On the fourth of August, fifteen seventy-seven, a violent thunderstorm struck the county of Suffolk. In the market town of Bungay, the congregation of Saint Mary's Church had gathered for Sunday services when a black dog burst through the doors. It ran the length of the nave, passed between two people kneeling in prayer, and wrung their necks. Seven miles away, at Holy Trinity Church in Blythburgh, the creature appeared again, killed a man and a boy, and left long black scorch marks on the north door. Those marks are still there. You can touch them today.

They call this creature Black Shuck. The name comes from the Old English word scucca, meaning devil. But Black Shuck is older than any church in Suffolk.

In this episode, we trace the phantom black dog from its Norse roots, through Viking-settled East Anglia, to the defining event of ...