A kobold (occasionally cobold) is a mythical sprite in German folklore.
Earliest attestation from medieval writings (13th century) indicate it was a doll carved from wood or made of wax, and it is speculated these were fetish figurines, or carvings of household spirits, set up in the house, likely mounted upon the fireplace mantel or the hearth.
The practice may have descended from an ancient Germanic house or a hearth god (German, Old High (ca.750-1050);: hûsing, herdgota), analogous to the ancient Roman lares or lar (hearth goddess) worshiped as figurines, or the Latin: penas (sing. of penates).[1] The Eastern slang German: gütel or German: güttel ("little god"; possibly equivalent to götze, or "idol") perhaps should by added as another kobold synonym, and may support the view of this sort of use.
What is clear is that these kobold dolls were puppets used in plays and by travelling showmen, based on 13th century writings. They were also known as German: tatrmann and described as manipulated by wires. Either way, the idol or puppet was invoked rhetorically in writing by the minstrels, etc. to mock clergymen or other people.
The kobold in the general sense of "house spirit" is known by various other names. Kobold subtypes called hütchen or Low German hödekin come from their wearing caps or hoods. It has been stated by Jacob Grimm that the kobold has the general tendency to wear red pointy hats, while acknowledging this to be a widely disseminated mark of European household spirits under other names such as the Norwegian nisse; and the North or Northeastern German Niss or Puk (cog. puck) which are also prone to wearing such caps.
The kobold subtypes katrmann and Hintzelmann suggest their occasional cat-form. The similar sounding Heinzelmann or Heinzelmännchen (cf.) has been explained to be a distinguishable, separate being by recent scholarship. But the kobold is also known by other pet names such as Chimke (diminutive of Joachim) and Woltken. As household spirits, they may perform domestic chores, or play malicious tricks if insulted or neglected. The kobold can also materialize in the form of other animals, a human, or a pillar of fire.
Tales of the vengeful kitchen spirit are quite old. Allegedly some time after c. 1130, the Hödekin (Hütchen) of Hildesheim (or Winzenburg Castle occupied by the bishop) dismembered a kitchen scullion for splashing him with slop water (see fig. right), recorded in a chronicle c. 1500. Similarly, the Chimmeken of Mecklenburg Castle, in 1327, dismembered a kitchen boy into pieces for stealing the milk offered to it, as attested by Thomas Kantzow, d. 1542.
The original notion of the kobold as household spirit, seemingly corroborated by the etymology kob[en] "chamber" + walt "ruler, power, authority" was corrupted by the idea of mine spirits by the 16th century, when mine spirits were known among German mine-workers as German: kobel (Latin: cobalus) and Bergmännlein (Latin: virunculos montanos), as attested by Georgius Agricola (see gnome). Grimm had argued for an alternate etymology for kobold, as deriving from this Latin cobalus, making kobold a cognate of cobalus (kobel) and "goblin". Older literature spoke of German, Middle High (ca.1050-1500);: stetewalden ("ruler of the place") which may be a precursor.
The name of the element cobalt comes from the creature's name, because medieval miners blamed the sprite for the poisonous and troublesome nature of the typical arsenical ores of this metal (cobaltite and smaltite) which polluted other mined elements.
The Klabautermann aboard ships are sometimes classed as a kobold.
The kobalt etymology as consisting of kob "chamber" + walt "ruler, power, authority", with the meaning of "household spirit" has been advanced and given by various authors, e.g., Müller-Fraureuth (1906). Otto Schrader (1908) suggested ancestral German: *kuba-walda "the one who rules the house". Dowden (2002) offers the hypothetical precursor German: *kofewalt.
The kob/kub/kuf- root is possibly related to Old Norse/Icelandic: kofe "chamber", Old High German: chubisi "house", also. and the English word "cove" in the sense of 'shelter".
Müller-Fraureuth (1906) wrote that the form kobe survives in modern German "Schweinekoben", meaning "pig stall", and that the true original etymology contained the stem -Hold as a name for "demon".
Related cognate terms occur in Dutch, such as kabout, kabot, and kaboutermanneken.
German linguist Paul Kretschmer (1928) recapped the foregoing etymology of kobold and its later transitive (conflated) meaning, stating that the word kobold originated in koben "chamber' + walt "ruler, power, authority", and that it originally denoted as Hausgeist or house spirit. But through assimilation or conflation with lore about "mine spirits", it came to be interchangeably used with various terms for "mine spirits" such as the Latin forms of German: Bergmännlein or gnome or German: Berggeist.
Although Grimm himself conjectured that the boxwood kobold dolls mentioned in 13th century literature derived from carven idols of household spirits (cf. below),[1] he did not advance the aforementioned "house-ruler" etymology, but rather saw kobold/kobolt as deriving from Latin cobalus or its antecedent Greek koba'los (pl. kobaloi; Greek, Ancient (to 1453);: Κόβαλος, plural: Greek, Ancient (to 1453);: Κόβαλοι), meaning "rogue". The final -olt he explained as typical German language suffix for monsters and supernaturals.
Thus the generic "goblin" is a cognate of "kobold" according to Grimm's etymology, and perhaps even a descendant word deriving from "kobold".[2]
As for the term cobalus (German: kobel) denoting mine spirits or demons, described these "little miners" as cobali (cobalus) and related it to Hence, this cobali/cobalus in the sense of "mine spirit (gnome)", and its German form kobel.
The cobalt ore was already known as kobalt among German miners in the 16th century, attested by Johannes Mathesius, and supposedly was thus called in reference to the mine demon.
Although kobold has slipped into becoming a generic term, translatable as goblin, so that all manners of household spirits become classifiable as "types" of kobold. Such alternate names for the kobold house sprite are classified by type of naming (A. As doll, B. As pejoratives for stupidity, C. Appearance-based, D. Characteristics-based, E. Diminutive pet name based), etc., in the (HdA).
A geographical map of Germany labeled with the different regional appellations has appeared in a 2020 publication.
Grimm, after stating that the list of kobold (or household spirit) in German lore can be long, also adds the names German: Hütchen and German: Heinzelmann.
The term kobold in its earliest usage suggest it to be a wooden doll (Cf. §Origins under below). A synonym for kobold in that sense includes Tatrmann, which is also attested in the medieval period.
More recently, the East Central German name German: gütel or German: güttel (diminutive of "god") has been suggested as a kobold synonym of the fetish figurine type. Grimm knew the term but placed the discussion of it under the "Wild man of the woods" section[4] conjecturing the use of güttel as synonymous to German: götze (i.e., sense of 'idol') in medieval heroic legend The term gütel answers to Agricola's naming the guteli (in Latin) as akin to his mine spirit.
Though the Heinzelmännchen (diminutive of Heinrich) is a "pet name" type of appellation and applied to the kobold according to Grimm,[5] this is incorrect according to modern linguist Elmar Seebold, who asserts that only the Hinzelmann/Hintzelmann (Cf.) is properly associated with kobold, and the Heinzelmännchen is completely distinguishable in terms of both appearance and behavior.
Chimke (var. Chimken, Chimmeken), diminutive of Joachim is a Niederdeutsch for a poltergeist; the story of "Chimmeken" dates to c. 1327 and recorded in Thomas Kantzow's Pomeranian chronicle (cf.).[6] Chimgen (Kurd Chimgen), and Chim are other forms[7]
Wolterken, also Low German, is diminutive for Walther, and another piece of household spirit of the pet name type, Wolterken glossed as "lares" and attested together with "German: Chimken" and "German: Hußnißken" in (1587) Panurgia lamiarum.
Under the classification of household spirit names based on appearance, a subcategory collects names based on apparel, especially the hat (classification C. a), under which are listed German: Hütchen, Timpehut, Langhut, etc. and even German: Hellekeplein (cf. cloak of invisibility). To this group probably belongs the Lower Saxon house spirit hôdekin (Low German; Low Saxon; German, Low; Saxon, Low: [[Hödekin]]) from Hildesheim, sporting a felt hat (Latin: {{linktext|pileus). Grimm also adds the names German: Hopfenhütel, Eisenhütel.
The kobold type Hinzelmann or Hintzelmann is completely distinguishable from Heinzelmann, Heinzelmännchen according to modern scholarship, ((cf.)) and is classified as a name alluding to the kobold's cat-like shape or transformation, according to the HdA. The analysis is expounded upon by Jacob Grimm, who notes that Hinze was the name of the cat in the Reineke (German version of Reynard the Fox) so it was the common pet name for cats. Thus hinzelman, hinzemännchen are recognized as cat-based names, as well as katermann (from kater "") which may be precursor to tatermann..
The katzen-veit named after a cat is categorized by Grimm as a "wood sprite", but also discussed under kobold, and classed as a "cat appearance" type kobold name (category C b) in HdA). Grimm localized the katzen-veit at Fichtelberg in the Erzgebirge (Ore Mountains), and Prateorius also recognized this as the lore of the Vogtland region, but his work published (1692) under the pseudonym Lustigero Wortlibio claims katzen-veit supposedly a famous "cabbage spirit" in the Hartzewalde (in Elbingerode, now part of Oberharz am Brocken in the Harz mountains).
Although King Goldemar (or Goldmar), a famous kobold from Castle Hardenstein, had hands "thin like those of a frog, cold and soft to the feel", he never showed himself. The master of Hundermühlen Castle, where Heinzelmann lived, convinced the kobold to let him touch him one night.When a man threw ashes and tares about to try to see King Goldemar's footprints, the kobold cut him to pieces, put him on a spit, roasted him, boiled his legs and head, and ate him.
King Goldemar, king of dwarfs, is also rediscussed under the household spirit commentary by Grimm, presumably because he became a guest to the human king Neveling von Hardenberg at his Castle Hardenstein for three years, making a dwarf sort of a household spirit on a limited-term basis.
For cognate beings of kobolds or house spirits in non-German cultures, see .
One proposed precursor to the kobold house spirit may be the German, Middle High (ca.1050-1500);: stetewalden mentioned by Frater Rudolfus of the 13th century,[8] meaning "ruler of the site" (Latin: genius loci).
One of the earliest attestations of kobold comes Konrad von Würzburg's poem (<1250) which refers to a man as worthless as a kobold (doll made from from boxwood).
Grimm conjectured (and Karl Simrock in 1855 reiterated) that home sprites carved from boxwood and wax and set up in the house, originally as a cult of the German hearth god (German, Old High (ca.750-1050);: hûsing or German, Old High (ca.750-1050);: herdgota), equivalent to Roman penates or (Latin: lar familiares), manes,[9] which are hearth deities. Otto Schrader also regurgitated this idea, observing that "cult of the hearth-fire" developed into "tutlelary house deities, localized in the home", and the German kobold and the Greek agathós daímōn fit this template.
The 17th century expression to laugh like a kobold may refer to these dolls with their mouths wide open, and it may mean "to laugh loud and heartily".[10]
Although Grimm supposes these were once seriously venerated as idols, even by this already Catholicized period (High Middle Ages), people were using them as decors in jest, like the modern nutcracker dolls, and the practice has endured in this playful context into modern times.[11]
Thomas Keightley comments that legends and folklore about kobolds can be explained as "ventriloquism and the contrivances of servants and others".
The kobolt and Tatrmann were also boxwood puppets manipulated by wires, which performed in puppet theater in the medieval period.[12] The traveling juggler (German: Gaukler) of yore used to make a kobold doll appear out of their coats, and make faces with it to entertain the crowd.
Whether doll or marionette, the terms were kobold and synonyms were used in literature to satirize the clergy as "wooden bishop", or "wooden sexton". This is sometimes comparing a man in silence to a mute doll.[13] T
Some of the kobold synonyms are specific classified under the slander for stupidity category in the HdA, as aforementioned.
But Konrad's poem above seems to be a more complicated double metaphor to the German, Middle High (ca.1050-1500);: luhs (Luchs, "lynx", conceived of as a hybrid of fox and wolf, and therefore unable to breed) deriding someone as reproductively sterile and deceitful, just like a kobold doll.[14]
Kobolds are spirits and, as such, part of a spiritual realm. However, as with other European spirits, they often dwell among the living.
Kobolds may manifest as non-human animals, fire, humans, and objects.,.
The kobold household spirit tends to be ascribed red hair and beard, according to Jacob Grimm. One report of a encounter experience with mine kobolds claims black skin (cf.).[15]
Kobolds supposedly also tend to wear a pointy red hat, though Grimm acknowledges that the "red peaky cap" is also the mark of the Norwegian nisse. Grimm mentions the spirit known as hütchen (meaning "little hat" of felt, cf.) immediately after, perhaps as an example of such a cap-wearer.
The kobold wearing a red cap and protective pair of boots is reiterated by, e.g., Wolfgang Golther. Grimm describes household spirits owning fairy shoes or fairy boots, which permits rapid travel over difficult terrain, and compares it to the league boots of fairytale.
There is lore concerning the infant-sized niss-puk (German: Niß Puk, Nisspuk var. Neß Puk, where Puk is cognate to English puck) wearing (pointed) red caps localized in various part of the province of Schleswig-Holstein, in northernmost Germany adjoining Denmark.[16]
Karl Müllenhoff provided the "kobold" lore of the German: Schwertmann, in his collection of Schleswig-Holstein legends, this tale localized at Rethwisch, Steinburg (Krempermarsch).[17] The Schwertmann was said to dwell in a Donnerloch or granite-hole, The being perpetrates mischief to villagers, but can also (try to) be helpful, may appear in the guise of fire, and appreciates the gift of shoes, though his burning feet quickly turns them into tatters.[17]
"Latin: lar, lar familiares"; "small lars";
lachen als ein kobold, p. 424 "koboldische lachen"; "laugh like a kobold", p. 512 tr. as "goblin laughter".
"for fun; Simrock: "German: zuletzt mehr zum Scherz oder zur Zierde lately more as joke or for decor".