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Evil Fairies
Evil
fairies in Irish folklore steal
people’s souls and leave changelings
behind in their place. They curse those who interfere with their
precious fairy forts. They wail
at your window when one of your family members is about to die.
I grew up
in Ireland and Irish
folklore is full of tales of fairies up to no good.
You
haven't seen darkness until you've been in the countryside in Ireland.
It's the kind of darkness that devours
everything beyond an inch from your nose and turns the forests and
fields to shadow. It's easy to imagine something drifting over the
moors or mistake the hoot of an owl for the lonely wail of a cursed
fairy.
Many Irish families claim to be haunted by evil fairies
called Banshees.
The Banshee is an Irish fairy that emerges at night drawing a
comb
through her long silvery hair. She is said to be drawn to certain
families (mostly those whose surname is preceded by an O', ie. O'
Grady, O'Brien and O'Connor) and to appear at their home wailing before
or shortly after one of their family member dies.
 ‘Away with the fairies’
is a popular expression in Ireland used to describe someone whose mind
is elsewhere. Its origins lie in the belief that mischevious or evil
fairies steal people’s
souls and carry them off to the underworld, leaving changelings behind
in their place. There’s even a recorded case of an Irish man
who
tried to murder his wife, claiming her soul had been kidnapped by fairies
and that her body was inhabited by a fairy spirit.
As
a child I was told never to play inside a fairy fort
because the fairies don't like it and might curse you as a result.
Fairy forts are the remains of
circular houses in which Irish people lived from the Iron Age up until
early Christian times. You can see them dotted all over Ireland,
circles of standing stones, usually with long grass growing in between
them where modern man fears to tread.
We don’t
really call our Irish fairies evil fairies. In fact we often refer to
fairies as the ‘good
people’ but they’re certainly capable of doing evil to
those who interfere with their ways. Whether
our mythology is the result of an active imagination, a drop too much
of
the Irish ale Puteen
or a special Irish sensitivity to
the supernatural, well, that's for you to decide!
Disney's portrayal of JM Barre's famous fairy
Tinkerbell
I
love our Irish legends but I think I prefer the fairies from famous fairy tales with
shimmering wings and musical voices. And I love JM Barre’s account
of the origin of fairies in his 1911 book Peter Pan and Wendy.
Barre writes: “When the first baby laughed for the first time, its
laugh
broke into a thousand pieces, and they all went skipping about, and
that was the beginning of fairies." Barre’s creation Tinkerbell (pictured
above)
is probably the most beloved fairy in the world.
 RETURN HOME from Evil Fairies to read more about the top 100 fantasy
books and top 100 fantasy movies of all time
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