Memorate

In folklore studies, a memorate is a first-person account of a personal experience, typically presented as a true story about an extraordinary event—often, but not always, involving a supernatural being or paranormal occurrence. The narrator tells the story in their own voice and frames it as something that happened to them (or, in some definitions, to a close acquaintance). This sets memorates apart from more fully traditionalized legends and other types of narrative.

The idea is commonly traced to Swedish folklorist Carl Wilhelm von Sydow, who introduced the term as part of a broader effort to classify narratives based on how they are transmitted and their connection to personal experience. Later scholars refined and debated the term’s scope. Work associated with Lauri Honko, for instance, treated memorates as a key source for studying folk belief and vernacular interpretations of unusual experiences, while noting that definitions have shifted across scholarly traditions. The term became especially important in Scandinavian folklore studies and has since been used increasingly in the English-speaking world.

In research, memorates help scholars examine how individuals narrate and interpret experiences within existing cultural frameworks, and how such accounts can circulate, accumulate variations, and sometimes develop into more widely shared traditional narratives.