Author Archives: AJ

El Cipitio

Main Piece:

“El Cipitio is the son of La Siguanaba, he was cursed to stay little forever. He likes to stalk young girls who are virgins. He approached these young girls while they lay sleeping. He would whisper things into their ears and would touch them. After visiting these girls, the girls would go crazy. They stayed crazy forever.”

 

Context:

The informant is a middle-aged woman, born in El Salvador. She learned this story from her mother. She believes her mother told her this story in order to cause her fear of not wandering at night or sleeping in the nude.

For another version, see Cordova, Carlos (2005). The Salvadoran American. Westport: Greenwood Press.

La Carreta Chillona/ The Weeping Wagon

Main Piece:

“It is a wagon that goes through the many towns during midnight. The spirits on the wagon would take all those it crossed. It is said that they would take them to hell. At midnight, you could hear the sound of the wooden wheel very loudly marking the wagon’s passage through the town. The wagon was conducted by spirits from hell in order to take humans to hell. My sister and I heard the wagon passing some nights. Maybe it was our imagination or fear, but we really thought we heard it passing. Some even say they saw it.”

Context: The informant is a middle-aged woman, born in El Salvador. Her mother told her this story, and she believes now that like many of the other stories her family told her, they were in order to prevent them from wandering the streets at night.

Thoughts:

I agree with the informant that the function of these stories is to prevent the young from wandering at night in order to avoid the many dangers that could occur at that hour.

La Siguanaba

Main Piece:

“La Siguanaba was the mother of El Cipitio. She wandered around the river banks at night and would lure men to her. At first, she would appear to be the most beautiful woman on earth to make sure men would follow her into the woods. She would flirt with them too. After playing with the men, the Siguanaba would turn into a hideous woman and would torture the men until they went completely crazy. She would do this over and over.”

Context:

The informant is a middle-aged woman, born in El Salvador. She learned this story from her grandmother. The informant believes that the story is told to stop people from wandering around at night, especially young men and women. This was a form to instill fear into them.

 

The Cow Head Man

Main Piece:

“When I was a child my mother told me that one late night, she stayed up waiting for my father to return home. It was really late…we lived up in the mountains. So it was always very dark. My mother said that she looked out the sliding back doors and she saw, what looked like a man. She ducked behind the couch quickly as the man walked closer to the sliding doors. When it got up to the doors my mother noticed that the man’s head was that of a cow. It had big black eyes and it just stood there…only moving its eyes from one side to the other. My mother was so scared, she did not know what to do. I think I remember her saying that the cow head man was there for about 10 minutes, looking around. Finally, my father arrived, and his headlights beamed toward the back. That is when my mother looked out again and the cow head man had disappeared.

“This figure, man, or whatever it is has always followed my family and I around.” (when she said this, I asked her what she meant by that, and she continued to tell the story.)

“You see, no matter where we moved to, my mother or me or one of my sisters or brothers said they saw the same man. The last time I saw him it was here (Her current home). I was in the back bedroom, asleep. I was waiting for my husband to arrive. I woke up exactly at 12 midnight. It was weird because my body just woke up on its own, anyway, when I looked over to the window there he was, with his cow head and those huge black eyes. He was just staring at me. I was so afraid. I could not move. There was a point when he looked away from me and that is when I ran right out of there and told my sister. My sister yelled at it and that was not good. You aren’t supposed to test them like that. It’s crazy because it just doesn’t leave us alone.”

 

Context:

The informant is an elderly Caucasian woman born and raised in Tennessee. She first heard about this entity from her mother when she was a child. According to her she has also witnessed the entity with her own eyes. She is not sure why it follows her family around.

 

Analysis: It seems that this story is one shared by many members of this woman’s family. They have all claimed to have encountered this entity in some way or another.

El Curro

Main Piece:

“He was a man…not sure if it was meant to scare us as children, but legend tells that at dusk everyone had to rush into their homes and close their doors and windows. Because once it was dark, you could hear the galloping of a horse all around the town. And it was said that it was a charro dressed in black…who all and any person he came across, he would take them and they would disappear forever. That is why once darkness fell, not a single person would step outside or look out their windows. Any people disappeared because of El Curro”

Context:

The informant is my 54-year-old man from Guadalajara, Mexico. He heard this story from his mother. He believes that the town used the legend of El Curro to explain any and all disappearance.

Analysis:

This story seems to help explain why people from the town were never seen again and also helped the town keep their children from playing outside at night.