CHORT

CHORT

"How could anyone let a devil into a tavern? Why, thank God, he has claws on his paws and horns on his head."

"But the pigs with legs as long as stilts climbed in at the windows and so revived him in an instant with a three-thonged whip, making him skip higher than this ceiling."

"The rest of the sentence died away on the speaker's lips: there was a loud rattle at the window, the panes fell tinkling on the floor, and a frightening pig's snout peered in through the window, roll it its eyes as though asking, "What are you doing here, folks?'"

Nikolai Gogol, The Fair At Sorochintsy

 

"In pre-Christian central and eastern Europe, the chort was a demon used to personify evil forces. He would be pictured as walking on two legs in an erect position, but with horns, hooves, a tail and often the bottom half of a goat. Sometimes he would have a pig face. Chorts would often live in hollow willow trunks or abandoned buildings, like mills. It’s the pre-Christian, pre-gentrified version of a savage, country-style devil. 

Luiza Oleszczuk, European Folklore Rife With Halloween Costume Inspiration