Harder mask
Fly to Interlaken
A figure from the Harderpotschete, which comes down into town every 2 January.
Look up from Interlaken at the Harder, the wooded mountain that rises over the town to the north: below the summit, a stretch of cliff forms a man’s face and shoulders. This is the Hardermannli, the “little man of the Harder”, the mountain’s own spirit. He comes down just once a year, on 2 January.
He arrives in a wooden mask, covered in fir branches and lichen, a staff in his hand, with his wife, the Wyb, whose wide-open mouth has only a few teeth left. Behind them run the Potschen, creatures in carved masks who howl, jostle the onlookers and sometimes carry one off with them. The ringers’ big, heavy bells herald the procession from far off; it sets out from the market square, crosses Unterseen and returns. The din scares off the winter spirits, and the departure of the man of the Harder celebrates the returning light.
The festival takes its name from pig’s bladders, the Potschen: butchers gave them to boys, who blew them up and, while they were still supple, used them to hit the girls. In the early 20th century, the day turned into a scrap between the youths of Matten, armed with hazel switches, those of Interlaken and those of Unterseen, who shot arrows across the Aare. In the mid-1950s it was given a tamer form, and a woodcarver from Brienz carved the masks of the man of the Harder and his wife that are still worn today.
Sources: Jungfrau Zeitung, “Harder-Potschete, Angst und Schrecken im Oberland”; swissinfo, “Sie schlagen mit Schweine-Blasen und wollen wecken”; Interlaken Tourism, “Harder-Potschete”.
Finding the chest
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Every site of Interlaken is discovered: the chest is waiting for you near the town.
