The Sorcerer Who Lives on the Moon
Polish legend says a nobleman sold his soul to the Devil, but tricked him, and was dropped on the Moon, where he still lives, with only a spider for company.
What was reported
Pan Twardowski was a nobleman of Kraków in Polish legend, who signed a pact with the Devil in exchange for knowledge and magical powers, on condition that the Devil could only take him in Rome, a city he never meant to visit.
The Devil tricked him by catching him at an inn named 'Rome'. As he was carried off into the sky, Twardowski sang a hymn to the Virgin Mary, and the Devil dropped him. He landed on the Moon, where he lives still, and sometimes lets his spider down on a thread to bring him news from Earth.
Explanations offered
Twardowski is a Polish Faust, perhaps inspired by a real 16th-century scholar of the occult. A magic mirror said to have been his is kept in a church in Węgrów, and Polish children still look for him on the Moon.
- When
- Told since the 1500s
- Where
- On the Moon, as told in Poland
- Witnesses
- Polish legend
- Status
- Legend
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.