HBM129: The Underearthlings

Explicit content warning

01/22/20 • -1 min

Lars Christian Kofoed Rømer claims his red hat is mere coincidence. He wears it because his mother-in-law knit it for him 15 years ago and he quite likes it. However, it also makes him visually match the mythical underground people he spent three years studying on the Danish island of Bornholm.

Bornholm folklore sometimes references “De Underjordiske”, a kind of people that live under the many ancient burial mounds that spot the landscape. Lars sometimes calls the people “subterraneans”, “pixies” or “underearthlings”. They’re known as a militant group, fiercely defending themselves, their homes in the mounds, and the island. But not an unthankful group either, rewarding humans for kindness or bravery.

It’s worth clarifying that Lars is no “troll hunter” (as the press often gleefully mistakes him to be), nor is he in the business of saying whether reclusive, sometimes-red-hatted people are real or legend. He is, however, in the business of collecting those legends and learning what they can teach us about us. And also what the legends can tell us about the archaeological significance of a Batlic Island that’s been conquered so many times that history’s forgotten who actually made those mounds in the first place.

Pursuing legends is difficult though, as Lars attests to in this episode of Here Be Monsters. He tells producer Jeff Emtman stories of both the underearthings and the stories of the skepticism he faced when he pointed the anthropological lens on the place where he grew up. He says, “That’s why there was so much talk about this project. Had it been an anthropological study of shamans in Siberia, or something in the Amazon, then there would have been then public expectation that, ‘of course people there have spirits and stuff like that.’...But when it’s about what happens in your own back garden, then I think that’s where it gets more controversial...there’s certainly magic in distance.”

Lars is an anthropologist and the author of Tales in an Underground Landscape, a dissertation he wrote while pursuing a PhD at University of Copenhagen.

Many thanks to producer Rikke Houd, who connected Jeff to Lars and has interviewed him about De Underjordiske for the BBC show Short Cuts.

Producer: Jeff Emtman

Editor: Bethany Denton

Music: Serocell, The Black Spot

Photos: Jeff Emtman

Lars is an anthropologist and the author of Tales in an Underground Landscape, a dissertation he wrote while pursuing a PhD at University of Copenhagen.

Many thanks to producer Rikke Houd, who connected Jeff to Lars and has interviewed him about De Underjordiske for the BBC show Short Cuts.

Producer: Jeff Emtman

Editor: Bethany Denton

Music: Serocell, The Black Spot

Photos: Jeff Emtman

Previous Episode

HBM128: Seeing Auras

Colby Richardson’s mom got leukemia when he was young. He has trouble remembering her. Soon after her death, Colby and his siblings wound up at a house in Hope, BC where he met Santo, a childhood friend of his mom’s. Colby remembers that Santo’s voice to be soft and extremely calm.

Santo told Colby that he had a beautiful, green aura, a glow that surrounded his body. Back when his mother was alive, Santo had been able to see her aura too, the same green, but with a deep purply violet mixed in.

That afternoon, Santo and Colby sat in a living room with their eyes closed. Santo led him in a visualization exercise where they breathed slowly together until a door emerged in their minds’ eye. They opened the door and let light shine down. And when Colby opened his eyes, he could see auras floating around too.

Colby only saw Santo that one day, but it made an impression. In middle school and high school, Colby would sometimes stare to see the moving shapes of light around people. Eventually the ability faded.

But even today, Colby still sees clouds of green and purple before he falls asleep. He says it makes him feel connected to his mom, like she’s watching over him. But he also worries that he was tricked into believing in magic while he was in a susceptible state, grieving the death of his mother.

So, these days, Colby is uncertain about how to reflect on that afternoon in 2003. In the intervening years, he’s thought about getting in touch with Santo, but never found the right time. Just recently, he finally reached out. He found that Santo’s health has degraded, and he may have missed his chance to get clarity about his experience with auras.

Producer: Jeff Emtman

Editor: Bethany Denton

Music: The Black Spot

Next Episode

HBM130: Mother Pigeon / Sister Marta

Mother Pigeon says the wild animals of New York City are hungry. So she feeds them.

Each morning, a flock of about 150 pigeons waits for her at her local park in Bushwick. She feeds them twice a day if she can afford it, and once a day if she can’t. Peas, lentils, millet and other grains, and corn in the winter to keep them warm. “When you go out to feed birds, you’re treated like a criminal, so I like to call myself ‘The Pigilante.’”

Mother Pigeon considers herself a press agent for the city’s “maligned animals”—animals strong enough to survive in urban environments, but not charismatic enough to become our pets. Animals like rats, squirrels, raccoons, and of course, pigeons. She considers much of the information available on pigeons to be propaganda from greedy exterminators. Less controversial though, are the dangers of inhaling the dust from dried pigeon droppings, which often carry fungus spores harmful to those with compromised immune systems.

It’s completely legal to feed birds in NYC’s parks. Though in 2019, the city proposed a rule that’d make what Mother Pigeon does punishable by fines and/or jail time. She and some others vocally opposed this rule—it did not go into effect.

On this episode of Here Be Monsters, producer Jeff Emtman visits Mother Pigeon’s studio. She tells him about the illegal capture of the city’s pigeons for transfer to Pennsylvania for live pigeon shoots. And she tells the story of how she used to pretend to be a nun to gain access to the captured pigeons and surreptitiously re-release them.

Mother Pigeon sells felt and wire animals (pigeons and rats, mostly). You can find her and her fake animals many days in Union Square Park in Manhattan. She posts her whereabouts on Instagram and sells her art in-person and on Etsy.

Producer: Jeff Emtman

Editor: Bethany Denton

Music: The Black Spot