THE “FIRST” HAUNTED HOUSE – ROME
- Pliny the Younger wrote one of the first “haunted house” stories ever recorded around 50 AD.
- In the story, Pliny describes a house in which the apparition of an old man, emaciated, bearded, and burdened with heavy chains plagues the inhabitants therein.
- Those who bought or rented the house became so frightened that they evacuated the property.
- Finally, a philosopher, who was identified as Athendorus, takes up residence there.
- Familiar with tales of the ghost, Athendorus decides to immerse himself in his writing, in the hopes of distracting himself when the ghost appears.
- However, the sound of the rattling chains and moaning becomes so dreadfully loud and terrifying that Athendorus follows the ghost to a spot outside the house, whereupon the figure disappears.
- Athendorus marks the spot with grass and leaves and in the morning orders the spot to be dug up.
- The excavation produced the corpse of a man wrapped in heavy chains.
- Athendorus promptly ordered a proper burial for the man, and his ghost was never seen in the house again.
Nature is a Haunted House – but Art – a House that tries to be haunted.
— Emily Dickinson
Behind every man now alive stand 30 ghosts, for that is the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living.
― Arthur C. Clarke
There are a few of the open-air spirits; the more domestic of their tribe gather within-doors, plentiful as swallows under southern eaves.
― William Butler Yeats
Houses are not haunted. We are haunted, and regardless of the architecture with which we surround ourselves, our ghosts stay with us until we ourselves are ghosts.
― Dean Koontz
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