Pied Piper's Pipe
The pipe of the Pied Piper of Hamelin is the magic instrument that, according to the legend, lured the rats of the town of Hamelin to drown in the river Weser in 1284, and then, when the citizens refused to pay the promised reward, drew away a hundred and thirty of their children into a mountainside, never to return. No actual pipe survives, and the whole episode belongs to the semi-legendary medieval tradition of the town and its later retellings, including the Grimms' version and Robert Browning's poem. The date 26 June 1284 is recorded in the town's medieval chronicles, and a window in the