| AT SEA: Sea serpents always had a nasty reputation of being
dangerous to small boats. At any rate people were mortally afraid of them. Onsøy in Østfold
A man died after having been hit hard by the tail of a sea serpent.
Ellinggårdkilen at Onsøy
In the Ellinggård inlet a sea serpent used to go ashore to hunt calves of dairy cows. There
soon was a trail from the sea leading up to the pasture. No farmer wanted to take the
calves indoors, as they then expected the sea creature to cause still
worse damage. Not even bullets of old silver did any harm
to it.
When the congregation was assembled in prayers for protection, the sea serpents took
still more
calves. One brave and strong man then made a club of solid oak tree and
hid to ambush the animal. When the sea serpent finally arrived, he struck a
hard blow and killed the beast. The tradition says that one of the vertebrae
parts for years was used as a milking stool in the barn of Ellingsøy farm.
Ørekvam in Hordaland
For a few successive years Åsmund Ørekvam saw a sea serpent at about the same spot
at a certain time of the summer. It was growing bigger all the time. He ha
made an axe with an unusually
long handle in order to kill the serpent. When he met the creature again,
it was half in the water, half on land. Even if he was a very strong and
curageous man, he
did not dare to pick a fight when he got close and saw the sheer size of the animal.
Bjørnefjorden
Johannes Furuberg in Mauranger was on his way to Bergen to buy grain. He
had borrowed a gun to defend himself if he met the sea serpent. In the Bjornefjord he saw somthing that he assumed
to be a cluster of fishing boats. It
wasn`t. It was the sea serpent, and in vain he tried to outrow it. When it
got very close to his boat, it raised its head high. Johannes said a
prayer, pointing the gun directly into the mouth of the monster he pulled the
trigger. The orm sank out of sight and coloured the sea red with blood.
Johannes loaded the gun again but the sea serpent did not surface again.
Molde
Lorentz de Ferry and his oars crew met a sea serpent at Juleneset in
1746. De Ferry shot at the animal, and it disappeared.
Romsdalsfjorden
Five men in a little sailboat met a sea serpent in the Romsdal fjord in 1815. One of
the men, J.C.Lund, fired a shot against the head of the sea serpent at
close range. The orm chased the men in the small boat till it reached shallow water, whereupon it
turned and left.
Brekkestadbukta at Ørland
A sea serpent entered the Brekkestad bay close to the entrance of
the Trondheim fjord. It stayed there patrolling the area, forcing the
fishermen to stay on land. No one dared go out fishing, until the
blacksmith Jørn Hovde solved the problem for them. He rammed a lot of
iron spikes into a log and went sea serpent fishing in the bay. When the
sea serpent closed in on him, he sent the spiked log forward. The creature
attacked the log, and eventuallyt got itself killed from the spike wounds.
Sandøyfjorden
The sea serpent entered the Sandøyfjord and stayed there. No one
dared to go fishing, except for an old man who knew what to do. He told the people to ask
a blacksmith to make a lot of iron spikes and hammer them into a log he
had found. Then they were to push the log out in the fjord next to an
anchored boat. So they did. When they started banging on the empty
rowing boat, the sea serpent surfaced. It saw the log and attacked. The
log started rolling in the water and the sea serpent coiled itself around
it. The dead sea serpent later drifted ashore. No animal or bird ever ate from
the carcass except for the ravens.
Tysfjorden
Some fishermen were outside the north side of Brynilen. Two
boats were anchored to allow the crew to sleep. Suddenly one of the
fishermen saw a head come out of the sea. The beast stretched its
neck and peeked down into the other boat. Then it disappeared but surfaced
again on the other side of the boat. Suddenly it lunged forward and pressed the
boat down into the water causing both boat and crew to disappear. The two fishermen of
the other boat hurried towards the safety of the nearest shore, but they had to stay there for two
days before the sea serpent left the area.
There are other stories about narrow escapes, but none as dramatic as
this one.
IN THE LAKES AND THE RIVERS: Contrary to salt water sea serpents
the sweet water variety have
never presented any direct danger or harm to humans, except for accidents
caused by panic or people trying to kill the animal..
Mjøsa
1.A Mjoes orm was killed in 1522 by a volley of cross bow arrows.
2.Another Mjoes orm had crawled up to the Ringsaker church. A brave man
climbed the bell tower and fired at it till it returned to the lake.
3.In the1920ies a man hunting pike emptied the magazine of his Krag
Jørgensen rifle
at a sea serpent.
Hønefoss
A man shot at an orm that came swimming downstream the river. When he
succeeded in dragging the dead orm ashore and saw the size of the animal, he
lost his mind.
Sperillen
Åbborvatnet at Bjonskogen.
The gun smith Rifle-Gunder lived in the 1st part of the 19th century. When he was about
to kill the greedy sea serpent of the Aabbor lake in the Bjon woods, he
crafted a heavy rifle in caliber 20 mm. The orm in the small Aabbor lake was particularly keen on killing
and eating livestock. Rifle-Gunder brought a live goat that he tied in a
leash on some flat rocks close to the shore, but he also tied himself to a tree as he was afraid
of the mesmerizing effect of looking into the sea serpent eyes. The gun
was loaded with two bullets, the one on top of the other. The orm came swimming,
got ashore and grabbed the bleating goat. Rifle-Gunder then aimed at a
yellow spot on the breast of the orm and pulled the trigger. When the
death throes of the animal subsided, the Aabbor lakes was coloured red
with blood.
This orm was supposed to have come from the lake Randsfjord. That one
in turn was supposed to have come from the lake Mjoesa. Stories like these
probably originated from the fact that many stories tell about sea
serpents that were seen when they appeared on land going back into the
lake.
Sperillen
Another sea serpent was supposed to have come from the lake Vangsmjoesa
along the river, then entering the lake Sperillen. Again
Rifle-Gunder was called upon to hunt it with his unique rifle. Crossing a pasture in
Fjoesvika
he came
next to a summer barn where he spotted a hideous head resting in the
doorway. The sea serpent had taken a nap inside the barn. Rifle-Gunder
aimed at the head and fired. When the beast was hit in the head the
convulsions and death throes of the dying creature crushed much of the inside riggings of
the barn.
The arm of Rifle-Gunder used to twitch when he was about to go hunting
some big animal. Before this trip the arm "almost came off", but
it was the last time his arm predicted a killing.
Seljord
In the Aall woods there is a small lake calld Mork lake. Knut Kleiva
went fishing there when he saw a small orm. He managed to get it ashore
and started killing the animal by hitting it with his wooden fishing rod.
By the time it died just two feet were left of Knut`s rod. The
neighbours called the10 feet long creature a water orm.
Fyresvatn
The sea serpent here was named the Gjev Troll. It was last seen in
1918 by two men when it recieved three rounds from one of the men`s Krag Jørgensen
rifle.
In Setesdal
A man ramming a long wooden stick into the throat of a sea serpent, was rewarded by a blow
of the tail so hard that he suffered from it the rest of his life.
Hallandsvatnet at Mandal
Two brothers gone fishing to the Halland lake met a sea serpent
there in 1969. One of the men threw a heavy stone down onto its head.
Vangsvatnet at Bruvik in Hordaland. An orm rested in the outlet thus damming the lake. People
hung gleaming brass outside the bell tower of the church. The orm got curious, came close
to have a look and got
killed. Jølstervatnet. The wedding party in a boat hung a silver can outside the
boat railing. The
orm came, and its head got chopped off.
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