In English folklore, a boggart is a household spirit which causes mischief and things to disappear like milk and dogs to go lame. Always, the boggart will follow its family wherever they flee. In Northern England, at least, there was the belief that the boggart should never be named, for when the boggart was given a name, it would not be reasoned with nor persuaded, but would become uncontrollable and destructive.
It is said that the boggart crawls into people's beds at night and puts a clammy hand on their faces. Sometimes he strips the bedsheets off them. Hanging a horseshoe on the door of a house and leaving a pile of salt outside your bedroom are said to keep a boggart away.
In the folklore of North-West England, boggarts live under bridges on dangerous sharp bends on roads as well as in chimneys. The Scottish variant is the bogle.
