Comments on: Britain’s Black Dog Legends – 7 Spooky Canines & Hellhounds

By: David Castleton

David Castleton — Sun, 10 Nov 2024 10:09:13 +0000

In reply to Burt. Hi Burt, sounds interesting! Please feel free to tell us about your encounter with the black dog.

By: Burt

Burt — Sat, 09 Nov 2024 13:24:37 +0000

I believe that I had an encounter with a guardian black dog. I am happy to elaborate if anybody here is interested.

By: David Castleton

David Castleton — Sat, 13 Jul 2024 07:28:32 +0000

In reply to Inkantress. So glad you enjoyed my round-up of black dog folklore, Inkantress. Many thanks for your comment.

By: Inkantress

Inkantress — Wed, 10 Jul 2024 13:45:10 +0000

This is a fabulous ecapsulation of the black dog phenomonon, thank you very much! I agree with deadlosh that an honoury mention of cerberus might be nice as well as anubis; the dog headed god of the dead in ancient egypt. But I think it’s not entirely necessary and you’ve got just such a well of information here. I’ce been researching this phenomenon and this is by far the best article I have found with the most information. Wonderful work!

By: David Castleton

David Castleton — Mon, 14 Dec 2020 20:06:56 +0000

In reply to deadlosh. Thanks for your comment, deadlosh. I think Cerberus is more of a guardian of the underworld rather than a hellhound in the later Christian sense, but there might be some vague relation between the underworld guardians of Greek and Norse myth and later black dog legends. I'll have to check out the differences between dog-monsters/hellhounds/ghostly dogs in Greek myth.

By: deadlosh

deadlosh — Mon, 14 Dec 2020 17:58:21 +0000

Speaking of greek mythology: Hellhounds were also the companion of Ecate (Hecate), goddess of boundaries, crossroads, witchcraft, ghosts, poisons ect.. Dogs were sacred to this specific deity and usually even sacrificed to her. Maybe that’s also one of the correlations between dogs and lost people and even this specific ghostly depiction of them as infernal beasts. Cerberus isn’t really a “hellhound”, yes the Ade is indeed the “greek hell” in a christian reading of the greek cosmology but Cerberus is just another dog-monster like others in the greek mithology (like Ortro, his brother) and put as a gatekeeper of Ade because of his monstrous appearance, violent behavior and dog attributes (fidelity and diligence) but still hellhounds/ghostly dogs existed as a separate creature in the greek mithology.