Tradition: Swiss Mythology
Alternative Names: The Phantom Cart of the Sihl Ravine
Category: Ghost
The Myth
In the old house of Friedli Menzinger, a man who was later beheaded, there once lived a poor widow with a large family of hungry children. Not far from the house lay an enchanted ravine carved by the Sihl River, whose waters often raged fiercely. On certain nights, the quiet of the surrounding countryside was disturbed by a strange and unsettling sound coming from the narrow path through the ravine.
The noise resembled a heavily laden cart struggling to make its way uphill, its wheels and load apparently laboring along the steep, confined track. The sound was so frightening that the widow never dared to look through her window or peer through the narrow cracks in her shutters. Whenever the ghostly cart approached, an even more terrible commotion erupted around the house: dogs and cats howled wildly and seemed to rage around the property.
The mysterious vehicle became known as the ghost car from the Sihl ravine. Its exact nature and origin remained unexplained, but its nocturnal passage brought terror to the widow and her children. The legend preserves the image of a phantom cart whose unseen journey could be heard in the darkness, accompanied by the furious howling of animals around the old house.
Sources
“Der Geisterwagen.” SAGEN.at – Traditionelle Sagen aus der Schweiz (Zug). Reproduced by SAGEN.at. https://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/schweiz/zug/geisterwagen.html