Wyrd and the West Norfolk Landscape
The East Anglian landscape is unique...
It has inspired feelings of dread and terror since
Beowulf, the first horror story in English, was
written here in the 7th century.
The master ghost story writer MR James also found East Anglia an appropriate setting for some of his most chilling tales. Later in the 20th century, filmmakers found it a perfect location for horror films such as Witchfinder General and The Tomb of Ligeia.
West Norfolk is rich in myth and legend and we encourage you to explore both the fact and fiction of the landscape.
Go seek out the arcane treasures of Kings Lynn and the West Norfolk Coast for yourselves; there is much to be discovered!
Some of the things you will discover are true.
Some things exist only in the realm of the imagination.
You must decide what you are willing to believe.
Photos: Rebcecca Hall Green, by permission of the In Grendel's Footsteps project.
"Wyrd is an Old English noun, a feminine one, from the verb weorthan “to become”.
It is related to the Old Saxon wurd, Old High German wurt, Old Norse urür.
Wyrd is the ancestor of the more modern weird, which before it meant odd or unusual in the pejorative sense carried connotations of the supernatural, as in Shakespeare’s weird sisters, the trio of witches in MacBeth.
The original Wyrd Sisters were of course, the three Norns, the Norse Goddesses of destiny.
Wyrd is Fate or Destiny, but not the “inexorable fate” of the ancient Greeks. “A happening, event, or occurrence”, found deeper in the Oxford English Dictionary listing is closer to the way our Anglo-Saxon and Norse forbears considered this term. ... One of the phrases used to describe this difficult term is “that which happens”.