Welcome back, Wyrdo's! We all love getting stuck into the ancient myths of Wessex, but sometimes, the news gives us a little peek at the modern 'wyrd'.
This week, we've trawled the headlines for the most peculiar and outlandish stories from the fringes of science, folklore, and animal attacks. So, grab a cuppa and let's dive into the weirdest news of the day.
The UK’s Bermuda Triangle: Werewolves and a Skull That Screams
Forget the rolling hills and gentle valleys of the Yorkshire Wolds; apparently, this seemingly tranquil corner of England is an absolute magnet for the bizarre. It's known as the Wold Newton Triangle, and frankly, it makes your average folklore hot-spot look rather tame. As author Charles Christian points out, this relatively small area has a concentration of myths and legends that rivals anywhere else in England.
The Screaming Skull of Burton Agnes Hall
The Wold Newton Triangle is home to one of the UK’s most famous ‘screaming skull’ legends, echoing the story we have right here in Dorset. This particular tale centres on Burton Agnes Hall, a stunning Elizabethan manor built between 1601 and 1610.
The trouble started with Anne Griffith, the youngest of the three daughters of the Hall’s owner. Anne was so completely in love with the building that, after she was brutally attacked by cutthroats and lay dying, she made a terrifying final request to her sisters: she wished for her head to be removed and placed inside the walls of the Hall. Her reasoning? If anyone attempted to remove her remains, she would cause a disturbance that would force the tenants out.
Naturally, her sisters were horrified and dismissed the request as a bout of deathbed delirium, burying her in the churchyard. Soon after, however, the Hall was plagued by dreadful sounds—doors slamming, strange noises, and general chaos. Fearing Anne’s curse, the sisters hastily exhumed her and placed her skull inside the house. Instantly, the noises vanished.
The legend continued for centuries. On one occasion, a disbelieving maid threw the skull into a manure wagon. The horses immediately froze, refusing to move until the maid retrieved the skull. Eventually, to stop the constant threat of disturbance, the owner had the skull bricked up within the Hall’s walls in the early 19th century, with its precise location remaining a mystery to this day.
Old Stinker is Back!
Werewolf sightings are, quite astonishingly, the most common story here. The creature in question is a terrifyingly-named chap called Old Stinker. He’s described as a massive, hairy beast with glowing red eyes. The link between this ‘werewolf’ and the area’s history is the 18th-century wolf bounty—as wolves often dug up corpses from graveyards, the locals rationalised the phenomenon by believing the animals were supernatural beings, shape-shifters, or werewolves.
The Noble Pursuits of the Ig Nobel Prize
Every year, the Ig Nobel Prize honours achievements that first "make people laugh, and then make them think." It's a celebration of the unusual, organised by the wonderfully-named Annals of Improbable Research.
This year’s ceremony featured a stellar line-up of questionable but genuine scientific endeavour:
The Zebra Cow: The Biology prize went to a Japanese team who proved that painting cows with black and white stripes significantly deters biting flies, offering a low-pesticide solution to an age-old problem. The lead researcher accepted the prize in full stripes.
Drunk Bats and Teflon Food: Other winners included a group who studied whether giving alcohol to batsimpaired their ability to fly (it did!), and researchers who explored the benefits of eating Teflon to increase food volume.
The 24-Second Lecture: True to form, one group used their entire 24-second lecture slot to sing about the allotted time, because why not?
The awards themselves are a handmade model of a human stomach, and the winners receive a single hand wipe—a modest reward for such groundbreaking, if ridiculous, work.
Attacked by an Evil Ninja Squirrel
Finally, we head across the pond to the San Francisco Bay Area, where a truly menacing story of a rodent menace unfolded, first reported by the Daily Star.
Residents were terrorised by an aggressive squirrel that was dubbed the "Evil Ninja Squirrel" by locals because it seemingly materialised from nowhere to attack people. This furry fighter launched itself from the ground upwards at one woman's face and sent at least two victims to the emergency room with bloody bites and scratches.
Experts from animal charities believe the reason for this unnatural aggression is a sadly common one: the animal was likely raised by humans as a baby. This meant it had lost its natural fear of people, and when it wasn't fed as it expected, its desperation and hunger led to the vicious attacks. The message is clear: Don't feed the squirrels!
That's all the wyrd news we could fit in this week! Hopefully, it’s given you a few things to ponder—perhaps you'll look at your local squirrels a bit differently from now on.
Until next time,
Stay Wyrd