Nanny Rutt

Nanny Rutt is a figure from a cautionary tale linked to Nanny Rutt's Well, an artesian spring in Math Wood near Northorpe in the parish of Thurlby, Lincolnshire. According to the legend, a girl entered the wood and vanished at the well, said to have been taken by Nanny Rutt.

As an oral tradition, the story varies depending on the teller, though certain elements remain consistent. The following summarizes the core narrative, with details that may appear in some versions.

The tale begins with a young girl, named differently in each retelling, who plans to meet a lover at the well in Math Wood. She enters the wood in the early evening and encounters an old woman in a shawl that casts a deep shadow over her face. The woman warns her about the dangers of the wood at night and the risks of eloping without her parents’ consent.

The girl ignores the warning and continues to the well’s source deep in the forest, where she waits for her lover. He never arrives. As darkness falls, she realizes she has been stood up. Tears blur her vision, and the night makes it impossible to find her way back. Lost and afraid, she stumbles into a clearing where a crumbling stone shack stands. In the doorway is the old woman, now with her shawl drawn back, revealing a hideous face in the pale moonlight. As the girl turns to flee, she falls. The woman’s shadow envelops her, freezing her in place with an unnatural chill. Her voice fails her as she tries to scream. She is never seen again.

The tale’s origins are unclear, though it was already in circulation by the 1920s and likely predates that. Parents once used the story to discourage children from wandering in the woods. In this way, Nanny Rutt served as a kind of bogeyman. It’s perhaps notable that le rut is a French word derived from Latin rugitus, meaning sexual drive. In English, “rut” is used for the mating state of male animals like deer and goats. In French, it can apply to either sex and even to humans. Rodin included it among the sins in a version of his Gates of Hell. The name “Nanny” may soften the implication. While goats are often associated with male sexuality, a “nanny goat” is female. The word “Nanny” can also refer to a grandmother or a childminder.

One possible interpretation is that a girl, exploring her sexuality, once entered Math Wood, met someone, and was later sent away to a home for unmarried mothers, never returning to Northorpe. In a time when sexuality was rarely discussed openly, the tale of Nanny Rutt may have emerged to explain her disappearance. If the story arose when French was still remembered in England, it could date back to the medieval period. Alternatively, Nanny Rutt may have been based on a real woman who once lived in the woods.