Key Info

- Malevolent spirit that causes nightmares and sleep paralysis

Brief Bio

In Norse and Germanic folklore, a mare (or mara) is a malevolent spirit or creature that causes nightmares and sleep paralysis by sitting on a person's chest, and also torments livestock. The term "nightmare" derives from the mare, and the creature's existence is thought to explain the physical sensations of sleep paralysis, such as pressure on the chest and an inability to move.

The mare was believed to ride horses, which left them exhausted and covered in sweat by the morning. She could also entangle the hair of the sleeping man or beast, resulting in "marelocks", called marflätor ('mare-braids') or martovor ('mare-tangles') in Swedish or marefletter and marefloker in Norwegian. The belief probably originated as an explanation to the Polish plait phenomenon, a hair disease.

Even trees were thought to be ridden by the mare, resulting in branches being entangled. The undersized, twisted pine-trees growing on coastal rocks and on wet grounds are known in Sweden as martallar ('mare-pines') or in German as Alptraum-Kiefer ('nightmare pine').

According to Paul Devereux, mares included witches who took on the form of animals when their spirits went out and about while they were in trance (see the Icelandic example of Geirrid, below). These included animals such as frogs, cats, horses, hares, dogs, oxen, birds and often bees and wasps.