It appears that the issue of unrequited love is eternal, with Swedes throughout the ages taking to drastic measures to either enchant the object of their desires, or remove a suspected enchantment placed upon them.

Here are a few examples from the Swedish Institute for Language and Folklore (we can’t vouch for how effective they are).

The sleeping beauty

According to one Oskar Jansson, born in Skåne in 1875, one sure-fire way to make the person you love return your affections was to cut a lock of hair from their head while they sleep and take it to a “wise person” who “could sort everything out”. Even if you do have access to the kind of “wise person” Jansson is referring to, it’s probably best not to cut a Swede’s hair while they sleep, especially if you don’t know them well.

The berry smuggler

Records from the Swedish Institute for Language and Folklore state that Albertina Nyman, from Bohuslän, believed that sneaking rowan berries in the pocket of the person you love would make them fall in love with you.

This is frankly the least weird suggestion on this list, so if you’re going to use one of these tricks, it might as well be this one.

The frog’s leg

In this tip, A. Johansson, born in 1863 in Bohuslän, recommends an odd way of enchanting the object of your desires – just make sure you follow the instructions carefully.

“Stroke the back of the person you want to have as your wife with a frog’s leg downwards,” they said, “and they will be completely insatiably in love with you.”

This was believed to work as you pulled the love of the person whose back you stroked towards you. Johansson does note here however that it works both ways: if you stroked the frog’s leg upwards you stroke their love away from you, meaning they would never fall in love with you.

Johansson failed to mention whether the leg should still be attached to the frog (either way, stroking someone with a frog’s leg would probably not be appreciated).

The coffee tamperer

Märta Wästerberg, born in 1853, said she had once met a young lady who claimed she could “make a man so crazy for her he would never want to part from her”, by putting her menstrual blood in his coffee.

We wouldn’t recommend you try any of these tips, but really, please, don’t try this one. As a general rule, probably best to avoid putting bodily fluids (or anything else) in someone’s coffee if you’re trying to woo them.

The overcomplicated thread spell

Pay attention, this one is complicated. One anonymous woman born in 1812 in Värmland is quoted by the Institute for Language and Folklore as giving the following advice for a lovesick boy to make the object of his desires return his affections.

First, the boy should go to a wise man who would perform the following spell. On a Thursday night at midnight, the boy must walk three times around a large circle made of willow which had been chopped and bound on a Sunday in Lent.

Then, on the first full moon, the boy must go to the girl’s home with the wise man and sit next to her. The wise man should then, without the girl seeing him, join the seam of the girl’s blouse to the boy’s coat sleeve with a thread or “nest”. Then he would cut off the nest, pull out the end of the thread and give it to the boy. The boy must then wear the thread constantly, night and day, until the girl fell in love with him. If he lost the thread, the love would disappear, taking all the boy’s belongings with it.

Just a hunch, but surely the girl would have been slightly suspicious when a strange man turned up to her home with a boy and started fiddling with the hem of her blouse?

Wine with a side of foot sweat

Finally, here’s a tip for breaking a love spell you suspect someone has placed on you, from an unnamed source in Södermanland in 1932.

Put on a pair of new shoes, walk until your feet begin to sweat, then take the shoes off. You must then fill the shoes with beer or wine, slosh it around (presumably to mix it with your foot sweat, delicious), and drink it. From then on, you will not be able to look at the person who enchanted you.

If you’re planning to woo a Swede this Valentine’s Day, however, it’s probably best to stick to buying some flowers or chocolate to show your affection, rather than enlisting the help of a wise man, cutting their hair while they sleep, or drinking sweaty beer from a shoe. That would probably just put them off.