The Mythology & Folklore Database
Several hundered years ago the inhabitants of the town of Hameln in Westphalia were plagued with such a great number of rats that it became nearly unbearable. It happened -- by chance or through a gift from God -- that there arrived a stranger or a traveler, such as the former traveling students in our German lands.
Hearing of the towspeople's complaints and troubles he offered to get rid of the rats in return for a certain payment. They happily agreed to this and settled on a payment of several hundred gulden.
Thereupon he walked through all the town's streets with a pipe, which he put to his mouth and blew upon. Immediately all the rats in the entire town came from all the houses and followed at his feet in unbelievable numbers to the outskirts of the town. He banished them into the nearst sacred mountain, and from then onward there was no sign of the rats in the town.
Now the townspeople had the promised money, but when he demanded it they hid it away and refused to pay him, claiming the task had cost him no effort or expense, adding that he had succeeded easily with the help of some strange art. He should not ask for so much, but shoud instead accept a lesser sum.
The strange man would not withdraw from the original agreement, insisting that they pay him what they had promised. If they failed to do so they would regret it. The townspeople insisted that it was too much, and they no longer wanted to give it to him.
When he saw that he was to receive nothing, he once again walked through all the town's streets with his pipe, as he had done before. This time a majority of the young children under eight or nine years, boys and girls, followed at his feet to the nearest mountain. Miraculously it opened up before them, and the stranger walked inside with the children. It immediately closed again, and neither the man nor the children were ever seen again.
A great cry of grief emerged from the entire town, but they could do nothing other than commit themselves to the Allmighty and confess their own stupidity and greed which had caused this evil.
This miraculous event will be remembered eternally, for everyone in the town writes in their letters the date according to the number of years following the birth of Jesus, but also the number of years "since the loss of our children."