Friday, May 13, 2011

Harbinger Spirits

A harbinger (pronounced har-bin-ger) is a spirit who is a messenger who foretells. Some people believe when these messengers appear it means something bad is about to happen. Others believe if you take heed of the harbinger’s message the occurrence can be diverted.

The traditional Irish harbinger is the Banshee. This harbinger is a female spirit or fairy that foretells someone’s death. 

Banshees are connected to specific Irish families and they wail when someone in that family is about to die. Immediate family members do not hear the banshee’s wail instead they are only heard by other relatives and family friends who take heed and travel to be with the person dying. 

The Irish banshee also appears as a bird.

Harbingers often take the form of women or birds. Many believe Native American people view the crow or raven as a harbinger of death—this is not correct. 

The animal most often related to harbingers within Native American cultures is the horse. They feel the horse is the harbinger of spirit knowledge. So some Spirit Harbingers are considered helpers and messengers of good.

Washington D.C. has its own harbinger cat. D.C. as they have named it, is described as a Demon Cat or phantom cat. 

This black Demon Cat has been spotted in the basements of the White House and the U.S. Capital Building. When it makes an appearance it at first looks like a harmless kitten but legend has it that as you move closer--it becomes larger and more menacing. 

I tell many more stories about the ghosts seen in the capital building here.

It is believed that a national disaster will happen shortly after it appears.  It was seen shortly before the great stock market crash in the 1920’s and a guard spotted it just before JFK was assassinated.

The stories about harbingers are widespread and varied. 

Lighthouses have had harbingers appear just before a shipwreck. When sailors encountered harbingers--these were often in the form of phantom or derelict ships –it always foretold something bad was going to happen to them. 

The Delta Queen River Boat has had a female harbinger appear several times. Two captains of this vessel claim her appearance helped to divert two potential disasters. The complete story is here.

2 comments:

Grannywitch said...

I help admin a paranormal subject Facebook page. We have page fans asking if anyone had heard of the DC Demon Cat being seen prior to this summer's earthquake that rocked DC. Have you heard any reports of a sighting? Thank you. The page name is Phenomenon.

Virginia Lamkin said...

I have not heard of any sightings.