Origins of the Dead Marshes

[Evisse the Blue]

I have also heard of the legend of the lights that misguide you through the marshes, Ophelia. it is held that evil spirits or demons inhabit the marshes, taunting people, making them get lost or showing them riches they can never obtain, thus making them go out of their minds.

Probably the abundance of such legends speaks for them having a basis in reality, like the stories about the mumified bodies from the marshes: many strange lights do appear in uninhabited places of some marshes. The scientific theory is that it is actually the result of the spontaneous combustion of swamp gas.

But I can see how the combination of these two true stories (about the executed criminals and the strange lights) could have led to such creepy tales about the marshes, among them - one of the creepiest stories from LOTR.