Roopkund Lake, India

Lies high in the Himalayas, its bottom carpeted with the bones of hundreds of long-dead pilgrims said to have perished under the wrath of a mountain goddess.

In a remote glacial bowl more than 16,000 feet above sea level, Roopkund spends most of the year sealed beneath ice and yards of snow. For a single month at the end of summer, however, the ice retreats. Clear water and rocky banks then reveal a chilling secret: hundreds of human skeletons, some still sporting bits of flesh, hair, and clothing. Locals long ago dubbed it Skeleton Lake.

When researchers finally reached the site, they found the skulls shared the same fatal injury—deep, round depressions. These fractures weren’t made by weapons but by heavy, rounded objects that struck straight down from above. Artifacts—wooden bowls, leather sandals, women’s rings, glass bangles—were also recovered. Taken together, the evidence pointed to a group of pilgrims killed by a catastrophic hailstorm, the ice stones reportedly as big as tennis balls. Later dating showed the deaths occurred in several separate eras, not all at once.

Villagers say the truth has always been preserved in their oral lore. Spiritual life here centers on the goddess Nanda Devi, an incarnation of Shiva’s consort. Fleeing a demon, she is said to have hidden in these mountains, which became her living body and sanctuary. To let her see her reflection, Shiva struck the rock with his trident, forming a crystal-clear bowl—Roopkund, “Lake of Beauty.” Ironically, the lake created to mirror perfect beauty now displays perhaps the most gruesome face of death.

The region’s founding myth explains the curse. The mighty Raja Jasdhaval set off for Nanda Devi’s shrine with his pregnant queen, hoping to pray for an heir. Blinded by pride, he broke every mountain taboo: instead of a humble pilgrimage, he staged a noisy carnival of musicians and dancers. Worse, the queen gave birth in a cave along the trail, shattering rules of ritual purity. Enraged, Nanda Devi blackened the sky and hurled deadly ice stones at the procession. A folk song still sung by Himalayan women tells of the goddess pelting the intruders with hail “hard as iron,” matching the fractures found on the skulls.

Even the route to Roopkund reads like a warning map. Each campsite bears a name tied to the goddess’s deeds. Patar Nachauni, for instance, is where the earth supposedly swallowed the king’s dancers for violating the mountains’ silence. Farther up stands the temple of Latu Devta—Nanda Devi’s brother and guardian—said to appear as a giant venomous serpent whose gaze can blind or kill. The temple opens only once a year; the high priest enters blindfolded and with his mouth covered so he won’t defile the deity with a single breath.

From 100 Cursed Places · Fern Flower Press