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Classic Archive Merged: Spider Spirit?

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Anonymous

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Robert Moss

I would have been around 8 years old. It was 1973 and my family (mum, dad and two sisters) would go blackberry picking on a Sunday afternoon in Essex (UK), where we lived. Piling into my dad's old blue Mini we'd find some deserted country lane, find some berries and try to gather enough for a few pies without eating them all first.

My mother, father and two sisters became interested in some berry-rich bushes and I wandered off, maybe twenty or thirty metres away. Crouching down in order to poke the big hedges and bushes I found a gap in the foliage - I peered in and got a shock.

There - sat in the middle of a huge web with strands like steel wire - was the biggest spider I have ever seen. It was a monster, maybe four feet from tip to tip. It's body had a brown and pink mottled colour, like those exotic speckled bird's eggs you see in collector's cages. I tried calling my parents but they wouldn't come - I felt so frustrated. They just ignored me and I was forced to leave it.

The event has stayed with me all these years, burned indellibly into my brain like a photograph. I have tried to rationalise it. Maybe I dreamed it, maybe the spider seemed bigger than it was, but I genuinely do believe that I saw it. Maybe I peered through a dimension door and saw what they call Iktomi, the spider spirit. The experience stays with me to this day.
 
Iktomi - Lakota (Sioux) Mythology

From you calling the spider Iktomi I presume you have background info as to the influence this spirit has on people? If not and you want some further information, then let me know. I spent over a year on a Lakota reservation in the US.
 
Mayby it was just a regular (if rather large) spider which your child-like perceptions expanded into this monster?

I mean, wouldn't a 4' diameter spider be just to big to live?

Niles "who get's arachnaphobic of any spider over 2 inches diameter... with 1 exception ;)" Calder
 
Contrary to popular belief, there are some very large species of spider living wild in Britain, about the same size as the bird-eating spiders of the tropics. I'm not sure of the species, but they are rare and elusive.
Your post is interesting. I am inclined to believe that a shock of any kind can alter the perceptics, such that the sight of an outsize spider literally altered the perceived dimensions of the creature into something a lot bigger. Things always seem a bit bigger when we ourselves are small (not unnaturally).
Anyway I always admit that I could be wrong, and maybe you really did see a 4ft spider. I would like to catch it if possible, and scare my sister:)

Big Bill Robinson
 
In Robert Anton Wilsons Cosmic Trigger 2 there is a chapter which deals with an incident when Wilson was four years old seems to describe the same kind of incident "One day in our back yard'between the tomatoes and the potatoes,I saw a Monstrous Giant Spider,about the size of a large dolls house or an Australian sheep hound.It scared the screaming blue Jesus out of me and I ran ,weeping ,to my mother ,howling about this Monster."
 
spider things

Adding a Jungian touch here - the tale of a giant spider leaped at me from the screen because I had just finished umpiring a fantasy role-playing adventure set in ancient Japan, in which the legendary Kumo featured prominently. The Kumo was, of course, a giant spider, known for its ability to change into the form of a human, dispense venom to sick people as "medicine" and generally give humanity a hard time. It also used to haunt old castles and ruins, lying in wait for a hero with a sword to come by and fight it; its webs were said to be unbreakable if any poor mug got caught in them. Also, a thought on comparitive mythology - I wonder if anyone else knows of a "spider god" native to other cultures elsewhere....?
 
You're not alone...

Just read your tale and to tell the truth it's sent shivers down my spine because I've seen exactly the same creature - or more probably the same species of monster. However, my rather more prolonged encounter with this monster took place in Manchester, Wythenshawe and I was probably about 10 years old and like yourself have since put the whole incident down to a dream or some childish misunderstanding. No matter how much I tell myself otherwise I saw what I saw and actually prodded the thing with a long stick ( a small branch stripped of twigs ).

I can't remember how I first spotted it but here's my version of events anyhow:

I noticed one day a large rusty brown almost suedey bundle wedged in the nook where the lower branches of a neighbour's tree met the trunk. On closer inspection it looked for all the world to be like a spider (the common garden spider) except huge - my estimates have always been that this spider would be 3 foot if outstretched. It had the same pinkish mottled patterning although as I remember only on it's ovesized abdomen. It's legs where held very tightly in to it's body and it was to all intents and purposes crouched up. I was scared, horrified and intrigued all at the same time. This particular tree was in the corner of a large front garden (due to the garden belonging to a corner house). I relayed my find to various friends who played in the streets there but all showed no real interest even after seeing it and soon returned to their perpetual road-based footy games.
I was undeterred by their indifference and stared up toward the creature wondering what I should do (as I recall it was residing on the first branch of this tree and about 7-9 feet from the ground).

I decided to tell these neighbours just what they had living up in their tree. They were always an aloof family and childless or else the children were then all adults; the man I spoke to ridiculed me and told me it was probably poison and not to touch it. He wouldn't even come to look at it just as your father would not humour you!

Still awestruck, a few days later I decided to prod the thing which is what I did. It felt fairly heavy and despite some seemingly minute give, it was not budging. Either way I was too scared to prolong my investigation with what was, after all, a huge crouched up spider.

A day later it was completely gone and so was a neighbour's dog (2 doors down). A dog not prone to wandering, an unexcitable and reliable creature gone off the face of the earth and leaving behind a very upset lad (owner) who could not come to terms with the abstract disappearance of his faithful guardian. A strange and timely coincidence if you ask me.

I've often thought about this monster spider and even relayed the tale to a few people and have been met with the same incredulence each time. I can't blame people for rejecting the incident as complete fiction but I know what I saw and have never seen it's like since. What do you think? Have we both seen the same type of creature? If so then it must surely raise a multitude of questions about how such a huge creature could exist and remain to all intents undiscovered. If it is real, then it can only be a nocturnal mover and a rare mover at all, if ever. Perhaps I saw the creature doing what it does best, keeping still and out of sight.

I'd be very excited if anyone else has ever come face to face with the impossibility of a huge native arachnid such as this.
 
From my mis-spent youth I recall a Japanese folk tale about a giant spider which took the shape of a beautiful maiden and ate people. It lived below an abandoned house, as I recall. A legendary hero (who's name, alas, escapes me) killed it and destroyed 'many things of horror' which he found at the site.

In the very early years of FT there was a report from a forestry worker who claimed to have seen huge multi-coloured spiders in (and this is near as damnit a direct quote) 'webs like steel strands'. Sounds a bit familiar, don't it? I've got the first FT collection, so I'll try and post the story.

Stephen King often puts little anecdotes that he's heard in real life into his fiction. In his early short story 'Gray Matter', some old folks are discussing strange events. One of them mentions a sewer worker who claimed to have seen spider the size of a dog, far underground. This later turned up again in 'IT'. Of course, I don't know for certain that this was one of the anecdotal fragments, but still...

The only problem is, a spider would collapse under it's own weight above a certain size. There are also some respiratory issues; do spiders breathe like insects, i.e. through ventricles (?) in their exoskeletons? Arachnophiles? It's over to you.
 
This thread makes me wonder where Tolkien got the idea for Shelob (LOTR) from.

A lot of his stuff can be traced back to European folklore of various kinds, but giant spiders are not common in that genre, in my experience.
 
Good Lord, that's a big spider! :eek!!!!:Heh, my wife's arachnaphobic, I think I'll tell her to skip this story.
 
I wonder if this is a rare sighting of a particular species as yet unknown. One poster (I forget who) claimed that there are large spiders in Britain. My question is if any match the description given?

I'll be hopeing not to be honest. I'm not scared of spiders as such just scared of anything that size.
 
Sounds like some of those bloody terrifying things I've seen in paleantology books...but, of course, they're all dead. Obviously.
Aw, crap...I'm going to buy a gun...
 
When i was a kid i sometimes took the bus to manchester museum to wander around the exhibits. Fastened on the wall in one of the rooms was a huge spider crab which must have been around 9 or 10 foot across, supposed to have come from Japan. It had certainly been alive once and i wouldn't like to see it coming along the beach near me! So, giant crabs, why not giant spiders?
 
Giant Spider Crabs can get much bigger than that...but they liveunder water, they are swimming crabs.
 
I was re-reading the story and it got me thinking. I notice on a lot of these threads someone will say something like; "I saw a (add wierdness of your choice) and called my parents, they ignored me, blah blah..."
I realise that kids have active imaginations, I have a 9 year old son and several nieces and nephews, but if my son said " Hey, there's a giant spider under these bushes. It must be 4 feet long." I think curiosity would get the better of me and I'd have to go look. Course, I am the kinda guy that regularly reads Fortean times.:blah:
 
The 'not-bothered' aspect is the part that sells it to me. It's a regularly observed phenomena that rarely gets studied. I had an almost first hand experience of this when some friends saw what sounded like a genuinely rather inexplicable UFO. They were utterly, and I mean utterly unbothered until quite some time after the event when it suddenly seemed to sink in.

Perhaps our brains are wired up to protect us from Eldritch Things (TM) under these circumstances.
 
DanHigginbottom said:
I had an almost first hand experience of this when some friends saw what sounded like a genuinely rather inexplicable UFO. They were utterly, and I mean utterly unbothered until quite some time after the event when it suddenly seemed to sink in.
Click to expand...

You know, it's weird -- I'm pretty sure my mother and I saw what we thought was a UFO when I was a child.

It was just as we were leaving my piano teacher's house (I think he saw it, too); then we drove home in silence. When we arrived, my mother called the RAF who said they had had no aircraft in the area -- but had received reports of sightings. Then we had dinner and didn't mention it again!

I cannot remember any specific details on the sighting itself, which is why I wasn't entirely sure it happened, but I mentioned it to my mother a few years ago and she said the same thing. Odd, eh?
 
Re: You're not alone...

Originally posted by hujiklo
[BIf it is real, then it can only be a nocturnal mover and a rare mover at all, if ever. Perhaps I saw the creature doing what it does best, keeping still and out of sight.
Click to expand...

I have seen some surprisingly large spiders in Lancashire. One that lived under my parents shed for many years had a body the size of a large mouse.

Has any one read the M.R.James story "The Night Visitors" (I think that is the correct title) which is about giant spiders living in trees? I wonder what his source for the story was. Had he seen giant nocturnal spiders himself?:eek!!!!:
 
Re: Re: You're not alone...

Austen said:
Has any one read the M.R.James story "The Night Visitors" (I think that is the correct title) which is about giant spiders living in trees? I wonder what his source for the story was. Had he seen giant nocturnal spiders himself?:eek!!!!:
Click to expand...

Good story, wrong title. It's actually called The Ash Tree.
 
Re: Re: Re: You're not alone...

Spook said:
Good story, wrong title. It's actually called The Ash Tree.
Click to expand...

Thanks for putting me right :) , I was thinking of the curse "There will be visitors at the hall..." Has any one ever filmed that story? I would imagine it could work quite well.
 
Crazy spider man in Saddleworth..

Since I posted my encounter with an impossibly big spider I've scoured the net to try and find any other encounters with these monsters...frustrating and fruitless to say the least. Makes me want to believe I dreamed it all actually...but I know I didn't!

Anyhow check this chap's web page...he alludes to sightings of 2 foot spiders in the Amazon... so why not here?

Regarding those giant spider crabs...they may well live in the sea but they come up onto certain Japanese beaches at night and are fairly nimble. They are capable of taking an arm off and have actually attacked some unfortunate people. They are supposed to be able to reach 12 foot leg span though most are about 6 feet. Anyhow they are spindly things. However, there is a giant devil crab which is supposed to be able to reach the same 12 foot dimensions except it's proportions are more akin to the standard stocky legged crabs. Now that is a monster!!

As for the spider with a body the size of a large mouse - do you have a picture? I'd love to see it!
 
That Goliath picture is interesting - especially as, if you use your Up and Down cursor buttons. you seem to see the spider's legs moving! :eek!!!!:
 
Re: Re: Re: Re: You're not alone...

Austen said:
Has any one ever filmed that story? I would imagine it could work quite well.
Click to expand...

The Ash Tree was apparently adapted for TV in 1975. I've never seen it but I have a book with an illustration by Bill Sanderson for that particular adaptation. (Sorry. I'm a bit of an MR James trainspotter on the sly like).

Oh, and cheers Austen your original post inspired me to dig out my Complete Ghost Stories of MR James which I haven't read for years and am enjoying immensely.
 
what I saw

I never realised, when I posted this story, that I'd see so many similar stories - in a weird kind of way that it's comforting to know that other people have encountered similar things.

It was a long time ago, I realise that memeory can be fogged by time, it could have been a dream... the rational explanation would be anything except what I believe, which is that I really did see a spider that big.

I understand that a spider that big would collapse under its own weight, and yet I can still see that spider, burned into my memory like a photograph.

I can't explain it... I'm willing to take on board any logical explanation... but I can't explain it.

Maybe the spider was a Goliath bird-eater that looked bigger to me than it really was.
Maybe it had escaped from a collector's collection.
Maybe it was some kind of freak that escaped from a secret research lab.
Maybe it was something supernatural.

Natural or supernatural, I know that I have seen nothing like it before or since.
 
Re: Crazy spider man in Saddleworth..

hujiklo said:
As for the spider with a body the size of a large mouse - do you have a picture? I'd love to see it!
Click to expand...

I don't have any photographs unfortunately. The spider would occasionally jump out from under the shed if its web was diturbed. Its legs were relatively short but it had the brown colour of a typical British spider. I suspect it used to live in our old coal shed before it was demolished. The garden shed was moved a few years ago and we haven't seen the spider since. Quite often I've noticed large spiders in the house after building work but they tend to have long legs and small bodies. The spider under the shed had an abdomen like a plum with a row of white dots.:eek:
 
Sounds like the spiders on the windowsill outside my living room, but bigger, obviously. If my spiders were that big, I'd be out with a flamethrower and bugger the paint work...
 
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: You're not alone...

Spook said:
The Ash Tree was apparently adapted for TV in 1975. I've never seen it but I have a book with an illustration by Bill Sanderson for that particular adaptation. (Sorry. I'm a bit of an MR James trainspotter on the sly like).
Click to expand...

There are some details about the production here:


http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~pardos/MediaList.html
http://www.eofftv.com/episodes/ghost_story_for_christmas_ash_tree_main.htm

http://www.shigson.freeserve.co.uk/Fineline/ghosts.htm

and notes on the story here:


http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~pardos/ArchiveAshtree.html



Apparently M R James was terrified of spiders!
 
There's a large and beefy one of those in the Natural history museum I recall...made me cringe anyway when I saw it.
 
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