Step aside, Krampus: Austria and Bavaria's Christmas villain is a demon that disembowels children
- Austro-German folklore has a Christmas villain that may be scarier than Krampus.
- The villain is a beaked demon-woman who disembowels her victims.
If you thought Krampus was scary, the horned demon is child's play compared to Frau Perchta, the Christmas demon who disembowels naughty children and even adults.
In Austro-German pagan folklore, Frau Perchta, or the "Belly Slitter," was a witchy half-woman, half-demon Alpine creature who punished anyone — kids and adults alike — who was lazy, careless, or greedy, according to Vice.
According to author Stephen Morris, she was often depicted as an old, haggard woman with one large goose foot, which Jacob Grimm (of "Grimms' Fairy Tales") believed meant that she could shapeshift into animals.
According to the lore, Perchta would descend from the mountains during the 12 Days of Christmas to roam the countryside, John B. Smith wrote in his essay, "Perchta the Belly-Slitter and Her Kin: A View of Some Traditional Threatening Figures, Threats and Punishments."
Then, she'd sneak into homes in the dead of night to check if families were upholding the proper holiday customs, and if they weren't, she'd punish them brutally, according to Vice.
Traditionally, Perchta's mission was to enforce "communal taboos," like ensuring that women had completed all their weaving before the holiday, that their homes were tidy, that children weren't naughty, and that people were participating in celebratory feasts, Smith wrote.
And unlike Santa's comparatively benign habit of giving out coal, Perchta's punishment was to slit open the sinner's stomach, remove their organs, and stuff them with rocks and straw before sewing them back up, according to Smith's essay.
And even those who didn't eat a traditional meal of fish and gruel on her feast day would get their bellies slit, according to Morris.
But Perchta wasn't all bad — for those who behaved, she'd leave a small silver coin in their shoe, according to Morris.
Though the legend of Perchta dates back centuries, she is still celebrated in parts of Germany and Austria today, like at Salzburg's annual Krampus and Perchten Parades, where masked marauders storm the streets to scare off the evil spirits of winter, like Perchta.