The Penanggalan vampire is a variation of vampire from
South-East Asia, primarily Malaysia.
Like the Loogaoo, the Penanggalan vampire is not quite undead since it’s
a living person during the day who transforms into the vampire at night. The
Penanggalan vampires are all woman who at night detaches their heads from the
rest of their body in order to fly off in search of victims, but their stomachs
and entrails are still connected to their head and they glow in the night as
they fly around. Talk about scary and disgusting!
In folklore, the vampire is either a beautiful old or young
woman who gained her powers through the use of black magic or through other
dark and supernatural methods in order to stay beautiful forever. A woman may also become a Penanggalan by
being cursed by someone with the use of black magic. The Penanggalan was also said to be a midwife
who had made a pact with the devil to not eat meat for 40 days, but she failed
this and as punishment she was cursed forever to suck the blood from mothers
who have given birth and their infants. This vampire can also control its hair
and organs like tentacles in order to remove obstacles from its path as it flies.
The penanggalan flies around at night in search of pray. The
vampire can drink blood and also eat flesh, but it prefers to drink blood. This
vampire may also wait on rooftops of houses where women are giving birth, and
it screams out when the infant is born.
It’s preferred pray are infants, the blood from mothers who recently
gave birth, and the placenta which it eats after it has been buried. If the
vampire is unable to gain entry to a house, then it can stretch its tongue
through under the front door or any other small openings and then it begins to
such the blood from its victims. Victims who come into contact with the tongue
but are not killed in the encounter, are said to then die from the wasting
disease unless they are healed by a medicine man. Many Malaysian houses are
built on stilts, therefore it is also believed that this vampire can use its
organs like tentacles and squeeze its way above the floorboards then proceed to
devourer any infants in the premises.
There are a few ways in which one ca protect themselves from
this vampire. One way to protect
yourself against it is to scatter the spiky leaves from the pandanus palm tree,
in hope that the vampire would puncture its exposed organs and lungs on them.
The thorny vine can also be strung up around windows and doors, so that the
flying vampire can get its organs snared in the vines and then it can be killed
with a machete. Although the snares wouldn’t protect the infants for when the
vampire enters through under the floorboards, therefore several months before a
child is expected to be born, the family can plant pineapples under the house,
and the spikes from the plant and fruit will protect against the penanggalan. Pregnant
women can also sleep with scissors or nut cutters, since the vampire is afraid
of these items. A way to identify when a
midwife is a penanggalan is to notice if they are licking their lips when a
woman is giving birth as if they are looking forward to drinking her blood at
night, and these vampires tend to avoid making eye contact when they are in
their human form. Men should find out where the vampire lives and when it flies
away into the night, they should go into the house and locate the detached
body and either cremate it or stick broken glass down the neck so that when the
vampire returns they puncture their organs and die or are unable to go into
their body and daytime comes and they die. A non-lethal way of dealing with one
of these vampires is to find the detached body and move it back to front so
that the vampire with attach its body with its head facing the wrong way for
everyone to see.
It is also believed that the penanggalan’s body begins to
decompose when it becomes detached from its head therefore she stores it in a
vinegar vat in order to preserve it while she flies around. Similar to the
loogaoo, if you find her detached body and rubs garlic paste on the inside,
then the vampire with perish.
How would you react if you saw this monstrosity flying outside your window at night?
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