Tilberi

Tilberi by Oleastro.

The tilberi or Snakkur is an amazing magical creature of Iceland.

Origin

The tilberi is part of a kind of sorcery that Icelandic witches allegedly used to steal milk from their neighbors. According to a Danish source, a woman was burnt at the stake in 1580 in Iceland for practicing tilberi magic. In 1635 another woman was acquitted after someone had accused her of creating a tilbery.

In order to make a tilberi, a woman should go to a graveyard early on Whitsunday and dig a human rib there. Then this rib needs to be wrapped in grey wool and be preserved between breasts for three weeks. Each Sunday during this period, when the woman goes to church, she must not swallow the holy wine at the communion, but has to spit it on the bobbin she has between her breasts. The tilberi will come alive at the thirde spite. Then the woman has to carve a nipple inside her thigh on which the tilberi will hang on and nourish itself.

Behavior

When it is fully grown the woman can order the tilberi to steal milk from cows and sheep. It can lie across a sheep’s back and suck two tits at the same time. When it rolls back, it spurns milk into a churn. If one draws the magical sign called smjörhnútur (butterknot) on the churn, the butter made from such milk falls into small pieces.

The only way a witch can get rid of her tilberi, is to order it to gather all the sheepdropping in three highland pastures. Eager to get back on the nipple the tilberi will overexert itself and explode, leaving only a human rib beside the heap of droppings.