Tatzelwurm

For this week's episode, we're heading over the Alps for a terrifying dragon (kinda?), the Tatzelwurm! How can you get this little terror to move on from your livestock? Why is it even called a dragon? 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.

It’s August if you can believe it, 2024 is going so fast - although I can’t complain. I’ve been a really busy bee for the last few months, so I’m hoping it might die down soon so I can get some well deserved rest.

DESCRIPTION:

Anyway, enough about me - we are staying in Europe for this week’s monster and heading over to a skiing hotspot to get away from the heat of the summer. We’re going over to the Alpine region of South eastern Europe for the Tatzelwurm!

The Tatzelwurm is described as a half-snake, half-cat dragon-like creature. This monster is 5-7 feet in length, with a grey long, winding body covered in scales, much like a snake and two or four arms with clawed hands. It has a cat-like upper half with a light layer of fur, sharp teeth and pointed ears and generally slinks about around the Alps.

It is sometimes said to have more than 2 limbs, sometimes having multiple like a massive caterpillar or even only being a few inches long and slightly resembling an axolotl but the most common description is of this slightly larger, asian dragon inspired monster. 

The Tatzelwurm was believed to be highly venomous in almost every aspect of itself. It was able to breathe poisonous breath, had a venomous bite with poisonous saliva, which could kill anyone who was bitten, as well as acidic blood which could burn through surfaces. You could tell one was around by hearing a high pitched noise, or hissing sound - but generally they stayed away from people. 

These creatures would usually live in wooded areas or the mountain ranges around the Alps away from people, however, they tend to be all over the Alpine region. They’ve been spotted in Switzerland, Germany, Austria, France and Italy but mostly within each of those countries’ part of the Alps themselves. However, they have been known to sleep in barns and haylofts, where they will sleep for long hibernation periods in the winter.

Tatzelwurm only bothered people when they were caught feeding on their livestock, but they wouldn’t eat the cows and sheep themselves, but would suckle from their udders for milk. They were also very defensive around their young, which they would carry on their backs like possums, but we’re not sure if they’re reptilian and were born through eggs - however, it does show that there were plenty of them around to be reproducing.

Generally, you could kill a Tatzelwurm by the usual means of slaying a small lizard - and it doesn’t seem like a particularly brave act although their bites did kill you. You could just tread on it or stab it with something, drop a heavy item on it etc. But if you wanted to just frighten it off instead, you could go out and buy a white rooster, which would make it leave your cows alone.

ORIGIN:

Over to etymology, Tatzelwurm is a Bavarian word which comes from Tatze meaning paw or claw and wurm meaning, you guessed it, worm. However, it’s not the only name it has - in Switzerland, it’s known as the Stollenwurm meaning tunnel worm, in Austria it was Bergstutz meaning mountain stump and in France, arassas and I don’t know what that one means I’m afraid. In English though, it’s mostly known as the Alps Dragon - but I haven’t heard of any of these I’m afraid. 

So for their history, it’s actually quite nicely laid out. The first ever story of the Tatzelwurm was from the 14th century, when a man called Heinrich von Winkelried, who was a convicted criminal, decided to stand up to the dragon, who was terrorising a local town. He fought and killed the monster in exchange for his freedom, but unfortunately decided to celebrate by holding up his bloodied sword, with a single drop of the Tatzelwurm’s blood dripping onto his hand and killing him instantly.

This story is the first of many with the Tatzelwurm, and really is the only history we have with it - not that that is a surprise when it comes to mythical monsters. It’s very common that we don’t have a biological or scientific text about them, it’s usually a story that has been told through the ages that gives them any credibility. 

The more precise story in terms of dates was in 1779 when a man called Hans Fuchs went walking through the mountains and bumped into two Tatzelwurm, who apparently had the same idea as him. They gave chase all the way home, and once he was safe Hans told his family and then died of a heart attack from the panic. He gave us the best description of the monster we have to this day with the cat face and serpentine body.

In 1828, the Tatzelwurm had been written into history when an Austrian peasant found the body of a Tatzelwurm which was half-eaten by crows by the time he got it home. The body was such a marvel back in the day that the Tatzelwurm was considered a real creature all through the 1800’s, so much so that it was even considered at one point to have just gone extinct, rather than be a mythical beast.

There were a couple more sightings within the 19th and 20th centuries, but in the 1930’s and 60’s there were two big hoaxes around this monster too. In 1934, a Swiss photographer saw this strange creature by a log and presented it to Berliner Illustrierte, a magazine in Berlin, who funded an expedition to find the Tatzelwurm. Of course, this was a failure and it was considered a hoax using a large river fish corpse. 

In the 1960’s, another photo emerged of a supposed Tatzelwurm and was given to a Geneva newspaper anonymously, however, it was believed to be a mayor from a local Bavarian town trying to rouse some tourist attention and was dismissed as another hoax.

In the modern day, in 2000 a skeleton was donated to the Geneva Institution believed to be the Tatzelwurm, however it also came with a sizable donation and to this day, they refuse to say who donated it or why they donated it to the Geneva Institution in the first place.

Lastly and most recently, in 2009 in Italy, reports were made of Tatzelwurm or Basilico near the Swiss border. Some of them even said there were raptor dinosaurs, however, it was believed that these were just missing monitor lizards that had escaped. However, modern sightings are frequent and there have been several articles in the modern day by cryptozoologists in large magazines trying to prove their existence.

What we do believe they are in reality is very similar. It’s widely believed that the Tatzelwurm were more than likely just a larger salamander species or potentially Gila Monsters, which are slightly larger than normal salamanders but do have a poisonous bite, as well as being some of the most venomous creatures on the planet - they’re also one of the very few venomous lizards. However, they’re not native to the Alps because of their natural cold blood, alongside salamanders and another potential explanation, the Giant Skink.  

Of course in the mythology space, we can compare them mostly to Dragons, but not to our normal European, Game of Thrones esque beasts, more like the Lindwurm, which was another European Dragon, but was more snake-like, however, was still pretty massive. We do also have the Dragon type of Wyrms here, spelt with a y and not a o or u, which are Dragons without arms and legs, but they do tend to have wings. Lastly, we do also have the Asian Dragons, who were said to have shorter arms and legs and more serpentine-like bodies. However, how likely is it that an Asian Dragon got over to Europe? Pretty unlikely.

The one other similar monster that is shouting at me is the Basilisk. This European and serpentine beast was pretty fearsome, and also incredibly venomous to humans, as well as having that petrifying glare. These were born from the mix of a chicken and snake and so also fit into our hybrid model for the Tatzelwurm, as well as being in the right area. However, they are still a bit larger than the Tatzelwurm, so maybe they’re just a really big, feathery cousin.

CULTURAL SIGNIFICANCE: 

Now onto modern media, we don’t have anything for the Tatzelwurm itself bar some video games - however, I’ve found a gold mine of cat-like dragons and I think that trope works for this one. 

For art, there are a few portrait bits hanging around - however, a lot of them don’t have artists names or actual names of the pieces for me to advise you on where to find them, but they are around if you search for Tatzelwurm. Otherwise, there are some cool independent bits this week, they’re pretty cool - but they are dragons so it makes sense.

In movies, we have; Spirited Away, Coco, How to Train Your Dragon, The Hobbit, Onward, Damsel, Godzilla, The Sea Beast, The Neverending Story, Pete’s Dragon, The Secret of NIMH, Inheritance Magic & Upside Down Magic.

For TV, we have; Dragons: Riders of Berk, Tricky, Dragon Hunters, Tales of Arcadia, Dungeons & Dragons, Yu-Gi-Oh! & Digimon.

In video games, we have ones such as; Elder Scrolls, Pokemon, Monster Hunter, Cookie Clicker, World of Warcraft, Spyro the Dragon, Puzzle & Dragons, Freedom Planet, Lunar, Dragalia Lost, Monster Sanctuary, Flight Rising, The Battle Cats, Dragon City, Final Fantasy & Dragon Creek.

My book recommendation this week is for Giants, Monsters & Dragons: An Encyclopedia of Folklore, Legend, and Myth by Carol Rose for a whole load of dragon folklore. Unfortunately, there’s not many books out there on Alpine folklore, but you can look at European Mythology by Jacqueline Simpson for wider European bits!

DO I THINK THEY EXISTED? 

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

It’s a pretty crazy hybrid monster, and generally my rule of thumb is that I don’t tend to go with these - and this one is unfortunately no exception. It’s also a more modern monster, making it almost a cryptid, and in some circles it is considered a cryptid too - but that just adds to the unbelievability I’m afraid.

I can’t say I’ve heard of this monster before and considering I’m European, I’m surprised. We do love our dragon types over here, but I think we mostly just scoop them all up under a dragon category and leave it at that, only really looking into them if you’re from a specific place or have a specific connection to the monster. 

However, this monster merges two of my favourite animals - cats and snakes, and then through in the mythology with the dragon and I’m well into this - so I’m sad that it probably isn’t wandering about, but with our history of Dragons over here in Europe, it doesn’t particularly surprise me that this kind of monster exists and I respect it.

But what do you think? Did the Tatzelwurm roam the Alpine mountains? Let me know on Twitter!

OUTRO: 

An interesting one with actually very little information about it around the world web and as I said, usually I can use my own brain for European monsters and definitely dragons, but not this time. So I hope you enjoyed learning about this one with me!

Next week, we’re staying in Europe, but heading over to Scandinavia for a legendary Norse monster. I hope you’re bringing something to appease all three of Garmr’s heads 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, Threads and Instagram are mythmonsterspodcast, and twitter is mythmonsterspod. But all of our content can be found at mythmonsters.co.uk, including some very cool merchandise - you can also find us on Goodpods, Buymeacoffee and Patreon if you want to help me fund the podcast too.

Come join the fun though 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.