How could it happen that I was in Iceland and did not see it!! Nábrók or pants made of human skin. Or maybe it’s better… Read and judge for yourself…
Nábrók, or panties of death, can be found in the Museum of Witchcraft in Strandagaldur. The Icelandic Museum of Witchcraft is located in the tiny town of Hólmavík. In Iceland, everything except nature is tiny, so the town and the museum do not sin in size. The founder of the museum was Sigurður Atlason and praise him for having the courage to include such a ghastly exhibit in his collection.
Death panties were supposed to provide the owner with an infinite amount of money. Nábrók must always be made of male skin. Before the skin was removed from the dead man, the person performing the ritual, usually a witch, had to obtain the consent of the dying man to use his skin to create nábrók. The body, just after burial, was dug out of the grave and the skin was removed from the waist down. The best pants were ankle-length pants. As well as during life and after death, the most valuable and sensitive element of trousers was the scrotum. This one had to be the most careful and could not be damaged. For into the scrotum was put a coin stolen in the new moon of a poor widow. The stolen coin was accompanied by a magic spell written with runes. The coin and spell were to ensure that the scrotum would always be full of money. Interestingly, by the way, that wealth was to begin with robbing a poor person, in addition a widow whose life in difficult Icelandic conditions was certainly not easy to live … Such a reflection.
The first coin always had to remain in the scrotum. Removed automatically ended the enrichment of the owner of nábrók. In order not to lose the accumulated property with such sacrifice with the death of the owner of the panties of death, it was necessary to persuade a relative to wear trousers before death. But beware, it had to be done skillfully – first one leg had to be put on by the new owner immediately after taking it off, then the other. Such a rite also ensured salvation for the previous owner of trousers, after all, he had something to explain himself to the Most High.
The copy kept in the Icelandic museum dates from the seventeenth century. But this is not the only case of belief in the special power of human skin pants. Trousers made of human skin were also worn by soldiers of the French Revolution, who pacified peasant uprisings in the Vendée. Who would have thought, the events and the army that changed the shape and direction of Europe…