The Penanggalan

[AlchoPwn]

The Penanggalan is a detached female head capable of flying about on its own. As it flies, the stomach and entrails dangle below it, and these organs twinkle like fireflies as the Penanggalan moves through the night. It is a creature of folklore from the Malaysian Peninsula with echoes in cultures across Southeast Asia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penanggalan

The recommended way to kill a penanggalan is to find the body while the head is absent and fill it with broken glass. You can detect a penanggalan by the constant aroma of vinegar around the person who so transforms.

 

[Ermintruder]

Wow. What a remarkably unsettling and disturbing legend

(I will confess that on reading the thread title, I presumed this was going to be about some kind of vague Welsh wraith...not the unforgettable horror I've just become informed about)

 

[ramonmercado]

The Penanggalan is a detached female head capable of flying about on its own. As it flies, the stomach and entrails dangle below it, and these organs twinkle like fireflies as the Penanggalan moves through the night. It is a creature of folklore from the Malaysian Peninsula with echoes in cultures across Southeast Asia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penanggalan

The recommended way to kill a penanggalan is to find the body while the head is absent and fill it with broken glass. You can detect a penanggalan by the constant aroma of vinegar around the person who so transforms.

Makes me think of an ex, liked a lot of vinegar on her chips.

 

[hunck]

Makes me think of an ex, liked a lot of vinegar on her chips.

oooerrrr.

 

[Vardoger]

Here they have supposedly caught a penanggalan. Looks like they got rituals for how to package the head.

And here is a penanggalan supposedly captured on surveillance cam.

 

[Ermintruder]

I presumed this was going to be about some kind of vague Welsh wraith

Umm...this is very odd.

I was, of course, only joking about what I said, about the name of this supernatural creature looking like it was Welsh.

But: if you take the individual parts of the name Penanggalan...and translate them onlne as if they were Welsh..you appear to get an odd result

"Pen" = head (noun)
"ân(g)" = be considered (verb tense)
"galan" = can, of first days (noun)

This is either an extremely-odd coincidence...or I'm leading myself astray.

Do we have any Welsh/Cornish speakers on the forum? (Oes gennym ni siaradwyr Cymraeg or Cernyw ar y fforwm?)

(Chan eil mi ach droch neach-labhairt Gàidhligh, an am juist a raucle-lyk bairn o' scots leid an aa)

 

[AlchoPwn]

Umm...this is very odd.
I was, of course, only joking about what I said, about the name of this supernatural creature looking like it was Welsh.
But: if you take the individual parts of the name Penanggalan...and translate them onlne as if they were Welsh..you appear to get an odd result

"Pen" = head (noun)
"ân(g)" = be considered (verb tense)
"galan" = can, of first days (noun)

This is either an extremely-odd coincidence...or I'm leading myself astray.
Do we have any Welsh/Cornish speakers on the forum? (Oes gennym ni siaradwyr Cymraeg or Cernyw ar y fforwm?)
(Chan eil mi ach droch neach-labhairt Gàidhligh, an am juist a raucle-lyk bairn o' scots leid an aa)

Interesting how these things crop up. There are a number of things like this to be found in other languages. For example in Japanese "oga" means "outsized or too big", while in English, the similar sounding "ogre" refers to a person who is basically "too big to be fought". These coincidences have in the past been closely analyzed by linguists, some of whom have tried to chase the similarities "down the rabbit hole". Much of this leads to common Sanskrit root words that inform a lot of Eurasian languages. Today linguists have constructed a proto-human language system that they, a Yoda-esque grammar think it had. This harkens back to the days when the Church thought that the first human language was spoken by Adam and Eve and was called "Adamic", and that all human speech derived from it. Pure nonsense of course, as if there were only 2 humans, there wouldn't have been sufficient genetic diversity to continue the species for more than 6 generations before the curse of the circular chromosomes struck them down to extinction.

 

[maximus otter]

Here they have supposedly caught a penanggalan. Looks like they got rituals for how to package the head.

And here are a penanggalan supposedly captured on surveillance cam.

lt must be said that l remain unconvinced. l don’t think l could remain that phlegmatic in the presence of the detached, flight-capable head & innards of a supernatural monster.

[RANT]People: If you encounter high strangeness with time to prepare and equip yourselves, FFS invest in a tripod and set your camera’s resolution/image quality to maximum! Thank you.[/RANT]

maximus otter

 

[AlchoPwn]

lt must be said that l remain unconvinced. l don’t think l could remain that phlegmatic in the presence of the detached, flight-capable head & innards of a supernatural monster.
[RANT]People: If you encounter high strangeness with time to prepare and equip yourselves, FFS invest in a tripod and set your camera’s resolution/image quality to maximum! Thank you.[/RANT]
maximus otter

Agreed. If I saw a penanggalan in real life I am sure I would evacuate my bowels while fleeing... then be very wary of people who smell like vinegar and carry a box full of broken glass. Penanggalans are f***ed up!

 

[FrKadash]

The Penanggalan is a detached female head capable of flying about on its own. As it flies, the stomach and entrails dangle below it, and these organs twinkle like fireflies as the Penanggalan moves through the night.

Quite interested in this folk spirit, I did a painting of her years ago, should be in one of my portfolios, will try and dig it out. The Krasue (กระสือ) also features in the film Mystics in Bali (1981).

 

[GNC]

Mystics in Bali! Thank you FrK - I knew I'd seen a film with one of those flying heads, but couldn't remember the title.