Research source

I am still near, Watching the smiles I prized on earth, Your converse mild, your blameless mirth.[64

Date of account: Late nineteenth-century compilation
Source: The Ghost World
Reference: The Ghost World · selected passage 68
Rights: public_domain
Language: English
Record updated: 2026-08-24

Record summary

Another form of spectre animal is the kirk-grim, which is believed to haunt many churches

Published source text

Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.

Source passage

Source text · mention only

Another form of spectre animal is the kirk-grim, which is believed to haunt many churches. Sometimes it is a dog, sometimes a pig, sometimes a horse, the haunting spectre being the spirit of an animal buried alive in the churchyard for the purpose of scaring away the sacrilegious. Swedish tradition tells how it was customary for the early founders of Christian churches to bury a lamb under the altar. It is said that when anyone enters a church out of service time he may chance to see a little lamb spring across the choir and vanish. This is the church lamb, and its appearance in the churchyard, especially to the grave-digger, is said to betoken the death of a child.[128] According to a Danish form of this superstition, the kirk-grim dwells either in the tower or wherever it can find a place of concealment, and is thought to protect the sacred building; and it is said that in the streets of Kroskjoberg, a grave-sow, or as it is also called, a 'gray-sow,' has frequently been seen.

Historical context

Contextual commentary · mention only

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Modern context

Contextual commentary · mention only

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