A njugle overthrows a mill and kills a man grinding corn.

Original Track ID

SA1954.113.4

Original Tape ID

SA1954.113

Summary

A njugle overthrows a mill and kills a man grinding corn.

The fearsome njugle [water horse] lived in burns [streams] and haunted mills. So great was its reputation, people went to mills in twos with one keeping watch lest it enter the building and overthrow the mill. Some 200 years ago a man from Newfield in East Yell took a bag of corn to the mill at Queyon. The man never came home, but in the middle of the night his five-year-old boy awoke and cried, "Mammy, Da's dead oot, Da's dead oot." Next morning a search found the mill overthrown, and the man's body was found in the under-hoose of the mill. The njugle had upset the mill. The man was buried at the Queyon Tiptons, where traces of the grave are still [1954] visible.

Brucie Henderson learned the story from an old man.

Item Notes

In the typical horizontal Shetland watermill, the wheel turned in a lower chamber called the under-hoose.

See:
'The Northern Isles: Orkney and Shetland' (Alexander Fenton, 1978), pp. 396 ff.

Recording Location

Item Location

Language

Scots

Genre

Story Information

Collection

SoSS

Source Type

Reel to reel

Audio Quality

Good