A particular brutal ghost from Icelandic ghost stories was called Hörghóll-Móri. Once he drowned, he was raised from the dead and sent on a mission of revenge for the killing of a farmer. Legend has it that he did not rest until he achieved success.
In Hörghóll, in the village of Vesturhóp, there lived a man named Jón, son of Simon. He had a son named Kristján, who was a grown man when this story took place. The hill called Hörghóll translates as “temple hill” and may have been a place of pagan worship. In any case, a few centuries ago it became a place of brutal hauntings.
One summer, the farmer Jón hired a laborer from the west on the glacier named Ívar, and in the fall he paid him his wages. The worker felt that the pay was meager and poorly served, but there was no way to change it. The following winter, Jón's son Kristján went fishing under the glacier and stayed on the same farm where Ívar lived. One winter day, Kristján's gloves disappeared and despite a long search, they could not be found. Kristján accused Ívar of causing their disappearance and punched him challenging in the face. Ívar took this seemingly calmly and said, “It will be bad for you if I do not return this blow or pay you back.”
In the spring, Kristján returned home to Hörghóll and the following winter stayed with his father, unaware of the plans that Ívar had implemented. At the beginning of this winter, many boats sank in the glacier bay, and many lost their lives. One day Ívar was walking along the seashore and found a drowned man washed ashore. Some say the man was only half dead
He cut off one of the man's arms and resurrected the dead man as an apparition, as Móri. He ordered him to go north to Hörghóll. “What should I do there?” asked the ghost. “Kill the farmer Kristján's son and leave no one on the farm alone,” said Ívar. The spirit then disappeared and went to do the bidding of its novel master.
Undead in Icelandic folklore
Móri is a male spirit found in Iceland. When a man is raised from the dead for a purpose such as revenge, he is not called a fylgja or draugr spirit, but a Móri. Often the term Fylgja spirit was used interchangeably with Draug spirit. The female version of this vengeful spirit was called Skotta. Móri means rusty brown in Icelandic, and the ghosts were named so because of the color of their clothes.
That evening the spirit came north to Hörghóll, where lamps were lit. Kristján was sitting on the bed opposite the entrance to the living room, eating his evening meal from a wooden bowl. They heard something climbing onto the roof outside. Suddenly Kristján threw the bowl and fell to the floor, and all the lamps went out. They tried to relight it with kindling and a wax candle and succeeded; this time the lightweight held and they saw the horror before them.
The brownish boy was crouching over Kristján as he lay on the floor, but he only had one arm. The ghost looked at the lightweight with terrible eyes and retreated when people approached. Kristján then jumped to his feet in a frenzy. An older woman from the farm named Vigdís was able to stop him from following him. Kristján now told about his quarrel with Ívar the previous winter and stated that Ívar must have brought this persecution upon him.
Hörghóll-Móri Haunted Kristján
In Böðvarshólar, a neighboring farm, lived a farmer known as a wise man, like many in those days. Kristján was sent there to protect him from the ghost. While he was staying with this farmer, the spirit couldn't touch him for some reason.
But then the spirit began to wreak havoc on Hörghóll, killing farm animals and spoiling food. The vengeful spirit openly rampaged through the farm and became so vicious that everyone fled except ancient Vigdís. She said she wouldn't bother running away from such “dust” and that the spirit didn't hurt her. She took care of the cows and they were left alone, but other farmers had to take care of the sheep and the spirit hunted them. This continued until the days became longer and the nights brighter, and then the killing of sheep ceased.
Now people sought advice from the priest in Breiðabólstaður on what to do. The priest advised everyone to go home for Easter; he himself would then come and perform home services to see how things were going.
Fight against Hörghóll-Móri
On Easter Monday the people returned and the priest arrived, bringing with him a farmer from Böðvarshólar. The priest began to read, but when he finished the gospel, the spirit attacked the house with such fury that the beams creaked. The priest stopped reading and went outside with the farmer from Böðvarshólar. They saw a spirit moving; he dodged them and stepped back.
They pursued him to a ridge above the farm called Kjölur. There they caught him and wrestled with him for a while. They couldn't completely tame it, but then it weakened significantly and didn't do any harm, so that people were able to live on the farm again.
It is also said that the Hörghóll-Móri became faint after encountering a man called Þórður the Strong in Bjarnastaðir. It is said that they fought all night and tore down the novel bridge. Þórður couldn't catch Hörghóll-Móri anywhere because it most closely resembled a tangled woolen fleece. Since then, Þórður has never been the same.
Kristján, a farmer's son, returned home and lived there for many years, married and took over Hörghóll from his father. He could never be left alone because the ghost was always chasing him. He was once traveling alone and was later found dead at Vesturhópsvatn, a lake near Hörghóll.
People attributed his death to the power of the spirit. Since then, the ghost has not harmed anyone, although people often thought they had seen it, and the inhabitants of Hörghóll were often concerned.
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Icelandic legends and fairy tales/Ghost stories/Hörghóls-Móri (2) – Wikisource
https://ismus.is/tjodfraedi/sagnir_aevintyri/1223
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