How do myths and folklore come to be? Is it our never-ending search to understand the world, or is it possible that we create legends to establish our way of life on a new territory? In 1820 American writer, Washington Irving, published a collection of stories and essays he wrote while living in England. However, there was one tale that stood out above the rest: “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”
A story that takes place in a small Dutch community in the state of New York in the years following the American Revolution, it centers on the superstitious yet scientific Ichabod Crane and the mysterious nightmare of the Headless Horseman.
“Another of his sources of fearful pleasure was, to pass long winter evenings with the old Dutch wives, as they sat spinning by the fire, with a row of apples roasting and spluttering along the hearth, and listen to their marvelous tales of ghosts and goblins, and haunted fields, and haunted brooks, and haunted bridges, and haunted houses, and particularly of the headless horseman, or galloping Hessian of the Hollow, as they sometimes called him.”
Historically, there is proof of an actual Ichabod Crane that met Irving in the early eighteenth century. However, this Ichabod was a far cry from the frightful schoolteacher; in fact, he was an army captain stationed in the area of what is now upstate New York. While working for the governor of the state, Irving also happened to meet a schoolteacher along the Hudson River who is likely to have helped inspire the famous character.
Some of the names included in the story did belong to residents of Tarry Town, New York and the surrounding areas. But the story of the demonic spirit roaming the land may well have been transferred by word of mouth throughout the years. Since several of the residents were descendants of Dutch and German immigrants, it makes sense that their ancestors would have brought their own stories with them.
“Then, as he wended his way, by swamp and stream and awful woodland, to the farmhouse where he happened to be quartered, every sound of nature, at that witching hour, fluttered his excited imagination.”
The dark woods of the land with its remaining echoes of battles from the American Revolution seem to be the perfect setting for this ghostly tale. One thing that stands out throughout the story is Irving’s subtle jabs at society, not only the hypocrisy from men who believe themselves to be holy and just, but also from people falling in love, not with each other but for their property, and, of course the perpetual stigma of blaming women for just about everything that could possibly go wrong.
“[H]e would have passed a pleasant life of it, in despite of the devil and all his works, if his path had not been crossed by a being that causes more perplexity to mortal man than ghosts, goblins, and the whole race of witches put together, and that was—a woman. “
The story is a short folktale, perfect to be told during a cold moonless night. It appears to have been created for the purpose of having traditional legends in a land where its inhabitants erased most of the previous settlers, and their way of life, in order to create their own attempt at Utopia. There are elements taken from real places, people, and events. However, this Headless Horseman that has been recreated in films, animation, and television, seems to be as imaginary as the one from the story. It wasn’t a legend from the region but a retelling of a story from the old country retold by an elder to the younger community in the New World.
