Immurement in the Balkans

Folklore from the Balkan region

Zemii Media is expanding our article focus to include culture and tales from various regions around the world. Today’s focus is on immurement folklore in many Balkan nations. Immurement is otherwise known as live entombment. It is exactly as it sounds. In these tales, women are sacrificed for various reasons and entombed alive in construction that can be found throughout this region. Countries focused on in this article include: North Macedonia, Greece, Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, and Bosnia and Herzegovina. All have similar tales, so we are including them together for comparison.

Immurement was used by the Romans to punish those who have committed a crime, which would cause death without anyone being responsible for causing the death. It was a means of torture that admonished the “executioners” of any responsibility for the passing of the convicted as they were placed in the immurement “cell” while still alive. This would make it possible to claim no responsibility since the person wa…