The Curious Origin of the Goblin
Goblin - early 14c., “a devil, incubus, mischievous and ugly fairy,” from Norman French gobelin (12c., as Medieval Latin Gobelinus, the name of a spirit haunting the region of Evreux, in chronicle of Ordericus Vitalis). Beginning with Ordericus Vitalis, an English Benedictine monk, scholar and historian from the 11th century, in his Historia Ecclesiastica. He tells the story of St. Taurin, who in the 5th century A.D. was said to cleanse the Temple of Diana in Mediolanum Aulercorum, the 4th century name of the Roman town in Northern Gaul, of a shape shifting demon that took 3 forms: That of a bear, a buffalo and a lion. Legend has it that upon breaking the demon it was forced to stay and haunt the region it had roamed, thereby being tortured by witnessing the Christianization of the local populace.
St. Taurin and the three incarnations of Gobelinus
Ordericus describes the encounter between St. Taurin and a demon named Zabulon. When St. Taurin casts out the demon from the statue of Diana, Zabulon appears as a bearded and sooty Ethiopian with fiery sparks that come out of his mouth. Two priestesses, Cambise and Zara then attempted to thwart his cleansing of the site but were immobilized by the sign of the cross. But Ordericus tells us that the locals referred to the demon as by the name Gobelinus, the source of our modern goblin.
Mind you, all of this seems farfetched when taken at face value, but when viewed through the lens of history, destroying pagan places of worship and creating heroes and villains, seemed a commonplace practice during the first 1,400 years of AD Christianity. (i.e. Constantine, Christmas, All Hallows Eve, etc.)
So, where was the temple of Diana located in Evreux? Right where it remains today, at the site of the Cathedral of Evreux location. The original cathedral was actively used through the 8th century. The current building dates back to the 11th century C.E.
The cathedral at Evreux
But the story doesn’t end in the 5th century. Zabulon appears again 1634 in Loudun, France some 210 miles south of Evreux in a case of possession that happened among Ursiline nuns. After long trials, accusations and torture, the head priest, Father Grandier was executed publicly by burning.
According to Sir Frances Palgrave (1788-1861), the demon moved on to the town of Caen, around 90 miles away from Evreux, and began haunting their townsfolk.6 But this passage was borrowed and translated from the Dictionnaire Infernal (1818) by Collin de Plancy but was merely an anecdotal compendium of folktales.
I don’t believe in the veracity of these stories, but it’s more than a little strange that a demon bearing the same name accosted at least two separate religious sites, in the same country, over 1,000 years apart, with malefic intent, consequences with a startling lack of fanfare.
Comments