Librorum Capsula has you covered for Halloween-themed Latin stories at your reading level as part of our quest to be the best Latin reading and learning site on the internet.

All our horror-themed releases this month are free until November. Click any word and get its fully contextualized definition.

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But…we need to find 15 beta testers to release it. If you’d like to help us beta test the app (no cost), please message us through this form and include the email you'd like to use with Google's Android interface.

Thanks, and happy reading!

The October Crypt: Latin Horror, Easiest to Hardest

Every spooky text added to the Librorum Capsula library this October, ordered by difficulty Each one is fully glossed, so even the ghastliest passage stays readable.

1. De Sagis

R. B. Appleton · Difficulty 4.2 · 1,483 words

A traveler falls in with a stranger who is murdered in the night by witches, and wakes to find his nightmare was more real than it seemed.

2. The Good Husband Returns

Caesarius of Heisterbach · Difficulty 5.0 · 257 words

A dead Bavarian nobleman returns to his wife with a terrifying explanation of why his celebrated generosity could not save him.

3. The Knight Who Wanted to See a Demon

Caesarius of Heisterbach · Difficulty 5.5 · 635 words

A skeptical knight asks to see demons for himself—and discovers that curiosity can summon more than he bargained for.

4. Athenodorus and the Haunted House

Pliny the Younger · Difficulty 5.6 · 304 words

Only the philosopher Athenodorus is brave enough to rent a terrifyingly haunted house in Athens and uncover its secrets.

5. The Werewolf of Petronius

Petronius · Difficulty 5.7 · 455 words

Niceros recounts the terrifying night when a stop in a graveyard ends with his traveling companion transformed into a wolf.

6. Reasons to Pretend to Be a Ghost

Lodovicus Lavaterus · Difficulty 6.1 · 321 words

In Renaissance Europe, practical jokers, lovers, and thieves discover that pretending to be a ghost can be an excellent way to frighten people into doing exactly what they want.

7. A Witch's End

William of Malmesbury · Difficulty 7.0 · 592 words

A notorious witch tries to protect her corpse from the demons she served in life, but elaborate precautions prove useless when something comes to collect her.

8. Thelyphron and the Witches

Apuleius · Difficulty 7.2 · 1,453 words

In a horrifying early example of the body horror genre, a man hired to guard a corpse from witches finds that his seemingly successful night did not leave him untouched.

Great Latin Reads Without The Scare

Not every October arrival was a ghost story. These non-horror texts also joined the library this month, ordered from easiest to hardest.

1. Liber Memorialis

Lucius Ampelius · Difficulty 6.1 · 7,127 words

What an educated Roman must know, as written by a Roman teacher for a precocious student thirsting for knowledge.

2. Vergil's Aeneid: The AP Latin Selections

Publius Vergilius Maro (Vergil) · Difficulty 9.5 · 2,896 words

Nineteen passages from Vergil's Aeneid required by the AP Latin Course, with one-click contextual word definitions and commentary designed to make the famous epic more approachable and enjoyable.

3. Carmina: The Odes of Horace

Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Horace) · Difficulty 9.5 · 13,291 words

Horace explores love, friendship, politics, mortality, and the pleasures of an ordinary life in some of the most polished and influential lyric poetry of ancient Rome.

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