Ogre

For this week's episode, we're heading back to Europe to look at the terrifying Ogre! How are these monsters linked to Biblical mythology? How often were they even mentioned in folklore before Shrek? Find out this week!

Transcript

INTRO:

Hello and welcome to Myth Monsters, my name is Erin and I’ll be your host for these little snack bite size podcasts on folklore and mythical monsters from around the world. 

These podcasts focus on the actual cryptids, folklore and mythic monsters from global mythology, rather than focusing on full stories of heroes and their big adventures.

I’ll also be dropping in some references that they have to recent culture and where you can see these represented in modern day content so you can learn more, and get as obsessed as I am about these absolute legends of the mythological world.

The intro this week is just a little tune I’ve put together based on this week’s monster -sing I’m a believer-

I’m joking, that's old school Erin podcast episodes - I won’t put  you through it, but I am so so glad we’ve finally got to this one in our episode list. Let’s go.

DESCRIPTION:

If you’ve been on the internet for more than 10 years, you would have most likely guessed what monster we’re covering today just from my little intro song. But we’re looking at the terrifying Ogre this week - which is one I’ve been looking forward to for the last year because SHREK.

But I’m not just going to talk about everyone’s favourite animated Ogre for the episode, don’t worry - I’m going to talk about actual Ogres from European folklore.

Ogres are described as giant, hideous humanoid monsters - with mostly human features, but they were considered extremely ugly, but they would have big beards and bellies like any good dad bod out there. They would have discoloured skin, a larger head, immense strength with an insatiable appetite, especially for human flesh. Sometimes they had big ol’ tusks, or piercings - looking traditionally more like orcs, but in the oldest folklore, Ogres were basically just big, sick looking people who also ate people.

They apparently, according to one story can also shapeshift, but this is just one story - and I’m not sure how in line with the monster this is - but I’ll tell the story later

I imagine you were imagining a green, trumpet-eared Scot who eats snails and eyes - and actually this is just all wrong according to the original folklore. Although, I think they may have just child-ified it so that they weren’t horrified by what Ogres really ate. 

And I hate to say it, but Ogres do not really have layers. I am sorry, this whole episode is Shrek puns and I’m not even ashamed. 

They had no special powers and weren’t born of any weird mixes of magical races, they were just big, strong, and cannibalistic boys - that’s about it to be honest in terms of description, it’s a little boring.

ORIGIN:

Now moving onto etymology, the word Ogre actually comes from the name of the Etruscan god, Orcus, who was the god of the Underworld in Roman Mythology - now I hear what you’re saying; Erin, the Roman god of the Underworld is Pluto like the planet - and you’re not wrong, but there was another. You might not have heard of Etruscan mythology, but it’s actually another type of Italian mythology - a very ancient one at that, dating back to 900BC. Orcus was a hideous giant that ruled over the underworld and fed on human flesh, so it only made sense that Ogres were named after him and the french word for Ogre is ogre - from this, so we just adopted this across the English speaking countries.

I know that I said last week that they were based in Britain, but I will get back to this later on I swear - I will justify this, but they did originally come from France too, as the earliest mention of Ogres is within a French poem, Perceval li contes del graal by Chrétien de Troyes in the 12th century.

I’m not going to read it in French as that’s just not my jam - if it was in German I would definitely give it a go, but not French. Here’s the English translation; 

And it is written that he will come again,

to all the realms of Logres,

which was formerly land of ogres,

and destroy them with that lance.

Now I did say I would get back to why I said they were from the UK - this is because although they were a French origin monster, they actually roamed the British Isles rather than France itself. They were most likely seen on the moors of Cornwall and Scotland than they were of Brittany or Lille. 

Ogres are actually, as you can probably tell, a little missed out in folklore. Their descriptions are quite vague, and being called an ogre now mostly relates to someone being a slob, or just being a vile person overall. However, they were the inspiration for so many fantasy monsters we know of today. Apparently, Tolkien loved the idea of Ogres, and used them as the base for his Uruk-hai in Middle Earth - born of fire and steel, they were very much based on the idea of the violent, warmongering monsters who fed on human or hobbit flesh.

However, we do also think that Ogres were inspired by some other mythical beasts, such as the Jotnar from Norse mythology. I did an episode on these not too long ago. But these frost giants very much cover the Ogre description, but they’re just cold instead. Another is the monster Grendl from the epic poem Beowulf, sometimes it’s believed that he was an Ogre, other times, he’s been called a monster in his own namesake. 

Lastly, there is Og from Biblical folklore, who was certainly described as being an ogre, but more in how vile he was. However, if you listened to last week’s episode on the Nephilim, you will remember I did say that these two monsters are linked - and Og is how. He was an Amorite king, a type of giant - and sometimes thought of as a Nephilim - the offspring of both angels and humans and/or demons. But in Og’s case, he was most likely just an Ogre - so that’s pretty fun.

Ogres are also used in loads of folklore tales, they mostly feature in Puss in Boots - which is weird because GOING BACK TO SHREK, not a single Ogre features in the Puss in Boots movie or TV series. The Ogre in this story was a king, and when Puss in Boots went to see him about a land dispute, the Ogre transforms into a lion to scare the cat, but the tricksy cat then confuses the Ogre and makes it turn into a mouse - then he promptly gobbles him up. Also, it’s debated whether the Giant from Jack and the Beanstalk is also an Ogre, based on his eating habits mostly - but again, it’s not explicitly mentioned, so we’re just not sure.

Now for a real life reason as to why these might exist in folklore, the only real thing is that of a couple of medical conditions, such as Prader-Willi syndrome, Acromegaly or even just normal Gigantism. These conditions back in the 12th century were certainly going to be hard for the general population to understand or accept with limited medical knowledge - so this might be a reason as to why ogres exist in mythology I suppose.

Really the only people who are ogres are those who act like it, so there.

CULTURAL SIGNIFICANCE: 

Onto cultural significance, which of course is what everyone has been waiting for!

For art, have a look at Norandino and Lucina Discovered by the Ogre by Giovanni Lanfranco from 1624, Der kleine Daumling by Alexander Zick from around 1880 or any of the artworks involving ogres in Gustave Dore’s work from 1862 which are from the Puss in Boots book!

I also would really recommend looking over some independent art this week, there are some really cool D&D inspired or World of Warcraft inspired art pieces that are just awesome to look at.

In movies, we have a few like; Ella Enchanted, The Hobbit, Pan’s Labyrinth, The Spiderwick Chronicles and Time Bandits. 

We obviously have to talk about Shrek here too - the Shrek franchise really is responsible for bringing Ogres to the mainstream back in 2001 with the first movie. They were the reason that Dreamworks Animation became so big and went on to have 3 other films, games, numerous TV spin offs and even a ride in Universal and a whole ‘Adventure’ experience in London’s South Bank.

For TV, we have; Doctor Who, Once Upon a Time, Special Unit Two, Wheel of Time, Wakfu, Adventures of the Gummi Bears and Adventure Time.

In video games, we have loads such as; Fallout, God of War, Warcraft, Elder Scrolls, EverQuest, Guild Wars, King’s Bounty, Runescape, PuzzleQuest, Pokemon, Ogre Battle, Warlords Battlecry, Warhammer, Wakfu, Dofus, Pillars of Eternity, The Witcher 3, World of Warcraft, Touhou Project, Tales of Maj’Eyal, Quake, Final Fantasy, Heroes of Might and Magic, Dwarf Fortress, Dragon Age, Dungeon Crawl, Darkest Dungeon 2 and Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. 

There are so many here, but my recommendations here are the Shrek 2 game, because it was amazing on Game Boy Advance, World of Warcraft obviously - I’m a huge WoW nerd. And lastly, Dofus and Wakfu, if you’re into turn based French games at least, it was a family favourite of mine when I was a kid!

My book recommendation this week is that of Breverton's Phantasmagoria: A Compendium of Monsters, Myths and Legends by Terry Breverton, which has loads of our monsters in and is just a fab book overall! But honestly, just watch Shrek - that’s all you need on Ogres, that’s all I’m gonna say.

DO I THINK THEY EXISTED? 

Now it’s time for, do I think they existed?

It’s kinda interesting for this one, as there is so so so much modern content around Ogres, and that usually helps back up belief of the myth - and we do know that giant people did exist once, right. But I’m gonna say no on this one, I just don’t see it happening I’m afraid. 

Although, look I understand that as well as all the modern media - they’re also in a lot of cultures’ folklore, but very much like the Cyclops, which are the same, in lots of films, TV etc and are across multiple mythologies across the world, but we can full on say they did not exist right?! RIGHT?!!?

Anyway, I think the argument is that there were some potentially violent, possibly vulnerable people who were slightly larger than most back in the middle ages, and maybe that frightened townsfolk - that’s literally my only explanation. Or potentially a real life medical condition such as Prader-Willi syndrome which accelerates growth, and causes learning disabilities - it’s more than possible that in the Medieval period, people with these conditions were treated horribly, so I wouldn’t put it past folklore to create a creature for this, which is horrendous. Even someone who was overly tall got myths made up about them, so it’s a plausible idea.

But what do you think? Did Ogres roam the earth? Let me know on Twitter!

OUTRO: 

I’m so glad we got to cover these this week, it was such a fun one - and to be honest, what person in the world doesn’t want to talk about Shrek for 15 minutes, I mean, that’s the dream right?!

Next week, we’re heading over to South America to look at a cryptid for the first time in a little while and looking at the terrifying El Cuero. If you’ve not heard of this one, you’re in for a wild ride - come trenching into the swamps again with me next Thursday!

For now, thank you so much for listening, it’s been an absolute pleasure. If you enjoyed this podcast, please give it a rating on the service you’re listening on - I’ve got the twitter for any questions, or suggestions on what monsters to cover next and I’d love to hear from you. The social media handles for Tiktok, Youtube and Instagram are mythmonsterspodcast, and twitter is mythmonsterspod. But all of our content can be found at mythmonsters.co.uk - you can also find us on Goodpods and Patreon if you want to help me fund the podcast, ya know if you feel like it.

Come join the fun and share this with your pals, they might love me as much as you do.

But for now, stay spooky and I’ll see you later babes.