II.2.3 The Ghost of Hutstein

Holzmännlein and Holzweiblein

When I first visited the ‘Hutstein’ I was told by an old lady sitting in front of her house in the hamlet of Hutstein that I should take care of the ‘Holzmännlein’ (‘Woidmanschgerl’) in the forest there, which she already met.

Male and female dwarfs, inhabitants of the forest, of whom there are countless, can still be found today, as the inhabitants of the area assure.
For example, a farmer once saw an ancient woman, barely half a meter tall, collecting spruce and pine cones in his huge humpback basket. Suddenly, however, she turned to the farmer and ordered him to carry the basket and follow him. But the peasants took fright, and he ran away as fast as he could.
The next morning, however, his hayfield was littered with thousands of cones, which he had to laboriously remove before he could dry and bring home his hay. It remained enigmatic how the little woman had scattered the countless baskets full of cones across the meadow. Certainly the whole little people of Grettenbergwald had helped him.

When I visited last time I was told that the cave at the Hutstein is still existing nowadays and that it was used not so long time ago, i.e. last century, by an elderly women who was said to live there and steal hens around this area.

the cave at Hutstein

 

 

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