A CHANCE IN HELL

Professional rivalries, regardless of field, can lead to some dirty business. However, one professional competition within the Welsh architect community took a demonic turn in the 1890s. St. Mary's Church in Swansea's city centre opted to undergo substantial renovations during this time. A local architect offered to work on the project, but he was passed over in favour of an outside contractor.

Enraged by the snub, he proceeded to prepare the most heinous retaliation. He bought a series of cottages next to the church, demolished them, and replaced them with red brick offices, which he topped with a three-foot-tall carved figure of the devil. Don't those eyes just wander around? According to reports, the spiteful architect cursed the church, stating, "When your church is destroyed and burned to the ground, my devil will remain laughing." Wow. Who knew there were Edge Lords before Reddit? The Devil's statue became known as Old Nick, and he stood on the roof day after day, unblinkingly watching over the Holy House.

The Germans destroyed Swansea a little more than 50 years later, during World War II. The 72-hour bombardment damaged 11,000 buildings and destroyed 872, including St. Mary's Church. Almost every structure in the city centre was destroyed, yet the building with Old Nick on top miraculously survived. The architect's curse had come true in one of the most statistically implausible ways possible, but old Nick's building was eventually razed in 1962, and the statue inexplicably vanished. Old Nick was eventually found in an English garage, thanks to the Devil's luck. The scary stone figure was placed on guard in the Swansea Quadrant shopping centre after a brief makeover. However, considering his history, the people were wary of him unblinkingly watching them, thus he was moved to the Swansea Museum in 2019. Today, he can be found safely behind glass, out of sight of any surrounding churches.

Let's talk about another mystery. This is renowned as the Unlucky Mummy, despite the fact that it is not a mummified body, but rather the lid of a tomb of an unknown high class Egyptian woman from circa 900 BCE. The artefact was discovered near Thebes in the late 1800s and presented to the British Museum. But why the moniker?

According to records, two of the four Englishmen who initially purchased it died in strange accidents, while the other two lost their fortunes and died in poverty. It was thought that everyone who came into contact with this ancient artefact would die, become ill, or go bankrupt, hence its now quite accurate appellation, but why? It's possible since the mysterious woman engraved into the lid was a priestess of Amen-Ra, the great sun god. She may have cursed anyone who disturbs her final resting place with tremendous ceremonial magic. To be fair, I'd be furious if someone stole my coffin lid.

The most astonishing aspect of this artefact story, however, connects it to one of the deadliest calamities in contemporary history, the Titanic's sinking in 1912. While he was not on the tragic cruise ship, journalist Williams Stead was among the 1500 people who died on the Titanic.

He was the first to write about the mummy's curse. Survivors recall William telling them stories about the frightening artefact over supper. That alone might have been enough to tempt the mummy's fate. There are no verifiable records relating anyone's premature death to the coffin lid, therefore it could be a strange coincidence or, more likely, a complete fallacy. So it was most likely a made-up ghost story to pique people's curiosity in this old artefact.

Which of these items frightened you the most? Please let me know in the comments, and thank you...