Who is Krampus?

Where Krampus comes from

History.com says Krampus “comes from folklore in Austria's Alpine region”, and today he is found right across the Eastern Alps: Austria, southern Bavaria, South Tyrol and Trentino, and with local names in Slovenia (the parkelj), Hungary, Croatia, Slovakia and Czechia. Some writers think he is older than Christianity; nobody knows for sure. His name is usually traced to the German Krampen, “claw”. A 1912 study of Christmas customs already describes him in Lower Austria following St. Nicholas, and in Tyrol as a shaggy monster with horns, a long red tongue and “chains that clank as he moves”.

What Krampus carries

A Krampus costume is a fur suit, usually goat or sheep skin, with heavy cowbells on a wide leather belt and a hand-carved wooden mask, often a work of art in its own right. He carries a birch switch (the Rute), sometimes a chain, and on his back a basket, the Butte, in which naughty children are said to be carried off. English-language stories usually give him a sack instead. Good children, we are assured, have nothing to worry about.

Krampusnacht and the Krampus runs

Krampus Night is December 5, the night before the Feast of St. Nicholas (see When is Krampusnacht?). Towns hold Krampus runs, Krampusläufe, from late November into December: SalzburgerLand says the run in St. Johann im Pongau has more than a thousand Krampuses. In the Gastein valley the older form survives, with groups of St. Nicholas and his Krampuses going house to house on December 5 and 6. The dates for 2026, from Salzburg to New Orleans, are in our Krampus events guide.

Greetings from Krampus: the postcards

Europeans have sent Krampus cards, Krampuskarten, since the 19th century, often headed “Gruß vom Krampus”, “Greetings from Krampus”. History.com links them to the postcard boom in Germany and Austria in the 1890s; they show him stuffing children into his basket or leading them off in chains, sometimes flirting with grown-ups instead.

The ban, and the comeback

The usual account is that Austria's Dollfuss government banned the custom in the 1930s; a New York Times headline of December 1934 read “Krampus Disliked in Fascist Austria”, and pamphlets calling him an evil man were still handed out in the 1950s. National Geographic tells it a little differently, and sources disagree on how far any ban was enforced. Either way, he came back. Monte Beauchamp's books of Krampus postcards (2004 and 2010) helped bring him to America, where he is now, in History.com's words, “a sort of ironic icon”, with Krampus runs and parties in dozens of cities and a run of films (Krampus films and books).

Krampus's Kousins

Krampus is not alone. Every corner of Europe has its own winter visitor who checks up on the children between St. Nicholas Day and Epiphany: The Yule Cat and Grýla and the 13 Yule Lads in Iceland, The Mari Lwyd in Wales, Frau Perchta in the Alps, La Befana in Italy, the The Kallikantzaroi in Greece, Caga Tió in Catalonia, Père Fouettard & Hans Trapp in France and Belsnickel among the Pennsylvania Dutch. Krampus introduces each of them on the air in Krampus's Kousins.