The Most Terrifying Night in the Seyahatnâme: The Witch War Witnessed by Evliya Çelebi

The great traveler Evliya Çelebi recounts an incredible event he witnessed in Bulgaria in his famous Seyahatnâme (Book of Travels). The horrific battle between Abkhazian and Circassian witches in the sky stands as one of history’s most mysterious accounts. Let’s explore this unbelievable night.

The Karakoncolos Night: The Sky Turns into a Battlefield

The year is 1076 in the Hijri calendar. The place is the village of Pedsi in Bulgaria, inhabited by Circassians and Abkhazians. What should have been an ordinary night for Evliya Çelebi suddenly transforms into a hellish scene. Lightning tears through the pitch-black darkness, momentarily turning the surroundings to daylight. Overcome by curiosity, Çelebi asks the Circassians outside what is happening and is left frozen by their answer.

This is no ordinary storm. This is the “Karakoncolos Night,” an event that occurs once a year.

Evliya Çelebi records the moment and the response in his work: “By God, once a year there is such a Karakoncolos night. The Circassian ghouls (witches) and the Abkhazian ghouls fly to the heavens and wage a great war” (Çelebi, 2007). Advised to watch this incredible event instead of fearing it, the traveler goes outside with a group of 70-80 people and cannot believe his eyes.

The Witches’ Weapons and the Horror of War

The sky is, in the truest sense of the word, a battlefield. On one side are the Circassian witches, riding the carcasses of horses, cattle, and camels, holding snakes and animal skulls as weapons. On the other side are the Abkhazian witches, mounted on giant jars, straw mats, cartwheels, and even oven posts.

These two groups fight for six full hours with a deafening roar. The battle is not just a spectacle of sight and sound. Objects and limbs rain down from the sky: broken boats, pieces of felt, doors, and most horrifically, body parts belonging to humans and animals.

At the end of the battle, seven witches from each side fall to the ground, entangled. The fallen Circassians instantly kill two of the Abkhazian witches by sucking their blood and throwing their bodies into a fire. These moments of terror only end with the crowing of the morning roosters.

The Belief in Human-Blood-Drinking Witches

As astonishing as this event was for Evliya Çelebi, it was a known reality for the local people. According to their tales, these witches not only fought among themselves but also made people sick by drinking their blood.

Identifying the Dead Witch

When someone’s blood was drunk by a witch, the victim would begin to waste away day by day. If the victim had family, they would immediately start searching the cemeteries with a “witch-finder.” Their goal was to find a freshly disturbed grave. It was believed that after drinking her victim’s blood, the witch would lie in her own grave, her eyes bloodshot and bulging from the blood she had consumed.

The identified witch’s corpse would be exhumed, a blackberry stake would be driven into her navel, and her body would be burned. Only in this way, it was believed, could the spell be broken and the patient healed.

The Punishment of the Living Witch

There were also witches who lived secretly among the people. When their time came, they would choose a victim and suck their blood from behind the ear. As the victim grew weaker day by day, their relatives would search from town to town with a “witch master” for the person whose eyes had turned red from drinking blood.

Once found, the witch was put in chains. After confessing their witchcraft at the end of three days, the same punishment was applied: a stake driven through the navel. When the gushing blood was smeared on the victim’s face, the patient would be instantly cured. As Evliya Çelebi noted, for the people, this affliction was worse than the plague.

Final Thoughts

At the end of his account, Evliya Çelebi himself underlines how “münkir,” or unbelievable, this event was. However, he also adds that hundreds of people, including himself, witnessed this celestial war. Whether it was real, a hallucination, or the peak of a cultural narrative is unknown, but this testimony is enough to make the Seyahatnâme and Evliya Çelebi one of history’s most mysterious witnesses. What happened in the skies of Pedsi village that night remains a secret that pushes the limits of human reason.

Bibliography

Çelebi, Evliya. (2007). Evliya Çelebi Seyahatnâmesi: Topkapı Sarayı Kütüphanesi Bağdat 308 Numaralı Yazmanın Transkripsiyonu – Dizini (10. Kitap). (Y. Dağlı, S. A. Kahraman, & R. Dankoff, Eds.). Istanbul: Yapı Kredi Publications.