09/10/2024
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Stormen rasede på Halsted kirkegård en nat i midten af 1800-tallet, men blæsten og regnen blev overdøvet af taktfaste hammer- og mejselslag i nattens mulm og mørke. Det så meget, at det fik klosterets vægter til sammen med tre naboer at bevæge sig ud i uvejret og undersøge støjen. Knapt var de nået frem, før de så en flok tildækkede skikkelser bære noget væk fra kirkegården og ud i mørket… Men hvad havde de ukendte personer fjernet? Der var ikke tegn på gravrøveri, men da kirken få år senere skulle restaureres, konstaterede en professor, at mørtlen omkring et tilmuret hul i kirkens apsis var ny. Hullet havde en dyster historie, og professoren befalede at få det åbnet. Han fandt til sin forfærdelse kun støv og resterne af en sandal. Men hvad havde han regnet med at finde derinde?
I 1300-tallet fik nonner adgang til Halsted Kloster, der indtil da havde været forbeholdt munke. Herfra gik naturen sin gang, og en munk forelskede sig i en smuk og jomfruelig nonne. I det skjulte opførte de sig aldeles ukristeligt i klosterets park og dyrehave, og nonnen blev gravid. Den slags har det med at vise sig før eller siden, og det forbudte forhold blev opdaget og indrømmet. Som straf blev nonnen muret inde i det lille hulrum i kirkens apsis. Munken blev pisket ihjel. Som en påmindelse om kirkens holdning til den slags utugt, blev der i kirkemuren indhugget et hoved, der kan ses den dag i dag. Hovedet skal forestille den stakkels nonne, der herefter gik igen på klosteret. Det var naturligvis
nonnens skelet, professoren havde ventet af finde.
Sagnet er blot en af utallige forklaringer på det mystiske stenhoved, der kan beses i kirkens apsis’ ydermur og er ca. 16 cm højt. Der er nærmest ingen grænser for hvor farverige og slibrige de lokale sagn om hovedet er, hvor nonnens afstraffelse tilskrives alt fra dyresex til omgang med djævelen selv. Trods de mange fortællinger om hovedet og nonnen, så er det aldrig blevet opklaret, hvem der huserede på kirkegården den nat.
(ENGLISH)
The storm raged at Halsted cemetery a night in the middle of the 19th century. But the wind and rain were drowned out by hammer and chisel blows in the dead of night. So much that it made the monastery's guard, together with three neighbors, go out into the storm and investigate the noise. Hardly had they arrived before they saw a group of cloaked figures carrying something away from the cemetery and into the darkness... But what had the unknown persons removed? There were no signs of grave robbery, but when the church was to be restored a few years later, a professor noted that the mortar around a bricked-up hole in the church's apse was new. The hole had a dark history and the professor ordered it opened. To his dismay, he found only dust and the remains of a sandal. But what had he expected to find in there?
In the 14th century, nuns were allowed access to Halsted Monastery, which until then had been reserved for monks. From here nature took its course, and a monk fell in love with a beautiful and virginal nun. In secret, they behaved unchristianly on the monastery’s grounds, and the nun soon became pregnant. This sort of thing tends to show itself sooner or later, and the forbidden relationship was discovered and admitted. As punishment, the nun was walled up inside the small cavity in the apse of the church. The monk was whipped to death. As a reminder of the church's attitude to this kind of fornication, a head was carved into the church wall, which can be seen to this day. The head must represent the poor nun, which haunted the monastery afterwards. It was, of course, the nun's skeleton that the professor had expected to find.
The legend is just one of countless explanations for the mysterious stone head that can be seen in the outer wall of the church's apse and is approx. 16 cm high. There are almost no limits to how colorful and lurid the local legends about the head are, where the nun's punishment is attributed to everything from be******ty to in*******se with the devil himself. Despite the many stories about the head and the nun, it has never been clarified who the cloaked figures were in the cemetery that night.