The Simiots of Catalan Folklore: Neither Are Reminiscences So Old, Nor Are They So Strange Beings

Abstract

The simiot is a creature in the Catalan Pyrenean mythology. The term can be translated as “a kind of ape” or “similar to an ape”. According to a medieval legend, around the tenth century, these wild beasts terrorized Arles, a Catalan village in the Vallespir region. Up until now, the number of scholarly studies dealing in depth with these beings is very small. Books and papers by several twentieth-century folklorists, such as Joan Amades, have not contributed to clarifying their origin. By and large, authors propose that simiots are remnants of an ancient and pagan religion, perhaps linked to canid cults or forest deities. However, considering their probable etymology, their origin can be traced to the thirteenth-fourteenth centuries.