Count Otto of Oldenborg and the Oldenborg Horn
Artist: FL Storch (Danish, 1805-1883)
Collection: Staten Museum for Kunst / The Royal Danish Collection, Copenhagen, Denmark
The Oldenborg Horn legend tells of Count Otto I of Oldenborg, who in 989 encountered a supernatural elf maiden while hunting. She offered him a drinking horn to quench his thirst. Suspecting a curse, he poured out the liquid, singeing his horse's skin, and fled with the artifact.
The legend is a quintessential European "fairy cup" or "stolen talisman" narrative, closely tracking folkloric motif (fairy cup stolen). The story features the classic warning from the maiden: if the count had drunk the potion, his county would prosper; by rejecting it, he doomed his lands to future disunity.
Compiled by Thomas Keightley, this seminal folklore text includes a full, translated prose version of the encounter between Count Otto and the elf maiden at the Osenberg.
Similar localized accounts appear across Germanic fairy tale collections, famously echoing the legends documented by the Brothers Grimm and various German chroniclers of the 16th century.