Linda,

Am having a hard time finding the original article which proffered this explanation.

A collapsed cave had been found around 2004 outside Hamelin. Inside the cave were the skeletons of 13 or so adolescents and one older male.

Apparently, some of the old rituals of initiation into a mystery school were still being practiced.

Some dignitary from the Holy Roman Empire was on a visit to Hamelin, and some young Saxony nobles, eager to impress this Papal emissary, collapsed the cave as proof of their Catholic efforts to stamp out competing 'pagan' religious observances.

Or even that parts of Saxony may have been a holdout of the Cathars.

(In Germany, the Cathars were known as Katter and in the north of France as Katiers, as they were alleged to worship the devil in the shape of a cat.) See: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4883611/

Anyway, I will try to find that article.

Thanks for the good read.