This post’s comment section is specifically for you to discuss vanishing and missing folktales, or share the tales you know, but feel do not get enough attention.

Update: this post now has a response from one of our guest bloggers, Virginia Crow, which you can read here.

Many places in Lincolnshire feel like they should have a folk tale attached to them, but none are apparent. We mentioned Bolingbroke Castle elsewhere in this blog, speculating that such a prominent location deserves more than a sighting of a white witch-hare. Perhaps there has been one, and it is now lost to memory.

Another example that fascinated us is the Amcotts Moor Woman, the name given to a bog body discovered in 1747 near Amcotts, Isle of Axeholme. She likely lived sometime between 200 and 400 C.E, in the late Roman period, and is famous for the well-preserved footwear found with her body.

Discovered by the villager John Tate, who was digging for peat, the Amcotts Woman was subsequently sent to the Society of Antiquarians (in some reports, the Royal Society) for study. Or, rather, her hand, thigh bone and right shoe were sent, while the rest of the body was reburied, this time in Amcotts churchyard.

It is possible that the woman fell victim to the strong currents that pulled her underwater, or that she was a sacrificial victim, but no definitive answer is available.

Still, despite her mysterious origins and the length of time since her discovery, we could find no folk tales associated with her. Does she walk the moors following her reburial in Amcotts churchyard? Does her one surviving shoe leave wet footprints? What else might be hiding below silt in still pools, or in what were once silt pools? Have YOU heard of the Amcotts Moor Woman?

We welcome your stories, sightings, and experiences, both pertaining to folk tales already discussed by this project, and those completely unknown to us. Please get in touch.

Words by Anna Milon.