The stretch of the E45 motorway near Ejer Bav­ne­høj is noto­rious for being haun­ted or cur­sed by a local witch named Maram. Read the intri­gu­ing story below

GPS coor­di­na­tes: Maram’s Hole (approx.): 55.968035, 9.859109, the sta­tue of Maram and the sta­ke: 55.976872, 9.830125

Nice to know: It can get very wet and swam­py at Maram’s Hole, so robust foo­twear is a must. In gene­ral, it is recom­men­ded to be pre­pa­red for bad weat­her in the area aro­und Ejer Bav­ne­høj.

Who was Maram?

The story begins seve­ral hund­red years ago. A woman named Maren Ras­mus­dat­ter—known popu­lar­ly as Maram—lived on a farm cal­led Rav­ne­hu­set (“The Raven Hou­se”, also known as the “Raven’s Nest”). The farm was loca­ted roug­hly whe­re the E45 motorway today cuts through the hil­ly ter­rain at Ejer Bav­ne­høj, one of Den­mark’s hig­he­st geo­grap­hi­cal points.

Maram was known as a cun­ning woman skil­led in herbs and medi­ci­ne, but she was also fea­red by the locals. She was noto­rious for casting the “evil eye,” and neig­h­bors bla­med her for eve­ryt­hing from defor­med live­sto­ck to dif­fi­cult bir­t­hs. With time, she died a natu­ral death and was buri­ed at Ovsted Ceme­te­ry.

Con­tem­porary sta­tue depi­cting Maram by Allan Bo Jen­sen

The Appa­ri­tion on The Roof­tops

Maram was bare­ly cold in the gro­und befo­re the dis­tur­ban­ces began. She was seen by locals sit­ting astri­de roof­tops, emit­ting a piercing, cack­ling laugh­ter. During festi­ve occa­sions like chri­ste­nings and wed­dings, guests would sud­den­ly hear her mock­ing, spi­te­ful grin. Gra­du­al­ly, panic began to spre­ad throug­hout the vil­la­ge.

Even­tu­al­ly the torment beca­me so seve­re that it was deci­ded to call for out­si­de help. A mes­sa­ge was sent to Laurits Søren­sen Wor­søe (b. 1711 — d. 1780), bet­ter known as Slan­te Laus. He was a noto­rious pri­est and exorcist who was said to “know more than his Lord’s Pray­er” and had repor­ted­ly stu­di­ed at the “Bla­ck School” in Wit­ten­berg, whe­re one lear­ned sor­ce­ry from the Devil him­self.

The Bin­ding ritu­al in the ravi­ne

Slan­te Laus per­for­med a secret bin­ding (banis­hing) ritu­al to sub­due Maram. She was exhu­med from Ovsted Ceme­te­ry and brought to a ravi­ne on her for­mer pro­per­ty, whe­re she was laid into the gro­und exa­ct­ly at a point “whe­re the lands of three men met.” To ensu­re she stay­ed the­re, a mas­si­ve oak sta­ke was ham­me­red through her heart. The spot whe­re she lies buri­ed is known to this day as Maram’s Hole.

Years later, an attempt was made by some locals to rem­ove the sta­ke. As it was begin­ning to loo­sen slight­ly, a faint voi­ce rose from bene­ath the gro­und: “Rock it again, rock the sta­ke again – and you shall get a tre­at”. About 100 years ago, a school­tea­cher and one of his stu­dents tri­ed to find the sta­ke, which had sin­ce been cove­red up — per­haps sim­ply due to the cour­se of natu­re. They repor­ted­ly suc­ce­e­ded, but were qui­ck­ly stop­ped by a neig­h­bor who fea­red Maram would bre­ak free if they med­d­led any furt­her.

The ravi­ne with Maram’s Hole today

Maram and the lindworm

An alter­na­ti­ve legend pre­sents Maram in a more posi­ti­ve light, portraying her as a wise woman who was once cal­led upon to deal with a fearso­me Lindworm (a type of wing­less, Danish dra­gon). The ser­pent had entwi­ned itself aro­und Ovsted Church and when Maram struck it with her broomsti­ck, she clea­ved it in two. One part fell into the ravi­ne near the motorway, for­m­ing a hole from whe­re blood is said to flow. In fact, a natu­ral spring ori­gi­na­tes near Maram’s Hole, and this is like­ly the sour­ce of that part of the legend (springwa­ter can some­ti­mes be col­ored red by depo­sits of ochre).

Ovsted Church, the hig­he­st-pla­ced church in Jut­land and the 3rd hig­he­st-pla­ced church in Den­mark

When the hig­hway arri­ved

In the 1960s and 70s, plans for the East Jut­land Motorway (E45) were pre­sen­ted. The rou­te was set to go direct­ly through Maram’s old pro­per­ty and right alongsi­de the ravi­ne whe­re she was buri­ed. When the aut­ho­ri­ties sought to expro­p­ri­a­te the land, the owners of Rav­ne­hu­set at the time war­ned against car­rying out the plans, fea­ring that Maram might bre­ak free and ter­r­o­rize the area again.

Rav­ne­hu­set was demo­lis­hed in 1979. A young coup­le who lived in the hou­se short­ly befo­re the demo­li­tion, repor­ted­ly had to flee in the mid­dle of the night with their chil­dren. In a let­ter left behind, they descri­bed how doors slam­med, lights fli­ck­e­red, and how their car ine­xpli­cably emp­tied itself of fuel as they attemp­ted to esca­pe.

The now decea­sed folk sin­ger Fro­de Ved­din­ge at Rav­ne­hu­set some­ti­me in the 1960s. His song Sog­nets Fat­tig­ste Gård (“The poo­rest farm in the parish”) is about Rav­ne­hu­set and even con­tains a few lines about Maram

The cur­se lives on

Among the locals, the notion of Maram’s cur­se is still very much ali­ve today. A few years ago, a woo­den figu­re of Maram and a sym­bo­lic “rock­ing sta­ke” were erected on top of Ejer Bav­ne­høj itself, as a tri­bu­te to the power­ful influ­en­ce she has wiel­ded through the years.

Sin­ce the ope­ning of the motorway, the stretch near Ejer Bav­ne­høj has alle­ged­ly been plagu­ed by a rising num­ber of accidents—far hig­her than elsewhe­re along the E45. It is said that Maram appears in the fog, sen­ding moto­rists into the ditch as reven­ge for her lost pro­per­ty.

Cur­rent­ly, the E45 is actu­al­ly being expan­ded with an addi­tio­nal lane, which means moto­rists will now come even clo­ser to Maram’s Hole. If the trend holds true, the num­ber of acci­dents could there­fo­re rise even furt­her in the com­ing years.

So, next time you dri­ve past Ejer Bav­ne­høj and see the fog rol­ling in over the asp­halt, remem­ber to keep a firm grip on the ste­e­ring whe­el.

Maram might have her sights set on you.

Maram and the bin­ding sta­ke on Ejer Bav­ne­høj

Com­men­tary

It is dif­fi­cult to make heads or tails of the Maram myth—or inde­ed, whet­her she ever exi­sted as a per­son at all. The­re are numerous legends and sto­ri­es asso­ci­a­ted with Maram, with count­less vari­a­tions cre­a­ted through a long oral tra­di­tion. In recent times, seve­ral of the­se sto­ri­es have been cove­red by Mia Bros­bøll Jen­sen, both in her own podcast Får­king Uhyg­ge­ligt and in the Podi­mo seri­es Myste­ri­et om..

In the lat­ter, Mia also took a clo­ser look at the rumors sur­ro­un­ding the ine­xpli­cably high num­ber of acci­dents on the stretch of motorway near Ejer Bav­ne­høj and con­fir­med that, sta­ti­sti­cal­ly, the­re is a slight­ly hig­her acci­dent rate than elsewhe­re on the motorway (offi­ci­al figu­res from 2019 showed 255 acci­dents over a five-year peri­od). Whi­le local tales point to Maram’s reven­ge, the Danish Road Directo­ra­te sta­tes that the cau­se is actu­al­ly the hil­ly ter­rain, the ste­ep incli­nes, and many cur­ves, as well as frequent fog.

Iro­ni­cal­ly, ano­t­her risk factor may also play a part if curio­si­ty leads some dri­vers to take their eyes off the road to scout for “Maram’s Hole.”

Maram’s Hole with the spring flow. The expan­ding motorway can be glimp­sed in the back­gro­und.

The exa­ct loca­tion of Maram’s Hole and the sta­ke that is sup­po­sed to hold her down are, as pre­vious­ly men­tio­ned, no lon­ger visib­le. Per­haps it is becau­se natu­re has taken over, but it is also pos­sib­le that it has been rem­o­ved. The lat­ter would explain Maram’s appa­rent influ­en­ce in recent times, as the sta­ke was spe­ci­fi­cal­ly the­re to pre­vent her from doing anyt­hing destructi­ve.

The pla­ce­ment at a spe­ci­fic boun­dary “whe­re the lands of three men meet” is, inci­den­tal­ly, a clas­sic ele­ment that recurs in seve­ral other Danish cases of spi­rit-bin­ding. Both the Cross at Con­ra­di­ne­s­lyst and the Cross at Skør­pin­ge are examp­les of loca­tions rela­ted to bin­dings at such boun­dary areas.

Even though the ravi­ne con­tai­ning Maram’s Hole is very clo­se to the E45, the site is cur­rent­ly not very acces­sib­le. It can easily beco­me very wet and swam­py here and you need to tra­ver­se a long stretch of field befo­re rea­ching the ravi­ne. When I visi­ted the site back in the sum­mer of 2025, I was caught for more than an hour in the worst rain­storm I have ever expe­ri­en­ced in this coun­try, and I did won­der for a moment if I had beco­me ano­t­her tar­get of Maram’s whims.

If that’s the case, I must say I got off very lucky!

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