A bogeyman (also spelled bogieman, boogeyman or boogieman) is an amorphous imaginary being used by adults to frighten children into compliant behaviour. The monster has no specific appearance, and conceptions about it can vary drastically from household to household within the same community; in many cases, he has no set appearance in the mind of an adult or child, but is simply a non-specific embodiment of terror. Parents may tell their children that if they misbehave, the bogeyman will get them. Bogeymen may target a specific mischief — for instance, a bogeyman that punishes children who suck their thumbs — or general misbehavior, depending on what purpose needs serving. In some cases, the bogeyman is a nickname for the devil.
Bogeyman tales vary by region. The bogeyman may be male, female or both.
In some Midwestern states of the United States, the bogeyman scratches at the window. In the Pacific Northwest, he may manifest in "green fog". In other places, he hides or appears from under the bed or in the closet and tickles children when they go to sleep at night. It is said that a wart can be transmitted to someone by the bogeyman.[1]
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The word bogey is derived from the Middle English bogge/bugge (also the origin of the word bug), and thus is generally thought to be a cognate of the German bögge, böggel-mann (English "Bogeyman"). The word could also be linked to many similar words in other European languages: bogle (Scots), boeman (Dutch), buse (Nynorsk), bøhmand (Danish), bòcan, púca, pooka or pookha (Irish Gaelic), pwca, bwga or bwgan (Welsh), puki (Old Norse), pixie or piskie (Cornish), puck (English), bogu (Slavonic), buka (Russian, бука), baubas (Lithuanian), baubau (Romanian), babau (Italian), bobo (Polish).[2]
In Southeast Asia, the term is commonly accepted to refer to Bugis[3] or Buganese[4] pirates, ruthless seafarers of southern Sulawesi, Indonesia's third largest island. These pirates often plagued early English or Dutch trading ships, namely those of the British East India Company or Dutch East India Company. It is popularly believed that this resulted in the European sailors bringing their fear of the "bugi men" back to their home countries. However, etymologists disagree with this, because words relating to bogeyman were in common use centuries before European colonization of Southeast Asia and it is therefore unlikely that the Bugis would have been commonly known to westerners during that time.
Bogeyman-like beings are nearly universal; common to folklore in many disparate countries.
In many countries, a bogeyman-like creature is portrayed as a man with a sack on his back who carries naughty children away. This is true for many Latin countries, such as Spain, Portugal, Brazil and the countries of Spanish America, where it referred to as el "Hombre de la Bolsa", el hombre del saco, or in Portuguese, o homem do saco (all of which mean "the sack man"). Similar legends are also very common in Eastern Europe, as well as Haiti and some countries in Asia.
In Spain, el hombre del saco is usually depicted as a mean and impossibly ugly and skinny old man who eats the misbehaving children he collects. In Brazil, o homem do saco is portrayed as an adult male, usually in the form of a vagrant, who carries a sack on his back (much like Santa Claus would), and collects mean disobedient children to sell. In Chile, and particularly in the Southern and Austral Zones, is mostly known as "El Viejo del Saco" ("The old man with the bag") who walks around the neighbourhood every day around supper time. This character is not considered or perceived as a mythical or fantastic creature by children. Instead, he is recognised as an insane psychotic murderer that somehow has been accepted by society which allows him to take a child that has been given to him willingly by disappointed parents or any child that is not home by sundown or supper time. In Honduras, misbehaving children fear "El Roba Chicos", or child-snatcher, which is very similar to "Hombre del Saco".
The Hombre del Saco actually existed, being the man who, during the 16th and 17th centuries, was in charge of collecting orphan babies in order to take them to the orphanages: he would put them in a huge bag or in wicker baskets, and carry them all through the province collecting more children. Most of them usually died before reaching the orphanage due to the lack of care and the obviously insalubrious conditions in which he transported them. French writer Victor Hugo wrote about this job in his The Man Who Laughs, describing it as the starter of the Spanish bogeyman myth.
In Armenia and Georgia, children are threatened by the "Bag Man" who carries a bag and kidnaps those who don't behave. In Bulgaria, children are sometimes told that a dark scary monster-like person called Torbalan (Bulgarian: "Торбалан", which comes from "торба", meaning a sack, so his name means "Man with a sack") will come and kidnap them with his large sack if they misbehave. He can be seen as the antipode of the Christmas figure Dyado Koleda (Bulgarian: Дядо Коледа; corresponding to Father Christmas). Usually, he is known to children as the family partner of Baba Yaga although this is based on folklore analogy. In Hungary, the local bogeyman, the mumus, is known as zsákos ember, literally the person with a sack" (in which he takes away children). "The mumus will take you away".
In Turkey, Öcü (less often called Böcü) is a scary creature carrying a sack to capture and keep children. In the Czech Republic, Silesia and Great Poland, children are frightened by the Bubak (in Polish, bebok, babok, or bobok) or hastrman (Bugbear, scarecrow, respectively) who is also portrayed as a man with a sack. He also, however, takes adults, and is known for hiding by riverbanks and making a sound like a lost baby, in order to lure the unwary. He weaves on nights of the full moon, making clothes for his stolen souls, and has a cart drawn by cats. In Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, buka ("бука"), babay ("бабай") or babayka ("бабайка") is used to keep children in bed or stop them from misbehaving. 'Babay' means "old man" in Tatar. Children are told that "babay" is an old man with a bag or a monster, usually hiding under the bed, and that it will take them away if they misbehave (though he is sometimes depicted as having no set appearance). In the Netherlands, Zwarte Piet (Dutch for "Black Pete") is a servant of Sinterklaas, who delivers bags of presents on the 5th of December and takes naugthy kids back in the now-empty bags. In some stories, the Zwarte Piets themselves were kidnapped as kids, and the kidnapped kids make up the next generation of Zwarte Piets.
In Haiti, the Tonton Macoute (Haitian creole for "Uncle Gunnysack") is a giant, and a counterpart of Father Christmas, renowned for abducting bad children by putting them in his knapsack. During the dictatorship of Papa Doc Duvalier, certain Haitian secret policemen were given the name Tontons Macoutes ("Uncle-Gunnysacks") because they were said also to make people disappear.[5]
In North India, children are sometimes threatened with the Bori Baba or "Father Sack" who carries a sack in which he places children he captures. A similar being, "Abu Kees" (ابو كيس), literally "The Man with a Bag", appears in Lebanon. In Vietnam, misbehaving children are told that ông ba bị (in the North - literally mister-three-bags) or ông kẹ (in the South) will come in the night and take them away. In Sri Lanka, elders frighten misbehaving children with Goni Billa, a scary man carrying a sack to capture and keep children. In the Western Cape folklore of South Africa, Antjie Somers is a Bogeyman who catches naughty children in a bag slung over his shoulder. Although the name is that of a female, Antjie Somers is traditionally a male figure (often an escaped slave who fled persecution by cross-dressing).
El Cuco, (also El Coco and Cucuy, sometimes called El Bolo) is a monster common to many Spanish-speaking countries.
In Spain, parents will sing lullabies or tell rhymes to children, warning them that if they do not sleep, El Coco will come and get them. The rhyme originated in the 17th century has evolved over the years, but still retains its original meaning. Coconuts (Spanish: coco) received that name because their brownish hairy surface reminded Portuguese explorers of coco, a ghost with a pumpkin head. Latin America also has El Coco, although its folklore is usually quite different, commonly mixed with native beliefs, and, because of cultural contacts, sometimes more related to the bogeyman of the United States. However, the term El Coco is also used in Spanish-speaking Latin American countries, such as Colombia, Peru, Mexico, Argentina, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Chile and Uruguay, although there it is more usually called El Cuco, as in Puerto Rico. In Mexico and among Mexican-Americans, El Cucuy is portrayed as an evil monster that hides under children's bed at night and kidnaps or eats the child that does not obey his/her parents or go to sleep when it is time to do so. However, the Spanish American bogeyman does not resemble the shapeless or hairy monster of Spain: social sciences professor Manuel Medrano says popular legend describes El cucuy as a small humanoid with glowing red eyes that hides in closets or under the bed. 'Some lore has him as a kid who was the victim of violence ... and now he’s alive, but he’s not,' Medrano said, citing Xavier Garza's 2004 book Creepy Creatures and other Cucuys."[6]
In Brazilian folklore, a similar character called Cuca is despicted as a female humanoid alligator. There's a famous lullaby sung by most parents to their children that says that the Cuca will come and get them if they do not sleep, just as in Spain. The Cuca is also a character of Monteiro Lobato's Sítio do Picapau Amarelo, a series of short novels written for children, which contain a large number of characters from Brazilian folklore.
On the children's TV program Sesame Street, the character of Grover was named 'Coco' in the Spanish version.
In the countries of the eastern Mediterranean, children who misbehave are threatened with a creature known as "babau" (or "baubau", "baobao", "bavbav" or similar). In Italy and Romania, the Babau (in Romania, Bau-bau) is also called the l'uomo nero (Romanian: omul negru) or "black man". In Italy, he is portrayed as a tall man wearing a heavy black coat, with a black hood or hat which hides his face. Sometimes, parents will knock loudly under the table, pretending that someone is knocking at the door, and saying: "Here comes l'uomo nero! He must know that there's a child here who doesn't want to drink his soup!" L'uomo nero is not supposed to eat or harm children, just take them away to a mysterious and frightening place. A popular lullaby says that he would keep a child with him "for a whole year".[7] In Slovenia, the "Bavbav" is described as a formless spirit. In Greece and Cyprus the equivalent of the Bogeyman is known as Baboulas (Greek: Μπαμπούλας). Typically, he is said to be hiding under the bed, although the details of his story is adapted by the parents in a variety of ways. In Egypt "al-Bu'bu'" (البعبع) is often depicted as a night creature that is dressed in black, who haunts children that misbehave.
In Germanic countries, the bogeyman is called the buztemann, busseman, buhman or boemand. In Germany the bogeyman is known as the "Buhmann" or the Butzemann. In Denmark it is bussemanden or "Bøhmanden" (meaning "The Buhman"). It hides under the bed and grabs children who will not sleep. Like the English, it is also a slang term for nasal mucus. In Norway, he is referred to as Busemannen. In the Netherlands, the Boeman is portrayed as a creature that resembles a man, dressed completely black, with sharp claws and fangs. He hides under the bed or in the closet. The Bogeyman takes bad children or those that refuse to sleep and locks them in his basement for a period of time. In the Pennsylvania Dutch dialect, used in those areas of Pennsylvania colonised by Swiss and Germanic peoples during the eighteenth century, "der Butzemann" is the term for a male scarecrow. A female scarecrow is a "Butzefraa" (Fraa dialect for Frau (woman)).
