Drapé

Lou Drapé (standardized Occitan: lo drapet) is a legendary equine figure indigenous to the folklore of Aigues-Mortes in the Gard department of France, specifically within the marshlands of the Petite Camargue. The creature is reputed to haunt the fortifications of the city under the cover of night, seeking to abduct children. According to local tradition, the horse allows a multitude of youths to mount its back before spiriting them away, a journey from which there is no return.

Typologically, Lou Drapé is often interpreted as a localized manifestation of the drac, a malevolent, shapeshifting entity common in Occitan mythology that frequently assumes the form of a horse to drown its victims. Functioning socially as a symbolic representation of death and a disciplinary nursery bogeyman—akin to the "big bad wolf" of broader European tradition—Lou Drapé belongs to a widespread class of predatory water-horses found throughout European folklore, serving as a cautionary embodiment of the dangers inherent to the region's aquatic geography.