According to the first pamphlet account written by Caspar Herber in 1581, Christman Genipperteinga was said to have been born in Körpen (Kerpen), near Cologne, in the Holy Roman Empire. His early life is largely unknown and remains undocumented in any official or church records. There is no surviving evidence of family, occupation, or religious background.

At some point around 1569, Genipperteinga allegedly fled civilization and began living in a furnished cave complex in the Fraßberg region, near Bernkastel. The cave was said to overlook strategic roads leading to Trier, Metz, Thionville, and Luxembourg, allowing him to rob travelers and merchants with ease. According to these accounts, he used the cave as a hideout to store stolen loot, armor, meat, wine, and weaponry, and to dispose of bodies in nearby mine shafts.

Genipperteinga is alleged to have murdered 964 people over the course of 13 years, from 1569 to 1581. The killings reportedly included men, women, children, and infants, with some tales describing how he threw corpses into a mine shaft linked to his mountain hideout. His loot, according to some reports, was worth more than 70,000 Gulden — an immense sum at the time.

In perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the tale, he is said to have kidnapped a young woman from Boppard, holding her captive as a sex slave in his cave. He allegedly fathered children with her, only to kill them at birth and hang their corpses, uttering the chilling line:

“Dance, dear little children, dance, Gnipperteinga your father is making the dance for you.”

According to the 1581 pamphlet, Genipperteinga also kept a diary, in which he recorded his victim count, detailed his murders, and catalogued his stolen goods. He is said to have claimed he would have been “satisfied” had he reached 1,000 murders.

Genipperteinga’s downfall came when his enslaved companion was allegedly allowed to leave the cave to visit Bernkastel. Once there, she escaped and informed town officials of the atrocities. A raid of 30 armed men followed, during which Genipperteinga was captured and his hideout discovered.

Inside, they reportedly found an enormous cache of loot, including salted meat, barrels of wine, coins, weapons, and valuables from numerous robbery victims.

He was tried and found guilty on June 17, 1581. For his crimes, he was sentenced to death by breaking on the wheel, a torturous form of execution in which the bones are shattered while the prisoner remains conscious. Legends say he was kept alive for nine days, sustained by “strong drink,” before finally dying around June 26, 1581.