The Thirteenth Candle: Rapunzel’s Real Tower

In 1690, a series of letters between German occultists mention a “girl of hair and fire” kept by a woman named Mother Gothel in the Black Forest. They called her Die Lichtgeborene — “The Lightborn.”

According to the letters, her tower had no doors, no windows — only mirrors arranged to refract sunlight into a single beam that never went out. It’s said her hair grew in rhythm with the light, pulsing like a living sunbeam.

Gothel sold vials of “liquid radiance” to nobles — extracted, they said, from the girl’s tears.

When lightning struck the tower in 1702, the surrounding forest burned for twelve days. The ground turned to glass.

In the center of the crater, a single candle burned — never melting, never dimming.

It’s kept today in a vault under Heidelberg University, sealed inside twelve layers of lead.

They call it The Thirteenth Candle.

No one knows why the wax smells like hair.