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Question about a version of "The Baby Roast"


UrbanTruth

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I'm already familiar with the version involving the hippie babysitter getting high and accidentally roasting the baby while it's parents are out for the night. However I came across another version that I found to be more interesting and far more chilling.

I found it from "The Encyclopedia of Urban Legends" by Jan Harold Brunvand.

Apparently it originated from Argentina, and goes like this:

"A young couple hires a young nanny since the wife is pregnant and almost due. The baby is born. A few weeks later the husband and wife go to the movies one evening, leaving the baby in the nanny's care. Until that time, she has always been reliable. When the couple returns, she approaches them ceremoniously dressed in the wife's bridal gown and tells them that she prepared quite a surprise for them. She leads them into the dining room to serve them a special meal. They enter and find a horrifying spectacle. In the middle of the table, placed there with great care, they see thier son on a large platter, roasted and garnished with potatoes. The poor mother goes insane at once, literally losing her speech. The father, who is a military man, pulls out a revolver and shoots the nanny to death, then runs away and is never seen again."

As you can see, that version is pretty summarized. I'm very interested in that version and want to know more about it. To those who are avid readers of Jan Harold Brunvand's books, and are aware of this particular version of the legend, which of his books, or books in general, have that specific version of the legend told in more lengthy detail?

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  • 2 weeks later...

Read the Norse Sagas or the Greek myths.    There are several versions of wives revenging themselves on their kingly husbands by murdering and serving their children. Also Weyland the  Smith, the English name, but his story also extends into past Scandinavian and Germanic times.

Never p*** off a queenly wife or try to cripple a legendary smith.

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  • 3 weeks later...

In times when women were mostly powerless, and inheritance and male progeny were critical,   any story about a woman killing a child (especially a male child)  had various deeply  rooted psychical meanings

eg while it would mean her own death, it was one of the few ways a woman could really hurt a man. Also  women were the nurturers/home keepers,  and so to reverse the role had deep significance,   and had great shock value in a narrative .

In some ways nothing much has changed. When a man kills a child it is almost expected and understood  although still deeply disturbing. It is accepted that men are (or can be)  natural killers 

It will make news in the local or state media,  but when a woman kills her children, it makes news around the world  because, to most, it is so unexpected and inexplicable, given our attitudes to women and their mothering role. 

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I am only familiar with the Hippy Babysitter version. I didn't know there was another version of it. This one seems more sinister, while the latter tries to use humor. To me both versions are disturbing. 

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