Arising from a bizarre
theological underworld, we uncover this
unspeakable horror of
myth, this
freak of freaks in the
legendarium of the
absurd. Laughably untrue, there yet remain those sufficiently detached from a semblance of reality that this horrid
creature inhabits not only their
imaginations, but their solemn
beliefs. For the Cephalophore is a phenomenon primarily recounted in no less twisted of a
worldview than the (
shudder)
tales of
Sainthood in the
Roman Catholic Church.
But enough
foreshadowing, let us get, at last, to what it is -- a cephalophore is a
saint,
martyred by
beheading, and held by
tradition to have continued to
preach beyond that event, walking about holding his ghastly haloed head in his hands, propelled by the deeper mythic power of the
faith peculiar to that
sect.
Cephalophoric accounts range from the simplistic -- spitting out a few words in completion of a
prayer after
decapitation -- to the outright fantastical. Some decapitated saints, so the stories are spun, strolled for
hours and for
miles along their particular path, continuously reciting
sermons and conversing with passers-by until at last they reached a
final destination whereby their
spirits might depart the material world.
Saint Denis is claimed to have come to such an end, pontificating over a six mile walk with head in hands. Of one at least, it was told that they hefted their hacked-off head to a river and hurled it in, therefrom to be carried on the
currents to its appropriate resting-place. Another fetched up his head and mounted his horse, thence to ride up the mountain (head in one hand, reigns in the other) and keep an appointment with a favored
uncle.
It hardly ought to be a
surprise, naturally, that such tales might be told as
truth among a population steeped in belief in
witches,
vampires,
resurrections,
sea serpents,
divine wrath,
werewolves, and
tiny demons causing
illness. But, alas, as with all such tales in later eras, this too is a set of
myths purloined from past times and simply reworded to manufacture some glory for the later teller's cause. There are, as well, a few modern analogues, such as the fictive Mr. Horace Graevsyte, ghostly father in the
Non Sequitur comic strip penned by Wiley Miller, carrying his head about on a
platter; as well as a headless
C3PO sequences in the second of the newer trio of
Star Wars films; and comedically quasi-villainous
Bruce Vilanch character, Wendon, in
Ice Pirates, whose autonomous head is abused for a bit before being appended to a robotic body.
But accounts feigning a factual basis? Nope, those we have seemingly outgrown.
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For Ten Years of Terror: The 2010 Halloween Horrorquest and THE IRON NODER CHALLENGE 3: THIS TIME IT'S MARTENSITIC