This work studies sixty Medieval ghost stories and analyses the role of children in these tales. Most stories were recorded for use as exempla, short narratives to be used in preaching to illustrate the dangers of sin. Ghosts took the form of apparitions (having the appearance of the person in life but lacking physical substance) or of revenant corpses (reanimated bodies that arise from their graves). Children occasionally feature as apparitions - usually souls in Purgatory seeking help in finding absolution for their sins or else seeking to furnish the living with information on the afterlife - but not as revenants. Child protagonists in ghost stories may be used to illustrate the consequences of minor sins, a role they can fulfil without undue threat to ideals of childhood innocence. The innocence attributed to children may also mean that children who return as apparitions were seen as a source of uncorrupted information about the afterlife.

中文翻译：

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中世纪西北欧的幽灵儿童

这项工作研究了六十个中世纪的鬼故事，并分析了儿童在这些故事中的作用。大多数故事被记录下来用作范例，在讲道中使用简短的叙述来说明罪的危险。鬼以幻影的形式出现（具有生命中的人的外表，但没有实体）或亡魂的尸体（从坟墓中复活的尸体）。孩子们偶尔会以幻影的形式出现——通常是炼狱中的灵魂寻求帮助来为他们的罪孽寻求赦免，或者寻求为生者提供关于来世的信息——但不是作为亡魂。鬼故事中的儿童主角可能被用来说明小罪的后果，他们可以扮演这个角色，而不会对童年纯真的理想构成不当威胁。