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Each Christmas season, the mountain peoples of Europe are beset by monsters. Fearsome figures like Krampus, Perchta, and the Kuker descend into quaint hilltop villages, sometimes to spread holiday cheer, sometimes to hasten the coming of spring, and sometimes just to sew chaos and discord. These figures are all part of similar winter celebrations found across the Alps, stretching from their western foothills in France all the way to the Dinaric Alps of the Balkans. Due to the primal nature of these traditions, in which men and women wear the skins of beasts and the faces of demons, scholars and churchmen have wondered for decades if these Christmas festivals could really be a remnant of much older traditions.

On this week's episode of Gladio Free Europe, Liam and Russian Sam explore the history of these Christmastime monsters, and the widespread traditions of people wearing their costumes to parade through the streets. While drawing a straight from Krampus to ancient Alpine paganism is not particularly easy, some of these figures offer interesting parallels to what we know of the traditional pantheons that Christianity supplanted.

Historians today are much hesitant to attribute modern beliefs to paganism than they might have been in the time of the Brothers Grimm. But it's clear that these traditions are among the oldest in Europe, with interesting to the development of witchcraft lore and even the spread of deadly witch hunts across medieval and Early Modern Europe.

Join us on a trip to the snowy highlands of Austria, Germany, Slovenia, and Bulgaria and decide for yourself if these winter monsters may be our last remnant of the pagan world.