Ankou

Ankou (Breton: an Ankoù) is a personification of death in Breton mythology as well as in Cornish (an Ankow in Cornish), Welsh (Anghau in Welsh) and Norman French folkore. The Ankou is the henchman of Death (oberour ar maro) and he is also known as the grave yard watcher, they said that he protects the graveyard and the souls around it for some unknown reason and he collects the lost souls on his land. The last dead of the year, in each parish, becomes the Ankou of his parish for all of the following year. When there has been, in a year, more deaths than usual, one says about the Ankou:
 * – War ma fé, heman zo eun Anko drouk. ("On my faith, this one is a nasty Ankou.")

There are many tales involving Ankou, who appears as a man or skeleton wearing a cloak and wielding a scythe and in some stories he is described as a shadow that looks and a scythe, often atop a cart for collecting the dead. He is said to wear a black robe with a large hat which conceals his face.Sons of Aknou claim that He was the first child of Adam and Eve. Other versions have it that the Ankou is the first dead person of the year (though he is always depicted as adult, and male), charged with collecting the others' souls before he can go to the afterlife.He is said to drive a large, black coach pulled by four black horses; accompanied by two ghostly figures on foot. His true origin and story is that the Ankou was once a cruel prince who met Death during a hunting trip and challenged him to see who could kill a black stag first.Death won the contest and the prince was cursed to roam the earth as a ghoul for all eternity.