While researching an essay for the new edition of “Switzerland” (Lonely Planet), I came across an oral myth told by alpine shepherds in the canton of Waadt. Switzerland has lots of myths about fertile, pre-glacial landscapes that become iced over and inhospitable. Often the transformation is punishment for some moral wrong-doing. Essentially, the myth goes like this: In the lush alpine valley the cows are so large and produce so much milk that villagers store this milk in enormous ponds, rowing out on the milky waters to collect the cream for butter. One fateful day a gust of wind capsizes a villager’s boat, but the other villagers can’t find any sign of him. While they’re making butter, the gruesome corpse turns up in their enormous butter churn. They bury him in a cave filled with honeycomb.
With a lot of creative license, here’s the myth in rhyming couplets, highlighting the spooky side (probably best imagined with a musical backing by Nick Cave or the Australian band The Triffids)
In a valley strange, where cows stood tall
Milk flowed abundant, a creamy sprawl
Villagers dug ponds vast and wide
To hold the riches, a milky tide
Yet fear prevailed in this strange abode
Whispers in the night, a mournful ode
Forces unknown, a constant fright
Haunted the settlers every night
Alas, a shepherd young and bold
Faced a horror, a tale untold
Rowing his boat on a pond so wide
Malevolent wind by his side
Capsized and sinking in milky deep
This shepherd struggled, his soul to keep
Desperation gripped, icy currents cold
An unseen force, his fate foretold
Fingernails scraped on the slippery hull
Bloody streaks on milk, a tale to lull
In dim morning light, cries unheard
Swallowed by whispers, the wind’s cruel word
Days passed, darkness, an unforgiving shroud
Villagers churned, a macabre crowd
Our shepherd’s body from a barrel tall
Foaming, rising, a gruesome call
Buried in a cave, walls adorned
Honeycombs by bees, malevolence born
A deep hum, a sinister sound
Echoing through the night, all around
The valley of plenty had turned to dread
Children spoke of the shepherd’s ghostly thread
Shores of milk ponds, revenge in the air
Against the wind that brought despair
Strangers in the cave, vanished, gone
Cries echoing, a haunting song
Icy crypts of stone, a chilling tale
A once-plentiful valley, now turned frail
No one spoke of the shepherd, his fate,
A shadow lingered, a malevolent weight
A reminder of consequences dire
For those who disturb the soul’s hidden fire