Ellert and Brammert — Schoonoord

Long ago, when the Drenthe heath was full of wild animals and dangerous places, there lived two giants in the area around Schoonoord. Ellert and Brammert were their names—two figures of mythic size, larger than ordinary men, strong enough to bend trees and hurl boulders. They were not native to this place. They were refugees—exiles from elsewhere, sought for reasons no one quite remembered anymore.

At first, they tried to adapt to life in the heath. They built huts. They searched for food. They tried to live peaceably. But the poverty was relentless. The land was harsh. No one in Schoonoord trusted the two strange, enormous beings. They were rejected by the villagers, who feared their size and foreign appearance.

Driven by hunger and rejection, and with no hope of ever being welcomed, Ellert and Brammert grew desperate. And in their desperation, they did something that would damn them forever: they began to attack and rob travelers on the road.

At the edge of Schoonoord, deep in the heath, Ellert and Brammert dug out their hiding place. The Ellertshaar, as it was called—the pit or crater of Ellert—became their underground fort. According to local tradition, they had dug tunnels that ran all the way to the road, so that they could spy on travelers and ambush them when they passed.

"They lay in wait beneath the earth," say the old tales. "They felt the footsteps of travelers above their hiding place. They heard the footfall, the rattle of wagons, the clip-clop of horse hooves. And when they saw their moment, they surged up from the earth like demons, and they robbed everything they could find."

The reputation of Ellert and Brammert spread quickly. No traveler dared any longer to enter the area around Schoonoord alone. It became a place of fear and danger—the Giants’ Land, they called it. All travelers went in groups. All travelers armed themselves. All spoke prayers.

What ultimately became of Ellert and Brammert is not precisely known. Some versions of the tale say they were captured and executed. Others say they hid themselves in the pit as their end approached, and died there. Still others claim they fled, vanishing forever to unknown lands.

But in Schoonoord, the legend never loses its significance. The two statues—impressive stone or wooden sculptures of the giants, their eyes staring, their hands outstretched—stand as monuments to that past. They remind the village of what happened, but they also remind of something else: the humanity of even the most feared beings. For in the modern telling, Ellert and Brammert are not simply monsters. They were men, exiles, starved, driven to desperation.

Each year, when the Ellert and Brammert Festival takes place, guides tell the stories to visitors. They take them to the Ellertshaar, show them the pit where the giants had their hiding place, and explain how these two tragic figures became forever part of Drenthe’s heritage.