The Sussex Knucker
The Knucker of Lyminster.
In the south of England lies Sussex. The name Sussex comes from the Old English Sūþsēaxe; lit. ‘South Saxons.’ It was once the Kingdom of Sussex, eventually becoming a county. It is an area containing many legends and lore, but today we will focus on the tale of the Knucker.
The name Knucker seems to have a few possible origins, one source could be the old Norse word Nikyr, which meant water monster. Another possible origin for the word is ‘Old Nick.’ slang for the devil.
There are a few different locations around Sussex where the Knucker could be located, and all the locations shared a similar feature, the presence of a ‘Knucker Hole.’ These were deep pools of water, said to be the home of the beastie, and also said to be bottomless. But what on earth is a Knucker? What did it look like? And what on earth did it get up to?
The Knucker was a water dragon, it was said to resemble a great sea serpent with wings and a blood chilling hiss. Unlike other dragons he was less interested in collecting hoards of gold and hassling Hobbits and Dwarves, and much more interested in devouring maidens (poor maidens, they always seem to get the worse end of the stick.)
Perhaps the best known Knucker lived in a Knucker hole close to the village of Lyminster. There are a few variations on his tale but an atypical version ran something like this:
Near the village of Lyminster there was a Knucker Hole said to be bottomless, and home to a dragon, the monster had terrorised the area for years and had devoured all the maidens, leaving only the Kings daughter. In desperation the King offer her hand in marriage to the person who could slay the beast. A local lad called ‘Jim Puttock’ fed The Knucker a giant poisoned pie, so large it had to be bought to the Knucker’s Hole by a horse and cart. The Dragon did not just eat the pie but devoured the horse and cart too (Now that is just greedy and unnecessary, poor horse.) Shortly afterwards it died of the effects of the poison. Unfortunately our young medieval pest controller never got to claim the King’s daughter’s hand, he himself accidentally ingested some of the poison in the pie and died the next day.
In another version of the tale it is a young knight who tries for the hand of the Princess, with similar results.
I hope you enjoyed this little foray into Dragonlore, next month is Halloween (the spooky season) and each week I will focus my blog on a different chilling tale, finishing with a very scary piece of folkore for Halloween.
