Herla or King Herla (Old English: *Her(e)la Cyning) is a legendary leader of the mythical Germanic Wild Hunt and the name from which the Old French term Herlequin may have been derived. Herla often has been identified as Woden [citation needed] and in the writings of the twelfth-century writer Walter Map, he is portrayed as a legendary king of the Britons who became the leader of the Wild Hunt after a visit to the Otherworld, only to return some three hundred years later, after the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain.
Map's tale occurs in two versions in his De nugis curialium. The first and longer account, found in section 1.12, provides far more detail; it tells of Herla's encounter with an otherworldly being, his journey to the latter's homeland, his transformation into the leader of the Hunt after his return to the human realm, and, finally, the disappearance of Herla and his band during the first year of the reign of Henry II of England (a synopsis of this longer version appears below). The second account, found in section 4.13, includes only the ending of the earlier version. Herla is not mentioned in the second account by name; instead, Map refers to the entire host as "the troop of Herlethingus" (familia Herlethingi).