{"id":131157,"date":"2025-03-13T17:20:12","date_gmt":"2025-03-13T17:20:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/adventure\/meet-greenlands-monster-hunter-the-good-times-by-intrepid\/"},"modified":"2025-03-13T17:20:12","modified_gmt":"2025-03-13T17:20:12","slug":"meet-greenlands-monster-hunter-the-good-times-by-intrepid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=131157","title":{"rendered":"Meet Greenland’s monster hunter | The Good Times by Intrepid"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

Greenland is home to some of the world\u2019s oldest storytelling traditions, dating back over 4000 years.<\/strong> Greenlandic Inuit culture is steeped in terrifying stories of monsters, myths and legends <\/strong>\u2013 each offering valuable life lessons about respecting nature and each other.<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

I remember the first time I learned about one of Greenland<\/a>\u2018s monsters \u2013 the Qivittoq, a wandering spirit and mountain walker. I was listening to a friendly Greenlander sharing myths from her home country as we sat at Copenhagen Airport. Lykke, who is half Danish, half Greenlandic Inuit, told me about the terrifying creature as we waited to board a plane towards said monster.\u00a0She wasn\u2019t to know that I have an irrational fear of zombies.<\/p>\n

I was terrified.\u00a0<\/p>\n

So, coming across Maria Bach Kreutzmann\u2019s work years later as a bonafide \u2018monster hunter\u2019, I was intrigued. Who would want to go searching for these mythical creatures through historical documents, archives, and, more importantly, in person?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u2018The reason I call myself a monster hunter is because it\u2019s an easy way to explain to people what I do,\u2019 Maria laughs when I ask her. \u2018I use that title when I give talks in schools. When I tell kids I disseminate culture, they don\u2019t understand what that means. But when I tell them I hunt and find the monsters from our stories like Newt Scamander in the Harry Potter universe, they get it.\u2019\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

As a writer who deep-dives into culture through traditions and lifestyle, I\u2019ve always been fascinated by Greenlandic Inuit storytelling, such as the art of Uaajeerneq<\/a> \u2013 mask dancing \u2013 which dates back 4000 years. Passing on stories of resilience and survival through generations via verbal storytelling often requires giving those lessons a visual form so they are easy to remember.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u2018Because our history hasn\u2019t been historically<\/em> written down and we still pass a lot of stories down orally, I collect stories and talk about mythology in visual ways,\u2019 Maria says. \u2018People often come up to me to tell me stories and myths they grew up with, and my job as a monster hunter is to collect these stories, document them, and recount them to others.\u2019\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Falling for monsters<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0<\/h2>\n

Born to an Indigenous Inuk father and Danish mother, Maria grew up in Nuuk, where her grandfather co-founded Greenland\u2019s National Museum in the 1960s. And this curiosity and calling to share cultural knowledge seems to run in the family.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When she was little, she was fascinated by monsters, creatures and mythology depicted in the movies she watched. Maria went on to become a trained animator with a background in computer graphics and 3D illustrations, and a self-proclaimed professional nerd. \u2018After living in London for several years and finally falling homesick, I moved back home to shift my focus back onto the mythology of my own people,\u2019 Maria shares.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 2017, she founded Glaciem House<\/a>, which is derived from the Latin word for ice. \u2018<\/em>I call it a house of icy curiosities because I do a variety of things,\u2019 she adds. \u2018I share Greenland\u2019s culture and history. A subset of that culture is the monstrous mythology.\u2019\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"\"\"<\/figure>\n

Personifying nature<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0<\/h2>\n

The stories Maria collects emerged out of the need to survive in a really harsh environment. \u2018Monsters and creatures were used to explain certain things that could happen to you when you\u2019re out in nature,\u2019 Maria explains. This meant Greenlandic Inuit passed down tales of survival by personifying nature. With such a deep symbolic relationship between nature and people in indigenous culture, the environment wasn\u2019t seen as separate.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u2018Nature becomes its own entity, its own person, in our stories. The Arctic is one of the harshest environments in which to survive due to snow and ice. We invented stories to teach us how to survive by turning nature into its own entity that we must interact with.\u2019\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"\"\"<\/figure>\n

Encountering legends<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0<\/h2>\n

The most iconic is Sassuma Arnaa \u2013 Mother of the Sea. Legend says her father cut off her fingers and threw her into the ocean. Her digits became sea creatures such as whales, seals and walruses, and her hair became the waves. While recently in Qaqortoq, a local fisherman told me the reason he couldn\u2019t catch enough lumpfish that season was because Sassuma Arnaa was angry. When people throw trash into the ocean, it gets tangled in her hair, and she gets irate.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

When Maria shares this symbolism with school kids, she explains that it\u2019s important to keep the sea clean because we rely on the marine animals that live in Sassuma Arnaa\u2019s hair to survive, and if we pollute the ocean she won\u2019t release them to humans.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u2018In the past, if you broke traditional taboo rules, she would be the punisher of your people,\u2019 adds Maria. \u2018Over time, she has shifted from being this really scary woman into being a representative of how we treat mother nature. So, when we talk about global warming and ocean pollution, we talk about her. Global warming has a huge impact not only on our cultural way of life but also on our economy, which relies on the fishing industry.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n

There\u2019s also the story of the Amarok, a giant magical wolf that stalks and devours people at night. Arctic wolves reside mainly in northeast and eastern Greenland. A confused wolf in search of food might, on occasion, wander to Western Greenland, where people rarely encounter wolves. Once sighted, it instantly gets labelled a mythical creature. \u2018Even though we have the Greenlandic sled dog, which is larger than Siberian huskies, an Arctic wolf is even bigger.\u2019\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

These mythological stories are still tied to everyday living in Greenland and have evolved to emphasise the importance of protecting nature for the sake of both people and wildlife.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n

\n