10 Examples of Chilean Legends

Chilean legends

The Chilean legends They are stories of oral tradition that tell invented stories, but that may have some real component, and that are transmitted or originated in Chile. All these stories always include some fantastic character or event.

Many legends Chileans come from native peoples or Europeans. Because of this double origin, some of these narratives tend to mix elements of these two cultures.

In addition, there are more modern legends that originated in the country or in the city. These have the peculiarity that they generally name or explain the existence of certain fantastic beings that supposedly exist in the present.

Characteristics of Chilean legends

Examples of Chilean legends

1. Legend of the Yastay

This legend is from the northern part of the country. The Yastay is a being that can take the form of a guanaco or a demon and is the protector of animals. This being is said to attack hunters because he is a protector of nature.

This legend has many variations, in some of them it is said that it can also take the form of a man with guanaco feet or that it can transform into a wind.

1. The legend of the Guayacán treasure

This legend has a character who was real: the English pirate Francis Drake. According to this story, this man discovered a bay in 1578, which is located in Guayacán, and it is said that he buried a treasure there.

1. Legend of the Pincoya

This legend is from an island in southern Chile called Chiloé. According to legend, the Pincoya is a mermaid who protects fishermen: she announces when there will be good fishing, when the fishing is going to be bad or rescue the fishermen and boats that get lost in high seas.

According to other versions, it is said that she is the protector of the sea and that she was the one who brought such an abundance of shellfish and fish to the Pacific Ocean.

1. Legend of the Añañuca flower

The añañuca is a flower that grows in the north of Chile. According to legend, a few centuries ago a miner and a woman fell in love and one night he dreamed of a mine in which he would find great riches.

The next day he went in search of this mine, but never returned. The woman became very sad and soon after she passed away. Her relatives buried her and say that in the place where the grave was, the first añañuca grew.

1. Legend of the Tue-Tue

This legend is from the Mapuches, a native people of Chile. According to legend, the Tue-Tue is a sorcerer who makes a bird sound and that if anyone hears it he will have bad luck. According to some versions this being cannot be seen, but according to others it is a bird with the head of a man.

In some rural areas, this fantastic character is believed to actually exist and is supposed to be scared away by lighting a bonfire.

1. The legend of the Laguna del Inca

This legend explains the color of the Laguna del Inca. According to this account, III Yupanqui married a princess, Kora-llé in the Andes Mountains, on a summit that is next to this lagoon. When the ceremony ended, the princess slipped, fell and died. Her husband decided that Kora-llé's body should be left in the lagoon and it is said that when she was placed in the water, it turned an emerald green color.

According to other versions of the story, at night you can hear the lament of this man who cries for the death of his wife.

1. Legend of Camahueto

This legend is from Chiloé, an island in southern Chile. The Camahueto is a fantastic being that looks like a sea elephant, but has a horn on its forehead. According to legend, he usually lives in the mountains, but at certain times he goes to the sea and destroys everything in his way.

This legend explains geographical phenomena such as rivers, streams, earthquakes, among others. In addition, there are many beliefs related to this being in this part of the country.

1. The bells of Rere

Rere is a town that exists in Chile and was built in 1927, but an earthquake destroyed a large part of the buildings in this place, however, buildings were rebuilt here. According to legend, in the first construction of the town there was a bell tower, which after the earthquake was destroyed.

The fantastic fact of this narrative is that when wanting to move these bells to another site, they seemed very heavy and could hardly move them forward. But when they wanted to return them to the place where the bell tower was, they were very light.

1. The legend of Tololo Pampa

This legend circulates in the Atacama region, an area where there is a very large desert. Tololo Pampa is said to be a ghost town that appears at night and disappears when the sun rises. Legend has it that in that place there was a town that was covered by a river that grew a lot and that its inhabitants are spirits that roam the area.

There are many variations of this legend. In one of them it is told that Tololo Pampa is the princess of her town and that a giant, who is in love with her, is looking for gifts for this princess. There are people who claim to have seen the ghost town in different places in this region.

1. The legend of the payachatas

This is an Inca legend that continues to be narrated in the present in Chile and that tells of the origin of two lakes in this country. According to this account, there were two tribes that were enemies, but one day, the princess of one of the tribes and the prince of the other met and fell in love.

When their families found out about this relationship, they did everything possible to separate them, but they could not achieve it and murdered the couple in love.

Nature was enraged by the murder and, therefore, manifested itself with a storm that lasted many days and caused great floods that made the two tribes disappear and that in their place formed two lakes, the Chungará and the Cota-Cotani.

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