep will bleed; well, in a word, so that he knew everything! "

The narrators are almost always silent about the ways in which teaching is carried out. Nor can they say anything about the teacher's dwelling.

Obviously we are dealing with a rite of passage dedications, which is part of the ritual system of many primitive tribes.

“At dedication, - writes Propp, - young men are introduced to all mythical ideas, ceremonies, rituals and techniques of the tribe. Researchers are of the opinion that they are presented here with a certain secret science, i.e. that they acquire knowledge. Indeed, they are told the myths of the tribe. One eyewitness says that “they sat quietly and learned from the old; it was like a school. ” However, this is not the essence of the matter. It's not about knowledge, but about skill, not about knowing the imaginary world of nature, but about influencing it. It is this aspect of the matter that is well reflected in the tale "Cunning Science", where, as indicated, the hero learns to turn into animals, that is, he acquires skill, not knowledge.

This upbringing or training is an essential feature of initiation throughout the world. In Australia (New South Wales), old men taught young people to play local games, sing tribal songs and dance some corroborri, which were forbidden to women and the uninitiated. They were also introduced into the sacred traditions (stories) of the tribe and into its science.

These performances and dances were not spectacles. They were a magical way of influencing nature. The initiate studied all dances and songs very carefully and for a long time. The slightest mistake could be fatal, could ruin the whole ceremony.

The heroes of the Russian fairy tale do not bring dances from the forest teacher - they bring magical abilities. But dancing was also an expression or a way of using these abilities. The dance was lost by a fairy tale, only the forest, the teacher and magic skill remained. But in fairy tales of other types one can find some traces and dances. Dances were performed to music, and musical instruments were considered sacred and forbidden. The house in which the initiation took place and in which the initiates sometimes lived for some time was sometimes called the "house of flutes." The sound of these flutes was considered the voice of the spirit. If this is borne in mind, then it will become clear why the hero in the forest hut so often finds gusli-samoguds, pipes, violins, etc. "

If we return to the legend of the Pied Piper, we will easily see that we have before us, as it were, half of the tale "Cunning Science". The legend is rooted in the Neolithic and leads us to the foundations on which the entire human civilization grew. We hear a story about how the Teacher, who owns the magic flute, takes children out of the city for whom it is time to undergo initiation.

It is clear that this withdrawal by a part of the population, and above all by the boys themselves, was perceived as a disaster. They do not yet know what great benefits lie ahead. But although the act of withdrawal appeared to be hostile, it was demanded by Public Opinion. Subsequently, when the rite began to wither away, Public Opinion changed.

Probably, for more than a thousand years of history, the happy ending of the fairy tale was lost, and it itself merged with the very real memories of the Hameln townspeople about the hunger caused by rats. And its main character turned from a wise forest elder and savior of children into a vengeful killer ...

It is known that on Mount Koppen, in the vicinity of the city, there was a cave in which pagans in ancient times sacrificed to their gods, and the Hamilnians called it "devil's cuisine." Some believe that a wandering musician took the children to a pagan festival that took place on that day, June 26, 50 kilometers from Hamelin. Consequently, the Flutist could be a priest, and children aged 10 -12 could be released for the ceremony. initiation.

Legends strikingly similar to the story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin, no, no, yes, and are found in Europe. The French tell of a certain monk who, in revenge for deceiving the magistrate, took away not children, but domestic animals. In Ireland, there is a tale about a piper who took young men and women out of the city with him no one knows where. On the english island White the legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin is repeated literally word for word - with the insignificant difference that the musician takes the children not uphill, but into the forest. And in Germany itself, several cities at once claim to be considered the homeland of a magician with a flute, who is called either a hermit monk or a sorcerer.

This multiplicity of legends indirectly confirms our assumption that the Pied Piper of Hameln was in fact a pagan priest of the type of the Slavic Magi. After all, the appearance of the Slavic Magi is described in church chronicles many times. This means that the initiation rites were secretly performed in medieval Europe and the pagan "teachers" regularly came for the "disciples."

In the 13th century, pagan traditions were not forgotten either in Europe or in Russia. In church chronicles, there are references to how sometimes the pagan wise men came out of the forests and announced themselves in the cities. The Novgorod Chronicle under 1227 preserved the news of the burning of the four wise men.

Where does such cruelty to the wise men come from? Maybe they burned them because they were afraid for their children? Maybe in those days they still remembered and knew that the Magi in the forest conduct rituals of initiation. And that after these rituals they return from the forest completely different people. But by that time, the Church had replaced the initiation with the rite of water baptism. The church established a monopoly and was unwilling to put up with competitors.

It should also be emphasized that the 13th century was a kind of apogee of Christian religiosity. The church has entered the apogee of its glory. All aspects of social, political and economic life were swept by the influence of the Church. This was the "summer solstice" of the Church.

It was a time of mass religious exaltation. The time of the dances of St. Vitus. So, in 1237 in Erfurt, about a hundred children, for some unknown reason, became obsessed with a mad dance, after which, shouting and jumping, they went out of the city on the road to Armstadt and, when they got there, collapsed in exhaustion, plunged into sleep. The parents managed to find them and return them home, but none of the possessed were so completely unable to come to their senses, many of them died, others had tremors and convulsive twitching of the limbs until the end of their lives.

Medieval consciousness could transform something similar into the legend of the Pied Piper, and the well-known folklore motif about devilish music, which neither people nor animals can resist, was later superimposed on the real basis.

In the folklore of different nations, much attention is paid to musicians who have the ability to enchant all living things. The sirens, who seduced the ancient Greek sailors with their songs, but pierced the Argonauts and the Odysseus, are of the same berry field with the Motley Flutist. Obviously, Orpheus, before whose art all nature, not excluding wild animals, and the hero of the Kalevala, musician Väinämöinen, bowed to his art. It is impossible not to recall that magic properties in folklore were attributed to the music and singing of the "little people" - fairies and elves... According to legends, he who heard this singing will either die soon or leave his home and look for a magical land, not knowing rest until the end of his days.

A little earlier in the same XIII century, a children's crusade took place.

Here the topic of initiations should be continued.

As you know, in the Middle Ages, boys at about the age of 12 were sent to study with a master. The apprentice lived in the master's house and learned his craft. The first four years he worked in the master's house for free. Then, after four years, he was transferred to the category of an apprentice, and now had the right to keep for himself 50% of the money earned. As a rule, in four years of work as an apprentice, a young man could save up a decent amount of money to buy himself necessary tools and become a master yourself.

Researchers note that at first the student was in the master's family as a "spirit" in the Soviet army: he unquestioningly carried out any order and often underwent a form of bullying, especially from the master's wife and other, more "advanced" students. What is this if not initiation in some perverse form?

Further. Craftsmen created professional corporations. For example, all builders of medieval Catholic churches and cathedrals were part of the corporation of master masons. They had their own corporate solidarity: non-"dedicated" masons were not allowed to participate in the construction of temples. They had their own hierarchy: apprentice - apprentice - master - great master.

It is here that modern Freemasonry originates. This modern Freemasonry was formerly called "speculative Freemasonry" in order to distinguish "free masons" from real masons. "Freemasons" borrowed from professional bricklayers their corporate solidarity, hierarchical structure, dedication to a degree, and added here a vinaigrette from a variety of teachings - from Hermes Trismegistus to Karl Marx.

Freemasonry, however, served as a model for the creation of all modern political parties, including in the USSR. Soviet pioneers - Komsomol members - Party members are very reminiscent of medieval apprentices - apprentices - masters. You just need, of course, to understand that the Soviet system was profanity Freemasonry, and Freemasonry, in turn, was profanity, by the "speculation" of the perverse initiations of the ancient stonemasons.

Thus, the KPSS - illustrative example counter-initiation... Counter-initiation is the antipode of initiation. Since the logic of a cyclical process, according to Tradition, inevitably moves along the path of degradation, from the Golden Age to the Iron Age, we must admit that in modern world there is no genuine, authentic initiation. Therefore, counter-initiation is nothing more than profanation initiation, it is a shell with no inner content. The hierarchs of counter-initiation — all these Trotsky and Leninists — Guenon, following Islamic esotericism, would call "awliya esh-shaitan", that is, "saints of satan".

This is his song, - said the girl. - If played correctly, it will take you away forever. But you can only play it correctly on his pipe ... Or maybe with a large orchestra. Probably. If you gather virtuosos from all over the world, so that there are several thousand people ... Then, probably, it will work out. Probably. Understand?

Marina and Sergey Dyachenko "Alena and Aspirin"

Remember the story of the musician with the magic flute, who took all the rats out of the city of Hamelin and drowned, and then, when the stingy townspeople did not pay him for the service, took their children away from somewhere? In childhood, each of us read or heard it. And everyone probably wondered: who was this strange rat-catcher? What is his flute? Where did he take the children? Did they all really die? Historians and science fiction writers vied with each other to offer their own answers.

The legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin is one of those that do not get lost in the depths of centuries, in the fabulous "long ago, in the distant kingdom", but on the contrary, have clearly defined time and place of action. This is a legend that claims to be true very convincingly. So what actually happened in the German city of Hameln on June 26, 1284?

How do we know this?

Interestingly, initially there were no rats in this whole story. The earliest version of the legend is set out in the chronicles of the city of Hamelin for 1375 in several lines:

"In 1284, on the day of John and Paul, which was the 26th day of the month of June, a flutist dressed in colorful clothes led out of the city one hundred and thirty children born in Hameln to Coppen near Calwaria, where they disappeared."

This event (if we assume that it was in reality) so shocked the Gamelnians that for some time they even counted down the time from this very date - "from the departure of our children." Earlier - around 1300 - the flutist, followed by children, was depicted in the stained glass window of the city church Marketkirche ("market church"), unfortunately not preserved, but known from descriptions and sketches.

13th century sketch depicting the Pied Piper Stained Glass

At the beginning of the twentieth century in Hamelin, during the renovation of the town hall, built in 1603 on the site of earlier houses, an ancient wooden beam was found with an inscription in the old dialect:

"In the year 1284, on the Day of John and Paul on June 26, there was a Whistler in colorful clothes, by whom 130 children, born in Hameln, were taken away and lost in grief."

Now this inscription adorns the facade of the house, which houses the hotel and restaurant. And on the Bungelosenstrasse ("street of silence"), where the building stands, it is legally forbidden to perform any music and dance - according to legend, it was along this street that Flutist took the kids away.

The old town hall, known as the "Pied Piper's House", and the corner of the "silent street"

History wandered from one historical chronicle to another, gradually acquiring details. Around the beginning of the 1560s, in the chronicle of the Württemberg counts, von Zimmern already contains full version legends in the form in which it has come down to us. True, the exact date of the event is not called this time, only an approximate one: "several hundred years ago."

And it was like this. Rich Hameln was overcome by an invasion of rats, which the townspeople could not cope with. And then, at the most opportune moment, a wandering schoolboy appeared, who promised to save the city from misfortune for a huge amount of several hundred guilders at that time. With the help of a magic flute, the musician led the rats to one of the nearest mountains, where he locked them forever. And when the city magistrate backed down and refused to pay the promised amount, the flutist did the same with the city children.

Tellingly, in the years when the chronicle was created, Hameln was really rich and famous. So the envious neighbors could have supplemented the legend by depicting the disappearance of children as a just punishment for greed, and not as an unexpected misfortune, as the Hamelnites believed this story.

City of Hameln

The small cozy town of Hameln (Hameln) is located in the east of Westphalia, on the Weser River, and is the capital of the Hameln-Pyrmont region. It was founded around 851 - it was then in the chronicles that a monastery was first mentioned, near the walls of which a village had grown, which by the 12th century had turned into a quite decent city. He got rich thanks to the grain trade - the surrounding fields were very productive. Since 1277 it has been a free city. In the 15th and 16th centuries, Hameln was a member of the Hanseatic League, an influential alliance of the trading cities of Northern Europe.

During the Thirty Years' War, in 1634, the city was besieged by Swedish troops. The rulers learned a lesson from this history: just a century later, Hameln became the most fortified settlement of the Kingdom of Hanover - it was surrounded by four powerful fortresses, and it was not easy to approach the city. Nevertheless, the city surrendered to the troops of Napoleon in 1808 without a fight. In 1864, Hameln became part of the Kingdom of Prussia, and remained so until 1871, when the German Empire was created.

Nowadays, the piper is no longer the scourge of Hamelin, but its main source of income, attracting tourists

Today the population of the town is about 58 thousand people. The main source of income for its residents is tourism. In addition to the places associated with the Pied Piper of Hamelin, the observation tower Klutturm, erected in 1843, is worthy of attention. It offers a magnificent view of Old city... Another notable place is the hotel, converted from the city prison, where during the Second World War the Nazis executed enemies of the regime, and British troops later - Nazi war criminals.

In the early 17th century, the Pied Piper appears in The Rebirth of an Extinct Mind, a historical work by Dutch-born Englishman Richard Rolance. Presenting the legend, the author adds a different ending to it: as if the children, taken away by the Spotted Flutist, passed through a mountain tunnel to Transylvania, where they remained to live. From the point of view of geography, such an outcome is, of course, completely incredible. Rolance gives a different date for the event, almost a hundred years later than the Hamelin version: July 22, 1376.

Rolance is borrowed from the legend by his compatriots Robert Burton (in the book "Anatomy of Melancholy", 1621), William Ramsey and Nathaniel Wanley. Moreover, the first explains this story by the intrigue of dark forces, and calls the unknown musician "the devil in the guise of a motley flutist." And he again gets confused in dates, this time calling June 20, 1484.

Title pages of the three-volume edition "The Boy's Magic Horn". Many of these songs are still sung in Germany.

The old legend gained real popularity relatively recently - at the beginning of the 19th century. In 1806, the first volume of the anthology of German folk poetry, The Boy's Magic Horn, was published by the romantic poets Ludwig Joachim von Arnim and Clemens Brentano. Among other folklore ballads, there is also the song "The Pied Piper from Hameln". She is openly instructive, her last lines: "Human greed - here it is, the poison that killed the Hameln guys." It was this version of the legend that became a textbook.

The legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin is known to us mainly not from this ballad, but from the fairy tale of the Brothers Grimm. They, too, did not escape the temptation to deduce morality from this story. The flutist, according to the storytellers, was the Devil himself, but the children managed to escape his obsession and stay alive by founding new town in Transylvania.

Rats and rat catchers

Rats were a real disaster in the Middle Ages and even in modern times. They multiplied so quickly that they were able to devour grain in the barns of an entire city in a matter of days. In addition, rat fleas carried the plague - this was not known until the end of the 19th century, when the plague bacillus was discovered. The situation was aggravated by the fact that the Europeans massively exterminated cats, considered devilish offspring, and there was no one to fight the tailed pests.

Meanwhile, the most insane methods of struggle were used, up to the burning of the city along with rodents. And in the Burgundian city of Autun, where at the beginning of the 16th century rodents destroyed all the bread, rats were even summoned to the court with specially drawn up summons and waited for a long time in the town hall when the Rat King himself would appear before the eyes of the judges and the people. When he cheekily disregarded the hearing, the rats were ordered to get out of the Burgundian lands. Needless to say, they ignored this order too?

"We were choking them, we were choking them!" The Pied Piper demonstrates the latest rodent trap to the townspeople. Drawing of the early 17th century

Against the background of such a disastrous state in the barns and in the minds of the honorable burghers, the profession of the rat catcher became popular, although not very respected. At the court of King Jacob I of England (1603-1625), a pied rat-catcher was included in the staff of the Royal Chamber. But few succeeded in getting such a lucrative position. Most of the rat catchers were itinerant artisans. They walked from town to town, carrying bundles of rat corpses, rodent traps, and potent poisons, and praised their way of getting rid of pests in the streets and squares. If the townspeople found the technique of one or another specialist to be effective, they entered into an agreement with him to exterminate rats in a separate house or in the whole city. Interestingly, many rat-catchers actually used musical instruments - it was believed that correctly selected melodies enchant rats.

Our mysterious Pied Piper is not alone: ​​in the mythology and folklore of different nations, much attention is paid to musicians who have the ability to enchant all living things. The sirens, who seduced the ancient Greek sailors with their songs, but pierced the Argonauts and the Odysseus, are of the same berry field with the Motley Flutist. Obviously, Orpheus, before whose art all nature, not excluding wild animals, and the hero of the Kalevala, musician Väinämöinen, bowed to his art.

It should be remembered that magical properties in folklore were attributed to the music and singing of the "little people" - fairies and elves. According to legends, he who heard this singing will either die soon or leave his home and look for a magical land, not knowing rest until the end of his days. And the elves were very fond of kidnapping small children - they, however, did not have such a love for rats.

Modern version of the rat catcher stained glass window

But the Pied Piper's pedigree goes back much higher - to the gods themselves. According to the beliefs of the ancient Germans, the souls of the dead take the form of mice and rats gathering at the call of the God of Death - it was his role that went to the Flutist. And Apollo, a divine (in every sense of the word) musician, among his other epithets, had such as Sminthias ("mouse" or "murderer of mice"), because he saved many Greek regions from the invasion of voles.

Legends, strikingly similar to the story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin, are not present and are found in Europe. The French tell of a certain monk who, in revenge for deceiving the magistrate, took away not children, but domestic animals. In Ireland, there is a tale about a piper who took young men and women out of the city with him no one knows where. On the English Isle of Wight, the legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin is repeated literally word for word - with the insignificant difference that the musician takes the children not uphill, but into the forest. And in Germany itself, several cities at once claim to be considered the homeland of a magician with a flute, who is called either a hermit monk or a sorcerer.

The legend, which is told in the Austrian city of Korneuburg, names the latest date of the event - 1646 - as well as the name of the mysterious Piper: Hans Mouse Nora. He hails, in his own words, from Vienna, where he served as a city rat catcher. The story of the kidnapping of children here ends prosaically: the flutist leads them to a ship on the Danube, which takes away "live goods" to the slave markets of Constantinople.

So what was it?

A lot of scientific works are devoted to the search for the real background of the legend about the Pied Piper. Most of the versions look convincing enough and are supported by facts - with the exception of very delusional ones like kidnapping of children by aliens or attacks by a pedophile maniac. But there are also enough objections to them. We can say that today the secret of the Pied Piper has not yet been revealed.

The children's crusade?

One of the most popular theories is that the departed children actually followed the infamous Children's Crusade in 1212. Thousands of children and adolescents in Germany and France were captivated by the speeches of little prophets - the German Nicholas and the French Etienne. The latter argued that God does not give Jerusalem into the hands of adults, since they are mired in sin, and only innocent children are able to conquer the Holy Sepulcher.

It is now believed that the bulk of the pilgrims were not small children, but teenagers and young men.

Adults also joined the children; at the time of the greatest ascent, there were 25 thousand pilgrims. Their fate was sad: many died on the road from disease and hunger, those who were able to reach Italy, from where it was supposed to cross to Jerusalem by sea, were sold into slavery in the slave markets of Tunisia. Someone managed to get on the ships in Genoa, but they were immediately flooded. None of the children returned home.

This version has two troubling points. Firstly, there was a lot of time left before the 1284 year indicated in the Hameln chronicles - the crusade of children remained in the people's memory as a completely separate phenomenon. Secondly, in such a story there is absolutely no place for the Motley Flutist: it is unlikely that the prophet boys or their henchmen wore multi-colored robes.

Plague?

Another theory of the origin of the legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin is no less sinister. It recalls the plague epidemics that devastated entire cities in the Middle Ages. The artists dressed the skeleton in colorful clothes, symbolizing the dance of Death, sometimes this creepy dancer took the form of a musician with a flute, accompanying himself and those who dance with him.

This theory perfectly fits the symbolism of the Flutist as the god of death and mice as the souls of the dead. And the hills behind which the musician takes the children can symbolize the border between our world and the afterlife. In addition, it is rats that are the main carriers of the plague - although in the Middle Ages they did not know about this.

Death accompanies terrible dances on a pipe

Everything seems logical, but in the 13th century, to which the legend is supposedly related, there were no major plague epidemics in Germany. It became a real disaster more than half a century later - in 1349, and at that time there was already a stained glass window in the Marketkirch.

Associated with this version is the theory of another contagious disease - the dance of St. Vitus... It may have a viral origin, but many researchers believe that in such attacks, people splashed out the horror accumulated during the plague epidemics. Sick with this grievous defeat nervous system could jump and twitch for hours in a strange semblance of dance, only to eventually collapse in exhaustion. There is a known case when in the German city of Erfurt several hundred children were possessed by this crazy dance, who in the dance managed to reach the neighboring city, where they fell. Many of them died, others, even after returning home safely, lived their whole lives with the consequences of the disease - trembling limbs and an unstable gait.

Great Migration?

The Pied Piper gave the artists an inexhaustible theme for cartoons ...

A very popular theory is that those who left the city simply went to settle in new lands, including Poland, Moravia and Transylvania, devastated by the Mongol invasion. The Germans also actively moved to the Baltic States, in which it was required to weaken the Slavic influence. Emigration was not very popular among the townspeople tied to their native places, so the lords hired special recruiters who persuaded residents to pack up their things and go in search better life in the east. Recruiters dressed in flashy clothes and carried drums and flutes with them to attract the attention of the people.

In this case, the children from the legend disappear, and young people who are light on their feet appear, including young families. An indirect confirmation of this version can be found in the drawing that copied the stained glass window in the Marketkirch: in the clearing between the Flutist and the children, three deer are depicted - the coat of arms of the von Spiegelbergs, local nobles who actively participated in the colonization of the eastern lands. And in modern Poland people live with the surnames Gamelin, Gamel and Gamelinkov, and just with typical Saxon surnames.

The version is definitely elegant. However, it is completely incomprehensible why the Gamelnites needed to transform the prosaic story of emigration into a mystical legend. This event is clearly not one of those that needed to be encrypted.

Holiday disaster?

And even propaganda posters for a healthy lifestyle

Among the versions of the legend about the Pied Piper, there is this: supposedly one or two children lagged behind the general procession and saw how those who had gone ahead were swallowed up by the mountain. It was they who conveyed this story to the Gamilians. Apparently, those telling the legend at one point realized that an event could not be considered true if all possible witnesses had disappeared.

Based on this version, the German researcher Waltraut Wöller suggested that a mountain landslide was the cause of the deaths of the children, and that the opened mountain was only envisioned from afar. Fifteen kilometers from the city, a suitable mountain was indeed found, next to which there is a gorge in which it is easy to become a victim of a rockfall, and a swampy quagmire where unfortunate children, led by a musician, could drown.

Where did they all go? Perhaps to the place of the celebration of the summer solstice - hence the need for a flutist. One problem: the solstice is still celebrated a few days earlier than the date indicated in the chronicles ...

Battle of Zedemund?

Some researchers are trying to build the legend of the Pied Piper to a minor battle at Zedemund (1259), in which the Gamen militia opposed the troops of the Bishop of Minden (Minden is a town in Westphalia) in a dispute over a certain land ownership. The Hamelnites lost the battle, many of them were captured - these "children of Hamelin" (that is, the natives of the city) and remember the lines in the chronicle and the inscription on the board. By the way, the prisoners, according to the chronicles, were taken away from the battlefield through the mountains, and could return home only through Transylvania.

True, it is not clear why the compilers of the chronicle attributed a different date to this event, why they indicated a different number of prisoners (there were 30, not 130), and also - where did the Spotted Flutist come from in this case? In a word, with any version there are more questions than answers ...

Motley flutist in fiction

The most interesting thing about the legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin is its ambiguity. It is difficult to understand who is the main villain in this story: the Flutist or the greedy townspeople who have lost their children. And who is this man with a pipe - a clever adventurer or a magician, the Devil himself or a brilliant musician-hypnotist? What is this story about - is it only about the fact that it is not good to be greedy and deceived, or is it also about the power of art, which can serve both for the benefit of people and to the detriment of? The widest scope for interpretation opens up - that's why the legend is still so popular among writers. It is no coincidence that the image of the Pied Piper often becomes a symbol: for example, the quite realistic novel by Neville Shute, The Pied Piper, tells the story of an elderly Englishman rescuing children from occupied France during World War II.

For most of us, the story of Motley Flutist is known not from the fairy tale of the Brothers Grimm, but from “The Miraculous Journey of Niels with wild geese»Selma Lagerlöf and the Soviet cartoon of the same name. This is a fairy tale, which means that explanations for the miracle are not required: if Niels finds that very magic pipe, then the rats will certainly obey him. The trick, it turns out, is in the magic item, not the musician.

Niels acts as a rat catcher

Adult literature has grown-up problems. In Bertold Brecht's play The True Story of the Pied Piper from Gammeln, the ending of the legend is completely different: the lost Pied Piper returns to the city with his children and is sentenced to be hanged. Marina Tsvetaeva in the poem "Pied Piper" (1925) denounces the well-fed philistine, deaf to real art, and presents the legend as a story of just revenge - not for greed, but for stupidity and spiritual emptiness. But the Pied Piper, in her interpretation, is not an angel of retribution, but a dangerous dictator, with sweet speeches leading him to certain death, a harbinger of the sinister tyrannies of the twentieth century. Alexander Green in his story "Pied Piper" also speaks of the danger of totalitarianism, but his main fear is not the Pied Piper, but the rodents themselves, turning into people and seizing power.

Scientists, of course, cannot get rid of the temptation to spread Hameln all over the planet. Harlan Ellison in The Emissary from Gammeln tells the story of a boy named Willie, a descendant of the Pied Piper, who, by playing the pipe, made all the cockroaches leave the city. However, people did not less pollute the Earth - and then he removed all adults from the planet, leaving it to children.

Arkady and Boris Strugatsky's story "A Beetle in an Anthill" features a planet that has been abandoned by the entire adult population, abandoning children - strange humanoid creatures in colorful clothes are trying to lure them somewhere.

In the novel by Andre Norton "The Gloomy Piper" (in another translation - "The Dark Trumpet") main character, identified with the Flutist, again acts as a benefactor: he helps a handful of children of the colonized planet to avoid the death that befell almost all other humanity.

And in Olga Rodionova's book "My Angel Pied Piper", a mysterious wanderer with a flute fights with "offspring" - mutant children with unusual abilities.

Terry Pratchett in the children's story "The Amazing Maurice and His Scientists Rodents" starts from one simple fact - rats swim beautifully, so the Fluttered Flutist could not drown them. The story is reminiscent of the good old film-fairy tale "Heart of the Dragon": intelligent rats unite with the Pied Piper - a boy, staging an invasion of the city and their subsequent removal with the help of a "magic" pipe. And in "The Autumn Fox" by Dmitry Skiruk, the main character of the cycle becomes the Hameln Pied Piper, against his will.

In the story of Marina and Sergei Dyachenko "The Burning Tower" and its indirect continuation, the novel "Alena and Aspirin", the Flutist is never named, but the reader has the opportunity to guess that it is he. Here he is an inhuman being, a kind of supreme judge and an embodied moral law that puts people in front of the most difficult choices. The girl Alena is one of the children whom the Pied Piper once took to the light world, full of joy and happiness, but her brother fled to Earth, and the girl followed him ...

The ominous appearance of the Pied Piper in our non-fairytale time is much more popular than his bright side. In Garth Nyx's children's cycle "Keys to the Kingdom" The piper who kidnaps children is the enemy of the protagonist, a boy named Arthur, and one of the girls, taken away by him, becomes Arthur's companion. And Chyna Mieville in the novel "The Rat King" is especially merciless to the Pied Piper: here he is a cruel megalomaniac, a "blond beast" with a thirst for unlimited power, which his music gives him.

The Motley Flutist has appeared countless times in songs - he was mentioned in their lyrics by ABBA, Jethro Tull and Megadeth, Queen and Rammstein, In Extremo and Led Zeppelin.

But there are not so many incarnations on the movie screen, especially original interpretations. Notable moments: in one of the film adaptations of the fairy tale ("The Motley Flutist" of 1972) he was played by the folk musician Donovan, and also the Pied Piper appears in the Disney cartoon "Fantasy" and in "Shrek". Finally, in one of the episodes of the old TV series "Batman", the protagonist parodies the Pied Piper, luring a crowd of mechanical rodents into the river.

The Japanese, with their habit of dragging everything that lies badly in anime and manga, also could not pass by the Pied Piper of Hamelin. The artist Asada Torao depicted a very cruel and bloody, a la "Battle Royale" story based on the legend: his manga "Pied Piper" describes a world in which gangs of schoolchildren rampage, and adults cannot do anything with them - after all, minors cannot be judged to the fullest extent of the law. But teenagers, who were once the same criminals, and then created Patrol 357, which fights against children's gangs, are easily dealt with with their peers. In the meantime, it becomes clear that someone is zombifying the schoolchildren, sending them orders to kill. Who could a mysterious intruder be, if not the legendary Hamelin flutist?

But the anime "Hameln no Violin Hiki" has nothing to do with the plot of the legend. The only thing the main character has in common with the Motley Flutist is that he can play music on the violin that subdues demons. In all other respects, this is a fairly standard fantasy, only curious in that many of the heroes in it bear names in honor of musical instruments(Flute, Trombone, Piano, Clarinet).

The violinist of Hamelin, oddly enough

* * *

It seems that we will follow the Pied Piper of Hamelin for a long time. Its melody calls and beckons, promising miracles, but instead only confuses more and more. The legend of the Motley Flutist is alive insofar as it is intriguing, forcing to seek and find new interpretations of it. In this sense, we can say that the Pied Piper fulfilled his mission, clearly and convincingly demonstrating to us the power of art, with the magic of which it is impossible to argue.

The Legend of the Pied Piper

The legend of the rat-catcher in its most famous version reads like this:
once the city of Hameln was flooded with a rat invasion. No gimmicks
helped to get rid of rodents, who are impudent every day until
that they themselves began to attack cats and dogs, as well as bite babies in
cradles. Desperate magistrate announced a reward to anyone who helps
rid the city of rats. At the same time, a "colorful flutist" appeared in Hameln
(or, as they sometimes translate, "motley piper"). It is unknown who he was
actually and where it came from. By obliging the magistrate to pay him in
as a reward for "as much gold as he can carry," he
took out of his pocket a magic flute, to the sounds of which all the city rats
ran to him, he also led the bewitched animals out of the city and
drowned them all in the Weser River.

The magistrate, however, managed to regret the hastily given promise, and
when the flutist returned for the award, he flatly refused. The same, with bated
anger, after a while he returned to the city already in a hunter's costume and
red hat and played the magic flute again, but this time to him
all the children of the city came running, while the bewitched adults did not
could have prevented it. Just like the rats before, the flutist brought them out of
city ​​- and drowned in the river (or took him into a certain mountain gorge on
Mount Coppen, where everyone disappeared).

Even later, this last version was redone: unclean,
pretending to be a rat-catcher, failed to kill innocent children, and
through the mountains, they settled somewhere in Transylvania, in the present
Romania.

Probably a little later, it was added to the legend that from the general
procession two boys lagged behind - tired of the long journey, they trudged
behind the procession and therefore managed to stay alive. Later, allegedly, one
one of them went blind, the other was numb.

Another version of the legend tells about one straggler - chrome
a child who managed to return to the city and talk about what happened.
It was this version that later became the basis of his poem about the Pied Piper
Robert Browning.

The third option says that there were three stragglers: blind
boy lost on the way, leading him deaf who could not hear
music and therefore escaped witchcraft, and, finally, the third, jumped out of
home half-dressed, who, then ashamed of his own appearance, returned and
that's why he stayed alive

In the Middle Ages, many wealthy cities in Europe suffered from rats, which lived not only in garbage dumps, but penetrated into barns, basements, where food supplies were stored, and climbed into the homes of citizens. In unsanitary conditions, they multiplied rapidly, neither cats, nor cunning mousetraps, nor toxic substances could destroy them. Rats are cunning creatures, they quickly adapt to the changing environment. It was believed that only a person with a magical gift could cope with them.

The prosperous city of Hameln, located on the Weser River, not far from Hanover, did not escape the plight of the invasion: in the summer of 1284, residents discovered that a myriad of rats had unexpectedly appeared in the city. As if someone had brought them to Hameln. They were not afraid of anyone, neither people, nor horses, nor dogs, nor cats. Residents tried to fight them, but nothing helped - the number of rats only increased. And the burgomaster seriously began to think about whether the inhabitants should leave the city, where the rats had destroyed all the food supplies.

At this tragic moment, a limping man in red trousers, with a red cape and a red hat on his head appeared in Hamelin. A flute was tucked into his belt. He looked like a traveling musician. At the city gates he was asked about the purpose of the visit, he replied that he would like to help the residents cope with the disaster that befell them. He was shown the way to the town hall.

The burgomaster and residents, having learned about his desire to rid the city of rats, said that if the musician manages to do this, he will receive as a reward as much gold as he can carry. The young man agreed. He went out to the square, where people who had heard about him had already gathered, pulled out his flute from his belt and began to play. Suddenly, rats began to appear from the basements and attics. They filled the area. People looked at them in horror, but the rats paid no attention to anyone. The young man played the flute and moved along the main street to the exit from the city, the rats followed him. One and all.

Residents could not believe their eyes - the streets were empty. The rats left the city. And the young man reached the Weser River, jumped into the boat and swam without ceasing to play. The rats rushed after him into the water. One and all.

After a while, the young man returned to the city. Residents ran through the streets, shouting their delight. They were ready to carry the young man in their arms. But he went to the burgomaster and recalled his promise. The burgomaster went out to the square and in front of everyone said that he did not believe that the young man had managed to rid Hamelin so easily of the rats. And just in case he handed him a few coins.

- And this is the promised payment? - the young man was surprised.
He did not take the money, and the burgomaster did not speak to him and indicated the way out of the city.

“Well, you keep your promises,” the young man said to the residents gathered in the square. “For your ingratitude, I will repay you in the same coin.

He pulled his flute from his belt again and began to play. And immediately from all the streets children began to run to him. The young man walked down the main street from the city, and the children followed him. Soon the rat-catcher and the children who followed him disappeared from sight.

The inhabitants did not dare to rush after them in pursuit. They were all bewitched. The children never returned to Hamelin.

_____________________________________________________

The legend of the Pied Piper hangs somewhere between a fairy tale, a myth and an entertaining novella. Despite its anecdotal nature, this is a legend, and not just an out of the ordinary case; I want to explain it, understand it.

Who is the Pied Piper? Where does his power over animals and children come from? How does it work: hypnosis, art? The legend is open to interpretation, it begs for interpretation.

The legend is symbolic and poses eternal questions: about the power of one person over many, about good turning to evil, about a miracle and about responsibility for one's promises.

An inscription on the old town hall reminds of a distant and sad event: “In 1284, the wizard of the rat-catcher lured 130 children out of Hamelin. They all died in the dungeon. "

The legend of the rat-catcher, supposedly originating in the 13th century, is one of the varieties of stories about a mysterious musician leading bewitched people or cattle with him. Such legends in the Middle Ages were very widespread, despite the fact that the Hameln version is the only one where the date of the event is precisely named - June 26, 1284, and the memory of which was reflected in the chronicles of that time along with completely genuine events. All this taken together makes researchers believe that some real events were behind the legend about the rat-catcher, which over time took the form of a folk tale. In later sources, especially foreign ones, the date for some unknown reason is replaced by another - June 20, 1484 or July 22, 1376.

Hameln lies on the banks of the Weser River in Lower Saxony and is currently the capital of the Hameln-Pyrmont region. Hameln became rich by trading in bread that was grown in the surrounding fields; this was reflected even in the oldest city coat of arms, which depicted millstones. Since 1277, that is, a year before the time indicated by the legend, it turned into a free city.

It is necessary to report a completely extraordinary incident that took place in the town of Hameln, in the diocese of Mindener, in the Lord's year 1284, on the day of Saints John and Paul. A certain fellow of about 30 years old, well dressed, so that those who saw him admired him, crossed the bridge over the Weser and entered the city gates. He had a strange-looking silver pipe and began to whistle all over the city. And all the children, having heard that tune, numbering about 130, followed him out of the city, left and disappeared, so that no one could later find out if at least one of them had survived. Mothers wandered from city to city and did not find anyone. Sometimes their voices were heard, and each mother recognized the voice of her child. Then the voices sounded already in Hameln, after the first, second and third anniversaries of the departure and disappearance of the children. I read about it in an old book. And the mother of Herr Dean Johann von Lude herself saw how the children were taken away.

It is believed that it was the neighbors' envy of the rich merchant Hameln that largely caused the change in the original legend, so that the motive of deception to which the hero was subjected by local elders was added to it.

This legend was so popular in creative circles that its plot was inspired at different times by such celebrities as Heinrich Heine and Prosper Merimee, Robert Browning (the poem "The Flutist from Hameln") and Valery Bryusov. In this list we will also meet Goethe, who dedicated a large ballad to the main character of our story.

In the Middle Ages, an oral tradition was formed in Saxony that tells how Hameln became the target of an attack by hordes of voracious rats. The local magistrate was at a loss; the residents panicked. But a certain flute player unexpectedly came to the aid of the townspeople. With the help of his instrument, he lured the rats out of the city gates and, bewitched by magical music, made them plunge into the waters of the Weser River one after another. In short, drown yourself. Residents breathed a sigh of relief, but the story, as you know, did not end there. The greedy fathers of the city refused to pay what they promised to the flutist. Then he, leaving Hamelin, began to play again in anger. However, now it was not rodents who followed him, but the children of ungrateful townspeople. And no one was able to stop either them or the magician musician. No one has ever seen more children.

This is the legend. But is it a legend? Already in a number of medieval documents, evidence is found that the legend about the Pied Piper is most likely not a fiction, but a real historical event. From the earliest works, one can mention the work "The Death of the Children of Hamelin" by Johann Pomarius, dating back to the XIV century. But the city chronicle is more interesting. The passage quoted below is the most reliable part of the tradition today.
"In 1284, on the day of John and Paul, which was on the 26th day of June, a flutist dressed in colorful veils led out of the city a hundred and thirty children born in Hameln to Coplen, near Calwaria, where they disappeared."
In this text, as we can see, only bare facts are given, in no way explaining the meaning of what happened. It is still unclear how the mysterious flutist managed to subdue the children to his will and, most importantly, to “neutralize” the parents. “It smells of witchcraft here,” they would have said earlier. These days, most likely, it would be assumed that the Pied Piper was a master of the art of mass hypnosis.

In the 16th-17th centuries, there was another curious passage in the legend, which later disappeared. It said that the two children still managed to escape and they told the residents of the city the details of the disappearance of their comrades. From their confused story, it followed that, lagging behind due to fatigue from other children, they saw how the children followed the Pied Piper into the mountain cave and the stone walls closed behind them. A few weeks after these events, one of the surviving children became numb and the other lost his sight. Superstitious townspeople considered the incident to be the machinations of Satan. They were sure that it was he who had come to the city under the guise of a flutist.
In addition to the lack of facts reflected in the chronicles and books, the study of the mysterious history is made difficult by the fact that some time after the events described, a plague epidemic began in Hamelin, which took away most of the witnesses of the tragedy.

A more interesting hypothesis was put forward by the scientist Maynard, who argued that children fell victim to a special "dance" psychosis that gripped them. He gave numerous examples of similar cases from the field of history and medicine. Let us recall at least the episode with the Children's Crusades, when teenagers, as if seized by sudden madness, set off unarmed, hoping to defeat Muslims with the help of religious songs.
Another version boils down to the following. In 1284, a certain recruiter, passing through Hameln, persuaded the young townspeople to follow him for resettlement to another place. Crossing the mountains, all these people ended up on the territory of modern Romania and settled there. Robert Browning writes:

And this is a tribe in Transylvania

It is different from everyone because

That his distant ancestors,

As legend has told us,

Once upon a time

From the dungeon to the heart of the mountains

Where unknown force

She lured them in early childhood.

In support of this theory, they pointed to the 16th century stained glass window installed in the Martyr Kirche Cathedral in Gameln. It depicts the leaving of children following the "emigration agent".

Why was the flutist, as legend has it, wearing a red and yellow suit? Let me remind the reader that in clothes of these colors, those convicted of having a relationship with the devil rose to the fires of the Inquisition.

Choreaomania

Unknown origin dance epidemic

A dance epidemic of unknown origin swept across Europe shortly after the end of the Black Death epidemic. Hundreds of people were engulfed in a frenzied dance, and their numbers were constantly growing. Crowds of those obsessed with the dance of St. John, or St. Vitus, as the documents of that time call it, scrambled from place, moving from city to city, and, it happened, all day long they screamed and jumped until they were completely exhausted, then fell to the ground and fell asleep right on a place to wake up and return to normal life.

but if at a later time choreomania covered almost all of Western Europe, local outbreaks were observed earlier. So, in 1237 in Erfurt, about a hundred children, for some unknown reason, became obsessed with a mad dance, after which, shouting and jumping, they went out of the city on the road to Armstadt and, when they got there, collapsed in exhaustion, plunged into sleep. The parents managed to find them and return them home, but none of the possessed were so completely unable to come to their senses, many of them died, others had tremors and convulsive twitching of the limbs until the end of their lives.

Medieval consciousness, attributing any nervous breakdown to the charms of witches or the devil himself, could easily transform something similar into the legend of the Pied Piper, and the well-known folklore motif about devil music, which neither people nor animals can resist, was later superimposed on the real basis.

This theory seems convincing, but no confirmation has yet been found.

Maniac pedophile

The theory was put forward by William Manchester in his book A World Illuminated Only by Fire (1992-1993). According to this author, the rat-catcher was in fact a maddened pedophile who managed to lure 130 children out of the city and then "use them for perverted pleasures." Manchester suggests that some of the children then disappeared without a trace, while others were found crippled or "suspended in trees." The author does not provide any evidence of this. The theory did not cause interest in itself

Ergotism

On this basis, a theory was put forward that the "revenge of the rat-catcher" was in fact the result of mass psychosis, when one person drags the others along with him, and the crowd, having lost its mind and with it a sense of self-preservation, is quite capable of getting into a dangerous or disastrous situation

Gypsy theory

It is assumed that the children were carried away by the brightly dressed gypsies, who, with songs and dances, managed to take them away from the city. However, this point of view does not have a large number of adherents.

similar legends:

Ireland also knows the story of a magic musician, however, not a flutist, but a piper, who took the youth away with him.

Sometimes it is also assumed that the rats that came to the legend later were inspired not only by real circumstances, since in the Middle Ages they really represented a disaster for many cities, although not in such a dramatic form as the legend says, but also by ancient Germanic beliefs. as if the souls of the dead migrate to rats and mice, gathering at the call of the God of Death. In the form of the latter, with this interpretation, the piper appears

The story of the unknown who appeared out of nowhere and without any explanation took the children of the city with him, there is also in Brandenburg. The only difference is that the sorcerer played the organistrum and, having lured his victims out, disappeared forever with them in Mount Marienberg

One day a musician with a bagpipe appeared in the Harz mountains: every time he started playing, a girl died. Thus, he killed 50 girls and disappeared with their souls.

A similar story exists in Abyssinia - in the beliefs evil demons named Hadzhiui Majui appear, who play pipes. They ride on goats through the villages and with their music, which cannot be resisted, take the children away to kill them.

According to the German researcher Emma Buheim, at the heart of the legend of the rat-catcher goes back to pagan beliefs about gnomes and elves who had a predilection for kidnapping children and bright costumes that were specially worn to attract children's attention.

Explorer of mythology

An integral attribute of big cities are rats, vile gray animals scurrying everywhere, stealing supplies and spreading infection. Usually they were fought with the help of cats. In addition to them, special people were also engaged in the destruction of rodents. And the most famous of them is Jack Black, Queen Victoria's fearless rat-catcher.

Unlike modern pest extermination with chemicals and poisons, Black dealt with them with his bare hands, removing wriggling, squeaking creatures from houses and sewers. A lover of rats, he had a lot of experience and collected them in armfuls. Black kept the captured tailed beasts in a special dome-shaped cage, which he carried instead of a suitcase.

Jack Black turned out to be a virtuoso showman. He demonstrated his professional skills to the crowd gathered on the streets of London. Cages full of rats, all kinds of traps and bags of poisons were laid out on a makeshift platform. Black thrust his hand into the rat cage and took out as many of them as he could hold. This caused exclamations of surprise and disgust in the crowd. Then Black let go of the rats, and they ran up his arms. The assembled people saw how the tailed beasts sat on Jack Black's shoulders and cleaned their faces, or climbed on their hind legs and sniffed his ears and cheeks.

Jack Black's abilities were only rivaled by his taste for fashion. He was wearing a high top hat, a red vest, a green coat, and white leather leggings, gnawed by the objects of his hunt. Over his shoulder he wore a leather sling adorned with a crown with the letters "V.R." (Victoria Regina, or Queen Victoria) and two metal rats on either side. As Jack Black claimed in his flyers, Queen Victoria herself had promoted him to the title of "Her Majesty the Destroyer of rats and moths."

Of course, rodent-trapping was not limited to a glamorous costume. In one interview, he told a journalist how a rat bit him on the finger. The infection started and everything looked very bad. But the rat-catcher saved himself by pulling out the broken fangs with tweezers.

Jack remembered another incident by pulling 300 rodents out of one hole in the wall. The usual cage was not enough, I had to carry the animals literally in the mouth, in the hands, under the armpits and in the pockets.

Through fearless exploits like this, Jack Black secured the position of Queen Victoria's chief rat-catcher.

In addition to killing pests, Jack Black also bred decorative rats. He kept colored or spotted animals that came across to him and carried out their selection. Decorative rats in Victorian times were as popular as birds. Young ladies kept them in golden cages for fun. Even Queen Victoria had one or two rats.

Also, the work of rat catchers at the British court has long been performed by cats. This tradition has survived to this day and now lives in the residence of the Prime Minister.