Death Omens 2

Ann Ankoù (The Worker of Death) Dieu Père (Father God) Yn Baase (Grim Reaper)

(pron. ANG-koo, DOO PEAR) Brittany, France: King of the dead. His subjects have their own particular paths along which their sacred processions move. Tall, thin man with long white hair who wears a long black coat, black wide-brimmed felt hat, carries a scyth with a reversed blade, hourglass with black sand, drives a cart (Wheelbarrow of the Dead) pulled by 2 horses: 1 old and 1 young or 4 black horses with 2 ghosts on foot to collect the souls of the dead to aid them on their journey to the next world accompanied by a crow. Is sometimes seen as a skeleton with a rotating head that can see in all directions. Some tales have it that he has 2 companions, who are skeletons in some versions, following behind his cart and tossing the dead into it. First child of Adam and Eve. Other versions have it that he is the first dead person of the year, always depicted as adult male, charged with collecting the others before he can go to the afterlife. Anatole Le Braz in his Legend of the Death: La légende de la mort en Basse-Bretagne: The Ankou is the henchman of the Death: oberour ar maro. The last dead of the year, in each parish, becomes the Ankou of this parish for all the following year. When it has been, in a year, more death than usual, one says about the Ankoù: War ma fé, heman zo eun Anko drouk: On my faith, this one is a nasty Ankoù. There are many tales involving Ankou: One says that there were 3 drunk friends walking home one night, when they came across an old man on a rickety cart. 2 of the men started shouting at Ankou, & then throwing stones, when they broke the axle on his cart they ran off. The 3rd friend felt bad, & so wanting to help Ankou, first found a branch to replace the broken axle, & then gave Ankou his shoe-laces to tie it to the cart with. The next morning, the 2 friends who were throwing stones at Ankou were dead, while the one who stayed to help only had his hair turned white. He would never speak in detail about how it happened. In one story, Marie-Louise Daniel —Ploumilliau, he comes on Christmas eve to collect a blacksmith who is still working after midnight [a reminder people died by overwork]. In another he is an uninvited guest at a party. He is god of the dead, ancestor of the Celts, and master of the cosmos. grym: strength [pron GRIM].

In the Saga of Grettir the Strong he is Grim, the forest man, who catches fish, and decapitates Hallmund the god of rebirth with an axe. He stays at Arnarvatn Heath all winter after Hallmund’s death. As Czernobog: Black God, he is the Ahriman of Slavonic dualism. Vladimir Tytla is the artist responsible for animating Tchernobog, the demon, in Fantasia. His rowanberry red aspect is Crom Dubh (13, 35:8, 176)

Yn Baase (Church Grim) Ghostly black dogs, the size of large retrievers, that guard churchyards from the Devil and hags. Do not speak, stare, or touch as it invites death. In some places the spectral dog is named Shuck and is said to be headless. Black dog types: Mauthe Doog, the Black Dog of Peel Castle in the Isle of Man and the phantom black dog in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of the Baskervilles, Mauthe means toll in German. Barguest, Shriker, Teurst: English goblin with horns, claws, rows of sharp teeth, glowing red saucer eyes and clanking chain. Appears as a donkey, pig, calf, human, or shaggy black dog. (6, 13, 14, 19, 210)