twin, where have you been? (part 1)
twin, where have you been? (part 1)
doppelgängers, doubles, and death omens
Have you ever noticed something off about your reflection? Something almost imperceptible out of the corner of your eye, as though its movement didn’t quite line up with yours?
Have you ever seen someone walking down the street who looks so familiar, that you needed to do a double take, only to find whoever it was had already vanished into the crowd?
Well, if either of these things happened to you, you might want to be wary, because you might have come face-to-face with your doppelgänger. And if the stories are true…you might not live long enough to tell the tale.
Doppelgänger literally means “double-goer” or an exact lookalike of a living person. It is a term that was coined by German author Jean Paul in his 1796 novel Siebenkäs, the story of a man who fakes his death and takes over his look-alike or doppelgänger’s life in order to escape an unhappy life.
Though the term doppelgänger is the most widely used in literature and pop culture, the concept of a mirrored double exists in some form in every culture around the world. They are most commonly seen as harbingers of death or misfortune, but in some myths, they are shapeshifters with ill intention and in others, they are not necessarily entities at all, but rather one’s lifeforce disconnecting from the physical body.
It’s impossible to really say what these entities are, but let’s take a look at some folklore about phantom doubles from around the world:
In pre-Islamic Arabian folklore, there was a belief that when an individual was born a spirit-double known as a qareen was also birthed into the universe and bound to that person. The term “qareen” literally means “constant companion”, but it’s not clear exactly what sort of companion these creatures were meant to be. In some accounts they are similar to the idea of a guardian, guiding their person through life, and in other accounts, they are evil entities, who try to tempt the hearts of those they dwell in.
In Norse mythology, there are the fylgja, which are a sort of guardian spirit bound to the spirit of an individual. They are not doubles per se, but they are entities that tend to appear close to one’s death, remaining close to the body in order to accompany the soul. And if you’re familiar with Irish folklore, that description might sound familiar to a creature known as a fetch.
In lore, fetches are phantom doubles that literally come to “fetch” the souls of those about to die. And because of this, they are typically regarded as a death omen, though supposedly if you see one in the light of day, it means good luck.
What’s interesting about fetches is their lore is inconsistent. Sometimes they appear before the individual about to die, and other times they choose to appear before their family and friends instead. Sometimes fetches will appear as the person looks at the present, and sometimes they will appear as the person will look at their moment of death. Sometimes the person will see their fetch and die the following day, and others might see one and go on to live for years.
There are also versions of doppelgänger lore that focus on the idea of an out-of-body experience as the reason for seeing one’s double.
In Norse Mythology, the vardøgar are more often associated with the feeling of déjà vu. It’s hard to explain, so let me give you an example: let’s say you are waiting for a friend at a fairly empty bar on a rainy evening and they text you that they’re running late because of the storm and will be there in 20 minutes. A few minutes pass and you hear the distinct sound of footsteps approaching, you smell something damp, and feel like there’s someone behind you. But, when you turn around, there’s no one there. Then, 15 minutes later, you hear the same sound of footsteps and smell the same dampness, but this time when you turn around, it’s your friend, drenched from the storm.
The experience of hearing the sound of their footsteps, smelling the rainwater on their clothes, and feeling a presence before the actual person is present would be considered encountering a vardøgar. It’s not necessarily a full-fledged phantom double, though it is possible to see the complete ghostly image of the person. Rather it is the spirit announcing itself before the body is present. So, if you’ve ever walked into a situation and felt a strange sense of déjà vu; it’s likely you (or at least a part of you) really was there moments before.
In Ancient Egyptian lore an individual’s ka, which was the more robust version of the soul or lifeforce, could be separated from the body and manifest itself as a phantom twin. There is a similar word for this in Japanese folklore, ikiryō, which is the idea that the soul can leave the body temporarily and appear in the physical world to haunt an individual. There are also entities like mimics, wraiths, and obake that can shapeshift and tend to appear as a double to haunt and torment the living.
There are so many different versions of the doppelgänger story with similar threads that never seem to meet. But, what about real-life encounters? Surely, if these creatures exist, there must be some proof outside of stories.
Well, luckily for you, there are plenty of famous accounts of individuals throughout the ages who have reported seeing their doppelgängers. Now, it’s obviously challenging to truly prove that someone has legitimately seen their double since we are solely relying on one firsthand account and presuming that the narrative is reliable.
For example, French author, Guy de Maupassant, claimed not only to have met his doppelgänger numerous times but that the entity sat down with him and dictated a completed novel to him. The book, entitled Lui? (or Him?), is a story about a man who fears he is losing his mind after seeing his double.
Could Maupassant’s tale have been a bit of literary marketing on his end or did he truly encounter another version of himself?
In Maupassant’s case, his encounter did not result in immediate death; however, he would eventually be committed to a mental institution a few years after publishing Lui?. Maupassant had unfortunately contracted syphilis as a teenager and spent the last several years of his life battling what we now believe was syphilis-induced psychosis.
So, it’s impossible to know if Maupassant really encountered his doppelgänger. Despite the numerous encounters and hours spent engaging with his double, there were no other witnesses, and given Maupassant’s sharp decline in his latter years, it’s entirely possible the encounters he had were a result of worsening psychosis.
But, what if the encounter Maupassant had wasn’t necessarily with an entity at all?
German writer, Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe, relayed in his autobiography that he encountered his double while riding to Drusenheim to visit his mistress. As he was riding, he happened to look up and see himself for a moment before the double disappeared. Unlike Maupassant’s story, there was nothing truly notable about the encounter, except that the other version of him was dressed differently in a grey jacket, trimmed with gold.
Years later, Goethe would ride down the same road, but this time in the opposite direction, away from Drusenheim. As he rode, he remembered his encounter with himself years earlier, and when he looked down at himself, he realized he was wearing the exact grey jacket with gold trim he’d seen on his double.
We don’t necessarily have reason to doubt Goethe’s account, since it is not particularly strange or self-serving, but what he describes sounds far less like a death omen, and much more like a premonition or like stepping briefly out of linear time.
Now, as someone who barely passed high school physics, I am in no way qualified to explain quantum mechanics. But, consider the following:
Let’s say you wake up in the morning and have to choose between starting your day with coffee or orange juice.
If you choose coffee, you make it to your bus and show up to work on time. Due to the fact you were on time, you had additional time to prep for an important meeting. The additional prep makes you stand out at the meeting, and your boss puts you up for a promotion.
If you choose orange juice, unfortunately, you spill it all over your clothes and the floor. You can’t go to work covered in juice and you need to clean up the floor. Because you have to change and clean, you miss your bus. The next bus is 20 minutes away, so you decide to walk several blocks and take a different bus route. When you make it to the other stop, the bus is there but it has a flat.
The next bus won’t be there for another 15 minutes, so you decide to Uber, which still takes 10 minutes to show up. By now, you’re an hour late for work, and you’ve missed over half of your important meeting. Your boss is livid with you, and the co-worker who filled in for you last minute ends up with a promotion for all her hard work.
Think of the multiverse theory as a vast forest where every tree is a version of you. Some versions of you are wealthy, some are amazing artists, some live in a post-apocalyptic world, and some are allergic to shellfish. And potentially, each version of you will make small decisions that branch out onto other parallel timelines.
Now, how does this relate to Goethe?
Consider that if there are all these potential parallel worlds with parallel pressed up against each other, it is possible that the barrier between some of these alternate realities might not be as strong, energy or even entities of some sort could interact with a parallel world or timeline. Goethe might have seen another version of himself from a similar world, but on a different timeline where he had purchased the jacket sooner or was slightly older.
The multiverse theory is tempting when it comes to doppelgängers because it offers a more scientific reason for the phenomenon. It does not necessarily explain why these encounters are so often followed by death, but if there are parallel worlds, isn’t it possible some alternate versions of us might be interested in finding a better version of their reality?
Catherine the Great of Russia was getting ready for bed one evening when servants came into her room looking confused. She asked them what was wrong and they told her they didn’t understand how she was in her room, but also sitting in the throne room. Catherine marched over to the throne room with her guards and found her double sitting on the throne. She ordered the guards to fire, and while the bullets did not seem to injure the entity, it did vanish soon after.
Two weeks later Catherine died of a stroke, and it was presumed that whatever appeared that night must have been a death omen. However, it does strike me as a bit odd that if this was a death omen, it would choose to appear in a place where it might not be seen or might simply be mistaken for Catherine herself.
In contrast, Queen Elizabeth I also claimed to have seen a ghostly version of herself shortly before dying, but her account is much closer to typical doppelgänger lore. When she walked into her bedroom one evening, she saw a sickly, pale version of herself lying in bed and looking close to death. The phantom vision gradually disappeared on its own, but Elizabeth was shaken.
Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States, had a similar account to Elizabeth, though his death omen appeared years before his assassination.
In 1860, right before his re-election, Lincoln claimed to have sat down on a couch in his bedroom and looked up to see a ghastly double of himself on the couch next to him. The other version of him was exceedingly pale and appeared to be on the brink of death. When Lincoln moved to examine the mirror, the phantom double vanished.
You see, mirrors back then did not always provide the best reflection, and seeing a distorted reflection was not uncommon, but the double only appeared when Lincoln was sitting on the couch, nowhere else in the room.
He later told his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, about the incident, and she was concerned it was an ill omen. Mary wondered at the time if whatever it was he saw meant that he would not survive a second term, and it turns out she was right.
On April 14, 1865, Abraham Lincoln attended a performance of My American Cousin at Ford’s Theater in Washington, D.C. Halfway through the third act, John Wilkes Booth made his way into Lincoln’s private box, walked up directly behind the President, and shot Lincoln in the back of the head. Lincoln would die in the same position as the doppelgänger he saw years before sitting slumped in a chair.
Now, whether or not you believe Queen Elizabeth and President Lincoln’s encounters, it begs the question of what exactly Catherine the Great encountered. Was it a similar death omen or was it some version of her that found its way into this timeline? And if it was the latter, are we sure the right Catherine disappeared?
I have one more story for you.
Well, more of a case study.
Days before Mary Shelley’s husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, drowned in a tragic accident, he confessed that he’d seen his doppelgänger numerous times.
Some of you may have heard pieces of this story before, but there’s a bit more to it than you may know. But, you’ll have to wait for Part 2.
Stay tuned for Part 2 of our doppelgänger deep dive for more on Shelley’s story, a deeper investigation into what these phantom doubles might be, and a bonus story for our paid subscribers about one of the most “well documented” doppelgänger encounters in history.
See you all soon!
Resources:
Bedeviled: Jinn Doppelgangers in Islam & Akbarian Sufism by Dunja Rasic
Breverton’s Phantasmagoria by Terry Breverton
Do Parallel Universes Exist? by Vicky Stein and Daisy Dobrijevic
Doppelgangers and Curious Myths and Stories of Spirit Doubles by Joanna Gillian
From Asgard to Valhalla: The Remarkable History of the Norse Myths by Heather O'Donoghue
The Book of Japanese Folklore: An Encyclopedia of the Spirits, Monsters, and Yokai of Japanese Myth by Thersa Matsuura
The Greek View of the Soul and Death by William Sherman Fox
True Stories of Doppelgangers by Stephen Wagner