The soccer match today
between Germany and the U.S., reminded me of a viral video I saw last year in May.
This video drew a lot of
attention, because supposedly during this match between Bayern Munich and BVB
Dortmund, a figure of a ghost was caught running in the middle of the field.
Skeptics immediately
announced that the figure was not a ghost but a mirror image of a player on the
other side of the screen. But this didn’t prevent over 4.5 million people from viewing
this video on YouTube.
Just the month before this
game, another supposed ghost was caught on camera, during a soccer match-- or “football”
which most of the world calls it--in Bolivia. One article at the time stated ghosts
must like soccer.
Here is the video recorded at
the DFB Cup Final that Germany won.
One of the best-known ghosts
in Germany is connected to the Hohenzollern Family who ruled Prussia for four
hundred years. The Hohenzollerns were first electors of the Holy Roman Empire
and then later they were emperors. The ghost that haunted them was known as the “”White Lady”. Members of the Hohenzollern family saw this ghost for
centuries. The White Lady was considered a harbinger for when she appeared it was always a
warning to the descendants of King Frederick that someone in the family was
about to die or some disaster was about to occur.
In the Middle Ages widows of deceased
sovereigns and princes always wore white mourning. The Hohenzollern ghost was always seen wearing white. This White Lady was described
as very beautiful but melancholy in appearance. She was tall, very thin, and
walked with a poise befitting her station while alive. All who saw her stated
she always carried a bunch of large keys attached to a chatelaine at her waist.
She was first seen in 1619
when three young pages spotted her in one of the castle’s halls. One of these
pages approached her to ask what she was doing there. She turned and whacked
him over the head with her keys. He fell to the ground dead. The other two pages
fled. The next day Elector John Sigismund died.
The one time the White Lady spoke it is
said she quoted Latin, “Veni, judica vivos et mortuos” meaning-- come, judge
the living and the dead.
After this appearance in 1628 a young prince of the
house died. In 1678 she appeared again. Soon after this Erdmann Phillip fell
from his horse and died.
It is said the White Lady
never appeared during Frederick the Great’s reign because he did not believe in
ghosts. But after his death he appeared to warn a family member about this harbinger. His nephew
Frederick William the Second in 1792 was camped outside Paris with his troops.
The night before they were set to attack his uncle’s ghost appeared before him
in a wine cellar and cautioned him not to attack. “He warned him to call off
his troops, or you will see the White Lady.” The nephew heeded his uncles’
advice and left France.
During the Age of
Enlightenment this ghost made several more appearances. She again appeared
just before the deaths of Frederick William the Third in 1840 and Frederick
William the Fourth in 1861. One of the last reported sightings of the White
Lady was in 1914 just before World War l. She appeared just before the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated. I wrote about Ferdinand’s cursed
and haunted car in another post here.
After the German’s defeat in
World War l, Kaiser Wilhelm the Second was the last ruling Hohenzollern-- he
abdicated the throne. It is stated that once there was no longer a Hohenzollern
ruler the White Lady was finally able to find peace. But many state that the
White Lady was seen one last time during World War ll in 1945 just before
Berlin burned.
There are several legends as
to who the White Lady was when she was alive. Each is more tragic than the next. Here are
just two. One common tale is that she was a young widowed countess who fell
madly in love with a Hohenzollern. She came to believe that her children from her first marriage were stopping him
from marrying her so she killed them. When he found out about what she had done
he shunned her and married another at which point she committed suicide. It is
stated that then she haunted and cursed the family for centuries.
Yet another story is just as tragic.
A young daughter was forced by her father to marry a man she didn't love for
political and financial reasons. Her father neglected to pay her dowry. The
young bride found to her chagrin that her new husband either ignored her or
beat her. She begged her father to rescue her but he ignored her pleas. He instead
blamed her problems on “her not loving her husband enough”. Her brothers
finally rescued her and took her home. Her husband was related to the
Hohenzollern family. So when she died it is stated she haunted the
Hohenzollern descendants in order to reek revenge.
The Hohenzollern dynasty is
not the only family that was plagued by a harbinger. The royal Hapsburg’s had a
raven and a White Lady that were both considered death omens.
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