He also, in the end, brought a larger one together. Pipers were often employed to lead civic celebrations. Others believe that that they may have joined the failed Children's Crusade of 1212 where thousands of children set off for the Holy Land, but many died on the way or were sold to slavery. You can go home, if you wish, loaded down with Pied Piper T-shirts, fridge magnets, mugs and flutes. The tale in fact has survived for a very long time. An eerily similar tale also exist in the German town of Brandenburg, where a man appeared with a hurdy-gurdy and lured the children away by its beautiful music. While some historians believe that the youth emigrated to Transylvania, the German linguist Jürgen Udolph’s theory is most accepted. Photo credit: Plum leaves/Flickr, A rat tile on the streets of Hamelin. In the 13th century, many Germans were persuaded, by offering rewards, to settle in Moravia, East Prussia, Pomerania or in the Teutonic Land by landowners. And the 15th Century Luneburg manuscript, an early German account of the event, along with five historical memory verses, some in Latin and others in Middle Low German, all refer to a similar story of 130 children or young people vanishing on the 26 June 1284, following a pied piper to a place called Calvary or Koppen. What happened to the missing children of Hamelin? We know the precise date from an inscription on a stained-glass window on the town’s church, which stood on the town’s square until it was destroyed in 1660. Consequently, thousands of young adults from Lower Saxony and Westphalia headed east and settled there as evident from dozens of Westphalian place names that show up in this area. The theories are legion, according to Wibke Reimer, project coordinator at the Hameln Museum who has been organising a special exhibit that focuses on the global reach of the Pied Piper legend. An entry in Hamelin’s town records, dating to 1384, laments that, “It is 100 years since our children left.” The stained-glass window in the town’s St Nicolai church, destroyed in the 17th Century but described in earlier accounts, reportedly illustrated the figure of the Pied Piper leading several ghostly white children. The music he played on his pipe attracted all the town's rats towards him, after which, he led the entranced animals to the Weser River nearby, where they all dove in and drowned. Some historians suggest the legend reflects a 13th Century children’s crusade, part of the wave of medieval crusades aimed at winning back the Holy Land. The Piper, in the end, is one very grim reaper. A 14th century portrayal of a “lokator” (with a special hat). The tale goes something like this: In the year 1284, there was a serious rat problem in Hamelin, which was at that time a prosperous port on the river Weser in Lower Saxony, Germany. People sometimes mistake me for a superhero, court jester or Robin Hood. Responsible for meeting and greeting visiting groups and dignitaries, he leads tours of the city and embodies the enduring hold of the legend that draws most travellers here. In fact, the real surprise of his tour isn’t so much the beautifully preserved townscape but the suggestion that the Pied Piper is much more than just a fairy tale. “They don’t explain the very particular date cited for the loss of the children, and the local sense of trauma,” Reimer noted. The story of the Pied Piper was turned into a poem by Robert Brown in 1889, as a cautionary tale made to frighten children. Everyone knows the tale of the Pied Piper of Hamelin, who lured 130 children away by playing his pipe, but few people realise that the story is based on real events, which took place on the day of Saints John and Paul on 26 June in the town of Hamelin, Lower Saxony, Germany in 1284. Photo credit: Taylor Sargeant/Flickr, Sculpture of the Pied Piper in Hamelin. The fact the documentation also emphasises that the youth followed the Piper to the Koppen, commonly translated as “hills”, suggest another link. In a mid-15th century reference found in the Latin chronicle from the German town of Lunenberg, the piper is described as a handsome and well-dressed man about thirty years of age who entered Hamelin and “began to play all through the town a silver pipe of the most magnificent sort.”. When the town refused to pay the Piper for his service, the saviour turned into a more satanic seducer and came for Hamelin’s children. Tags: history, pied piper of hamelin, germany, robert brown, poem, fairytale, story, Where did the Coronavirus 19 Originate from? But most people recognise him for what he is, the Pied Piper incarnate, appointed by Hamelin to impersonate its simultaneously favourite (at least commercially) and least favourite adopted son. The settlers clear the forest and build houses. Perhaps the Piper, emblematic of a pagan shaman, playing his flute, was leading the youth of Hamelin to their midsummer festivities when the local Christian faction, hoping to cement conversion of the region, waylaid and massacred the group.