Editing Lindworm (section)

== In tales ==
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[[File:Klagenfurt 2018(1) 06 (cropped).jpg|thumb|left|16th-century lindworm statue in [[Klagenfurt]], Austria, featuring wings and limbs.]]
An Austrian tale from the 13th century tells of a lindworm that lived near [[Klagenfurt]]. Flooding threatened travelers along the river, and the presence of the lindworm was blamed. A duke offered a reward to anyone who could capture it and so some young men tied a bull to a chain, and when the lindworm swallowed the bull, it was hooked like a fish and killed.<ref>J. Rappold, ''Sagen aus Kärnten'' (1887).</ref>

The shed skin of a lindworm was believed to greatly increase a person's knowledge about nature and medicine.<ref name="Lindorm">{{cite web|url=https://runeberg.org/nfbp/0351.html |title=645-646 (Nordisk familjebok / Uggleupplagan. 16. Lee{{Snd}} Luvua) |date=22 January 2018 |website=runeberg.org }}</ref>

A serpentine monster with the head of a "[[salamander (legendary creature)|salamander]]" features in the legend of the [[Lambton Worm]], a serpent caught in the [[River Wear]] and dropped in a well, which 3–4 years thence, terrorized the countryside of [[County Durham|Durham]] while the nobleman who caught it was at the [[Crusades]]. Upon return, he received spiked armour and instructions to kill the serpent, but thereafter to kill the next living thing he saw. His father arranged that after the lindworm was killed, a dog would be released for that purpose; but instead of releasing the dog the nobleman's father ran to his son, and so incurred a malediction by the son's refusal to commit [[patricide]]. [[Bram Stoker]] used this legend in his short story ''[[Lair of the White Worm]]''.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/meft/meft43.htm |title=The Lambton Worm|publisher= sacred-texts.com|access-date=June 1, 2019}}</ref>

The sighting of a "whiteworm" once was thought to be an exceptional sign of good luck.<ref name="Lindorm"/>
[[File:Lissitzky Cold synagogue Mogilev dragon 01.jpg|thumb|A painting of the city of Worms and the Lindworm, as depicted in the story by [[Juspa Schammes]]. The painting was displayed in [[Cold Synagogue, Mogilev]].]]
A German folk legend, written in the 17th-century by [[Juspa Schammes]], tells that the origin of the name of the city of [[Worms, Germany|Worms]] is rooted in a tale involving lindworm: This creature, resembling a [[snake]] and a [[worm]], arrived in the city of Germisa and terrorized its inhabitants. Every day, the people held a lottery to determine which of them would be sacrificed to the lindworm in order to spare the city from destruction. Eventually, the lot fell on the queen. One of the city's heroes refused to allow her to sacrifice herself and offered to replace her on the condition that if he survived, she would marry him. The queen agreed, and he donned iron armor. After the lindworm swallowed him, he cut his way out from the inside and killed it. He married the queen, became king, and renamed the city to Worms to commemorate this tale.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Eidelberg |first=Shlomo |title=R. Juspa, Shammash of Warmaisa (Worms). Jewish Life in 17th Century Worms |publisher=Magnes Press |year=1991 |isbn=9652237620 |location=Jerusalem |pages=82–84}}</ref>

The [[knucker]] or the [[Tatzelwurm]] is a wingless biped, and often identified as a lindworm. In legends, lindworms are often very large and eat cattle and human corpses, sometimes invading churchyards and eating the dead from cemeteries.<ref>{{cite web|url=   https://www.astonishinglegends.com/astonishing-legends/2018/9/24/tatzelwurm|title=Tatzelwurms |date=24 September 2018 |publisher=Astonishing Legends   |access-date=June 1, 2019}}</ref>
[[File:The pink fairy book (1897) (14597454479).jpg|thumb|right|The maiden amidst the Lindorm's shed skins. Illustration by [[Henry Justice Ford]] for [[Andrew Lang]]'s ''[[The Pink Fairy Book]]'' (1897).]]
In the 19th-century tale of "Prince Lindworm" (also "[[King Lindworm]]")<ref>Grundtvig, Svend. ''Gamle danske minder i folkemunde: folkeæventyr, folkeviser''. Kjøbenhavn, C. G. Iversen. 1854. pp. 172-180.</ref> from [[Scandinavian folklore]], a "half-man half-snake" lindworm is born, as one of twins, to a queen, who, in an effort to overcome her childlessness, followed the advice of an old [[crone]] who instructed her to eat two onions. As she did not peel the first onion, the first twin was born a lindworm. The second twin is perfect in every way. When he grows up and sets off to find a bride, the lindworm insists that a bride be found for him before his younger brother can marry.<ref>{{cite web|url=   https://www.worldoftales.com/European_folktales/Norwegian_folktale_3.html|title=    Prince Lindworm•	|publisher= European folktales 
|access-date=July 1, 2019}}</ref> Because none of the chosen maidens are pleased by him, he eats each one until a shepherd's daughter who spoke to the same crone is brought to marry him, wearing every dress she owns. The lindworm tells her to take off her dress, but she insists that he shed a skin for each dress she removes. Eventually, his human form is revealed beneath the last skin. Some versions of the story omit the lindworm's twin, and the gender of the soothsayer varies. A similar tale occurs in the 1952 novel ''[[The Voyage of the Dawn Treader]]'' by [[C. S. Lewis]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2015/05/22/the-lindworm/
|title=The Lindworm|publisher=Paris Review |last=Stein|first=Sadie|date=May 22, 2015 |access-date=June 1, 2019}}</ref>

The tale of Prince Lindworm is part of a multiverse of tales in which a maiden is betrothed or wooed by a prince enchanted to be a snake or other serpentine creature ([[Aarne–Thompson–Uther Index|ATU]] 433B, "The Prince as Serpent"; "King Lindworm").<ref>Jan M. Ziolkowski. 2010. “Straparola and the Fairy Tale: Between Literary and Oral Traditions.” Journal of American Folklore 123 (490). p. 383. doi:10.1353/jaf.2010.0002</ref><ref>Thompson, Stith. ''The Folktale''. [[University of California Press]]. 1977. p. 101. {{ISBN|0-520-03537-2}}</ref>

In a short Swiss tale, a Lindworm terrorises the area around [[Grabs, Switzerland|Grabs]]. "It was as big as a tree trunk, dark red in colour and, according to its nature, extraordinarily vicious". It was defeated by a bull that had been fed milk for seven years and had hooks attached its horns. A girl, who had committed an offense, was tasked with bringing the bull to the Lindworm. After the beast was defeated, the enraged bull threw itself off a cliff, but the girl survived.<ref>{{cite web|url=  http://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/schweiz/st_gallen/lindwurm_grabs.html
|title="Der Lindwurm", Sagen des Kantons St. Gallen|publisher= Werner Hausknecht & Co. St. Gallen   |last=  Kuoni|first=  Jacob|date=  1903   |access-date=June 13, 2021}}</ref> In another tale, a cowherd falls into a cave where a Lindworm lives. Instead of eating him, the Lindworm shares his food source, a spring of liquid gold. After seven years, they are discovered by a Venetian who hauls up the Lindworm and ties it up. The cowherd releases the Lindworm, who kills the Venetian and then leaves. When the cowherd goes home, no one recognizes him and he no longer likes human food.<ref>{{cite web|url=  http://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/schweiz/st_gallen/lindwurm_gamidaur.html
|title="Der Lindwurm in Gamidaur", Sagen des Kantons St. Gallen|publisher= Werner Hausknecht & Co. St. Gallen   |last=  Kuoni|first=  Jacob|date=  1903   |access-date=June 29, 2021}}</ref>