mara

In Slavic and Teutonic folklore, the mara are the souls of living beings, mostly women, who leave their bodies by night. They enter houses through a key-hole or knot-hole to visit sleepers for the purpose of tormenting them by sitting astride their chests. The mara also torment domestic animals, draining them of milk and sucking their blood. It is said that their eyebrows meet and that the soles of their feet are flat.

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