As the British readers of this blog will know very well, the Welsh name for Wales is Cymru- pronounced, roughly, ‘cumri.’ This modern word derives from Old Welsh Combrogi– ‘the countrymen’- which, it is less well-known, is also preserved in the English county name Cumberland or Cumbria, the region that, along with Westmorland, makes up the ‘Lake District.’ These names remind us that, even quite late in the so-called Dark Ages, there was a very definite ‘Celtic fringe’ running down the west coast of Britain, from Cornwall (Kernow) and Devon (Dyfnaint) in the south-west through Wales and up to Cumbria and the south-western part of Scotland, now Dumfries and Galloway, but once the British kingdom of Rheged.
Here ends the history lesson- but what intrigues me is whether this continuity of British (as against English) culture might have had an impact upon folklore as well as leaving linguistic traces. I think there are several hints that this may be the case. We are lucky that the faerylore of Cumbria has been relatively well recorded and a number of similarities with accounts from Wales and further south suggest a link between the respective faery tribes (although I have found some links across the Irish sea with the Isle of Man as well).
Firstly, where did the Cumbrian faeries live? It’s widely agreed that they preferred to be underground. So, in 1822 the antiquarian John Briggs summarised their lifestyle as follows: they had marriages and children, followed occupations and churned their own butter. They lived in caves, were perfectly harmless, and could be either visible or invisible to us as they chose. In 1887 Thomas Gibson noted how the faeries were often held liable for items that had gone missing. To propitiate them, he explained, bread and milk were left at the mouth of caverns and glens. Gibson remarked that this food always disappeared and that the ‘simple’ country folk assumed this was because the faeries had taken it- whereas he reckoned it was foxes and badgers. Oddly, though, he didn’t complete his story- too busy being rational and superior, he neglected to tell us whether or not those offerings worked and the lost items were retrieved. A century earlier, in 1770, a local man William Hutton had described the parish of Beetham near Carnforth. He again was very dismissive of the idea of faeries, but he remarked that, at a place called Waterhouses, there were some remarkable rocks and caves, “which, I fancy, gave rise to tales of fairies living thereabouts.” Unconsciously, perhaps, Hutton confirmed the consistent connection that was made in the area between faes and caves (which were often called fairy-whols’ in the local dialect). I point all of this out because, in Wales, it was equally common knowledge that the tylwyth teg lived in caverns and holes in river banks. Interestingly, in Magical Folk (2018) Simon Young contributed a chapter on the Cumbrian faeries in which he observed that, of thirty two identifiable faery place names, twelve (just under a third) were associated with caves. As he said the “Cumbrian fairies liked… underground places and you went there at your peril.” Some boys who visited the Fairy Holes at Lamplugh in 1800 took a pistol with them- just in case. Simon also noted an 1876 account of some boys who dug into the slope of a hillfort and uncovered a roof tiled with slates. They were called for a meal and (of course) when they returned there was no sign of the hole they’d dug, let alone the roof.
The next consonance with Wales is the Cumbrian faeries’ liking for clouds. An article in the Kendal Mercury for October 13th 1849 that described a ride from Keswick to Penrith mentioned that “the fairies were in the habit of holding wakes on the clouds and mountain tops…” Even more impressive is the story of Jack Wilson of Martindale, which was published in 1857. He is alleged to been one of the very last people to have seen the local faeries. Walking at Sandwick near Ullswater one moonlit evening, he saw a large group of faeries “engaged in their favourite diversions” (presumably, dancing to music). He sneaked up and saw that there was a ladder leading up into a cloud. Jack dashed forward but the faeries all scrambled up their ladder, pulled it up behind them, and vanished. The tylwyth teg especially like misty and cloudy days: they can move about unseen and they can use the fog as a cover for stealing cattle and abducting children. These two Cumbrian stories may well be an echo of that affinity.
The Cumbrian faeries have also been linked with copper mines (just like the knockers of the south-west and the coblynau of Wales) and they have been accused of thefts at markets- something that is a common feature of Welsh stories of midwives who acquire the second sight. A shared fashion sense may also be detected between the tylwyth teg and the Cumbrian faes. The former are often referred to as the ‘elves of the blue petticoats’ and we find similar styles further north. The writer in the Kendal Mercury also mentioned that the faery women preferred a “sort of short petticoat” and John Close, recording the Tales and Legends of Westmorland in 1862, likewise noted “short green frocks” and “short green coats”- although this underlines the fact that the more conventional faery colour of green seems to be preferred in Cumbria. They are often seen in these garments dancing to “aerial music,” another trait shared with the tylwyth teg.
Lastly, just as the pixies of the south-west are renowned for their ability to mislead hapless humans, there are some hints of pixie-leading and manipulations of the environment from the north as well. One travel writer, William Hutchinson, alleged that the local faeries, “certain genii who govern the place, by virtue of their supernatural arts and necromancy” would change the shape of a local landmark rock formation as visitors approached. More interesting still is a classic pixie-led story of a farmer who, travelling home at night from Kirkby Lonsdale, encountered a hedge across the road which simply shouldn’t have been there. A small man then appeared and offered to remove the obstruction in return for a pound of the butter that the human was carrying home from market. He was paid and a way through the hedge duly appeared. We’d be inclined to label this as a kind of supernatural highway robbery, were it not for the fact that the man’s son went the next day to check on the mysterious hedge and found none- but he did find the butter sitting on top of a wall…
Undoubtedly, there are also marked differences between the tylwyth teg and their Cumbrian cousins. Whilst the former have a curious liking for interfering with human baking, the Cumberland faeries are fascinated by the process of churning butter, with which they’ll both assist and interfere. They share traits with British faeries more generally, too, from riding tiny horses, through an aversion to rowan, to a tendency to abduct people. Prominent in the faerylore as well are the hobs or brownies (called ‘Dobbies’ in the local dialect); they share their character and habits with the brownies of all of northern Britain. Nonetheless, I’d argue that there are enough similarities to propose a familial link between Cumbrian faeries and the tylwyth teg of Cymru. For all the details of the latter, see my recent bookWelsh Fairies- The Tylwyth Teg (Green Magic, 2023). See, too, my posting on Cumbrian boggles.
I have remarked numerous times before how odd it seems to me that faeries are considered suitable subjects only for the interest of children (and not- clearly- for the likes of you and I). This makes little sense to me, given the very adult nature of the faeries of British tradition, what with their sexual appetites, violence and greed, but equally because of the way that previous generations deployed faeries in relation to children.
Katherine Briggs wrote about what she called the ‘nursery sprites,’ the supernatural beings whose existence was employed almost solely to scare children into good behaviour, whether that was going to bed on time (and staying there), keeping out of dangerous places and not going into parts of a house or farm where they weren’t wanted. Britain is rich in a tribe of bogies or bugbears whose job is to keep children in line- hence the old Midlands’ phrase “to take bug”- meaning to take fright.
Bogies Galore
A good illustration of this kind of creature is the clim of East Anglia. Robert Forby, in his Vocabulary of East Anglia (1830), defined the clim as “a sort of imp which inhabits the chimneys of nurseries and is sometimes called down to take away naughty children.” The sprite’s name is simply a derivative of the verb ‘climb,’ but the notion of this lurking being who can scuttle up and down the chimney is quite a disturbing notion still to me as an adult; I’m sure that aged seven or eight it could have given me terrible nightmares and kept me firmly in my bed.
The clim is just one of numerous equally unpleasant and alarming beings. Tod-lowery is a hob-goblin whose imminent appearance is used to alarm infants. The two elements of the name both mean a ‘fox,’ but combined together they have acquired a new, supernatural sense in Lincolnshire and around the Fens. A related being is Tom or Tommy-loudy, a name used in Holderness for a loud, blustering goblin who shakes the window-panes, whistles and moans through the lattice, scaring the children inside with his noise and ensuring they won’t go out. Interestingly, though, the fenland folklorist Mrs Balfour classed the tod-lowries along with witches and seemed to regard them as rather more serious and dangerous than mere nursery sprites. She described the charm that protected against them being used by adult men; it involved reciting the ‘Our Father’ backwards and then spitting towards the east; this is probably much easier said than done when you’re terrified and dry mouthed with fear.
The Cornish Litany by Arthur Wragg (1930s)
Knocky-boh is a North Yorkshire bogie who taps behind the wainscot panels to frighten children. Faery authority Katherine Briggs remarked that the being seemed to be a kind of boggart, or even a poltergeist. The ‘boh’ element is simply a variant on bogie/ bugaboo, so that another name for the knocky-boh was ‘boh-thing.’
Mumpoker is known on the Isle of Wight and is used once again to frighten small children into behaving: “I’ll zend the mumpoker ater ye.” The ‘mum’ element of the name denotes his silent and stealthy approach as he creeps up on the little ones, the word being related most probably to the phrase ‘to keep mum.’ Hodge Poker appears to be a related sprite, but his nature is now obscure. He’s been described as a “a goblin of perished fame” and, other than his lurking habit, little can be said about him. He was classed with hobgoblins, elves and Robin Goodfellow in the early seventeenth century, but we should note that the first element ‘Hodge’ derives from the name Roger, which was used familiarly of the devil.
In the north of England, the devil or hobgloblin Old Scrat was invoked “By goy! but auld Scratty’ll git thi if thoo doesn’t come in,” or in Lincolnshire “Be a good bairn or Scrat ‘ll be sewer [sure] to cum for thee.” Tankerabogus, whom we’ve looked at before, had a similar monitory function, with the threat that ill-behaviour would result in the wayward child being dragged off to the bogie’s pit..
Tom Dockin is another South Yorkshire bogie (or boggard or barguest). He’s equipped with iron teeth, with which he devours bad children. According to a letter published in the Sheffield and Rotherham Independent in December 1888, the threat commonly made was- “If you’re not good, Tom Dockin will fetch you.” Old Harrow Tooth, a hag from County Durham, seems to have inspired fear in children in just the same sort of way. The element ‘Dockin’ in Tom’s name is very likely to derive from the verb ‘to dock,’ meaning to cut, and so describes how he chomps up naughty infants; an alternative derivation may be from ‘Dicken’ as a nickname for the devil. Tom-poker, meanwhile, is a closely related East Anglian bogie who is “the great bugbear and terror of naughty children” inhabiting dark closets, holes under stairs, unoccupied cock-lofts and such like. He lies in wait in these so-called ‘poker holes’ for unsuspecting infants who trespass there. During the late eighteenth century, in Tommy Thumb’s Song Book, ‘Nurse Lovechild’ declared “This in particular, I insist on… that you never mention a Bull Beggar, Tom Poker, Raw Head and Bloody Bones…” We’ll return to his last two companions shortly.
The ‘poker’ element in the names of both Mumpoker and Tom Poker denotes a hobgoblin or bogie- hence “A mother when her child is wayward… scareth it with some pocar or bull-begger.” The term derives from an older word, pocar or pocker, which meant a devil. This, in turn gave rise to ‘poker-hole,’ which was any dark closet or hole supposed to be inhabited by bogies or bugbears. The forename ‘Tom,’ which was applied to both Tom Dockin and Tom Poker, comes from another familiar name for the devil, ‘Old Tom.’ Pokey-hokey, from East Anglia and Punky, from West Yorkshire, would appear to be very similar entities. ‘Punky’ denoted a very dirty person, such as a chimney sweep, so that the punky who, it was threatened, would take them away may be imagined as a coal-black coloured entity. Boh-sweep therefore was another dark being used to frighten kids.
The ‘barguest‘ (a word that’s spelled with many variations) is an entity of the north of England, more often heard than seen, because only a few had the second sight that enabled them to see the being’s teeth, claws and huge eyes, whereas many heard its nighttime shrieks and howls, or its dragged chains, which often foretold calamity. Interestingly, though, the term was often used as a term of reproach or abuse for one who was untidy in appearance; or badly behaved- most especially children. Hence, in East Yorkshire, it was applied to little kids who were always running away and causing their parents alarm: “Cum here, thoo lahtle bagheeast; thoo ommast flays [affrights] ma oot o’ mi wits. In Nottinghamshire ‘You noisy bargust’ was applied to a disruptive child and, in the south of the same county, it denoted a filthy infant: “Go and pull them fow [fowl] rags off of yer, yer ugly bargest, an’ dress yersen decent. Y’er allus i’th’ road, yer young bargest. Ger out!” In the same fashion, in Cornwall ‘tankerabogus’ could be applied to a noisy child
The Cornish Litany by Arthur Wragg (1930s)
Rawhead & Bloodybones
Around the disused coal pits of the Staffordshire Black Country, both rawhead and bloody bones were known as half human, half animal beings. They were very dangerous, but would periodically come out of the mine workings to beg for food and other items at nearby cottages. By late Victorian times, however, they had diminished to not much more than bugbears used by parents to scare their children away from playing too near to the pit mouths. From Yorkshire and Lancashire running down through the Midlands into East Anglia, Tommy Rawhead and his companions performed a similar function, lurking near ponds, streams and flooded marl pits, much like the Grindylow, Nelly Long Arms and Jenny Greenteeth. Children were told to “keep away from the marl-pit or rawhead and bloody bones will have you.” Ruth Tongue recorded a more typical image of the sprites in her Somerset Folklore (1965, p.13), citing a witness who told her that Bloodybones “lived in a dark cupboard, usually under the stairs. If you were heroic enough to peep through a crack you would get a glimpse of the dreadful, crouching creature, with blood running down his face, seated waiting on a pile of raw bones that had belonged to children who told lies or said bad words. If you peeped through the keyhole he got you anyway.”
These two bogies are seldom separated and their identities, appearances and habits tended to merge. Rawhead (sometimes also called Rawflesh) is portrayed as a being with a skull head or a flayed body; Bloodybones’ looks speak for themselves. According to Sidney Addy, writing on the local dialect, around Sheffield in South Yorkshire Tommy Rawhead was known; he was used to stop children venturing out into the dark: “Tha moant go out at neet, or Tommy Raw-head will fetch thee.” A well at nearby Hackenthorpe was called ‘Tommy Raw-head Well,’ in which it was said that an iron man with chains on his body lived. Interestingly, an Ulster correspondent to the Welsh magazine, Byegones, in March 1909 noted that forty years earlier English families’ children there had been frightened away from dangerous places and objects by the threat of the being, whose “nature and appearance was of a particularly horrible, but undefinable, kind.” The writer was responding to a letter of November 1908, which had explained how, in Shropshire (as well as other midland and northern counties), the two bogies had kept children away from wells and unfenced bodies of water.
The pair seem to have started out as demons and servants of Satan, but from at least the mid-sixteenth century they have been regarded as creatures suitable for thrilling or scary stories told to small children. Around this time one author suggested that telling young children about the two beings would stop them crying and calm them down. Personally, I can’t imagine this working very well, unless the infant was scared speechless and frozen with terror… Perhaps, though, this was exactly the plan. John Locke described “the usual method of servants to awe children, and keep them in subjection, by telling them of rawhead and bloodybones, and such other Names, as carry them the Ideas of some hurtful, terrible Things, inhabiting darkness.” The terrifying memories of those childhood nightmares could persist into adulthood, as Henry Brooke suggested in his novel of 1765, The Fool of Quality: “I should not like, even now, to have my curtains at midnight opened suddenly upon me by a death’s head and bloody bones.” Neither should I.
Old Bloody Bones is a Cornish version of Rawhead-and-Bloody-Bones, according to F. W. Jones writing inthe Old Cornwall journal. Old Bloody Bones inhabited Knocker’s Hole near the village of Baldhu in the mid-Cornwall mining district. There was said once to have been a massacre in the area and it is suggested that Old Bloody Bones was a ghost or evil spirit attracted by the spilt blood. His function or purpose isn’t made clear in Jones’ note, but as Knocker’s Hole suggests that it was some kind of abandoned mine working, I reckon we’re looking at the local equivalent of the Black Country sprite.
The Cornish Litany by Arthur Wragg (1930s)
Summary
All but one of these beings are male, and the dividing line between them and either a demon or an animated corpse is sometimes vague. They represent an outside world full of dangers- wild beasts that may maul or consume you, strangers who may have malign intentions and a host of perils in the environment, both natural and man-made. Keeping children alert was no bad thing.
These nursery sprites are, I think I’m right in saying, fairly unique to England: I don’t recall anything equivalent in Wales, Scotland- or Ireland. They are the familiar, and generally helpful (if touchy) brownie, hob or boggart gone wrong, a being with nothing but a bad temper and a mission to punish errant youth. I suppose sociologists might speculate about the internal dynamics of English households- and why they ended up becoming infested with such scary and dangerous (yet useful and tolerated) lodgers.
This posting is an adapted, edited and expanded version of some sections from my 2022 book Faery Mysteries (Green Magic Publishing).
In a previous book, I examined how Faery had effected human music from classical to rock and pop; in this new book I focus on the music of the faeries themselves, pulling together the many scattered materials on their music and song to try to provide a comprehensive statement as to why the faeries sing and play instruments- and what exactly those tunes sound like.
Many people, over hundreds of years, have heard faery music- and they continue to do so today. Often (predictably) it accompanies the faeries’ dancing, but song is the accompaniment for much of their everyday activity as well, such as the different stages of cloth making. They also seem to have a tradition of purely orchestral and choral music- and it is often this haunting sound that has the most profound impact upon human witnesses. Men and women have often been drawn into faery dances by the captivating sound of their reels and jigs; the almost unearthly and indescribable nature of their other compositions can create an trance-like or spellbound effect upon us- the listeners are rooted to the spot, rather than being lured in to faery rings. Instead of being abducted physically, perhaps they are ‘taken’ spiritually, unable to forget the sounds that reached them from another dimension.
One notable feature of the experiences with faery music across the British Isles is the difference in the degree of interaction that takes place from region to region. In England, the music is certainly heard- and this is often combined with the witness seeing the accompanying dancing or revelries, or even joining in with those. However, that’s as far as it goes. In Wales, Scotland, and on the Isle of Man, musicians will go into faery hills to participate in these events; they may learn their amazing musical abilities from the faeries- or receive from them a special instrument- or, at the least, they may overhear a faery tune and learn it. Why this should not be a feature of English contacts is unclear.
Music is a conduit for direct communication with the faery realm. Alasdair Alpin MacGregor, author of The Peat Fire Flame- Folk Tales & Traditions of the Highlands & Islands (1937, c.2) stated that the Highland faeries played both the bagpipes and (much less commonly) the Celtic harp or clarsach. He knew several people who had heard faery harping and had been able to recall fragments of the melodies they had heard and he even set down several bars of a tune relayed to him by a Miss Annie Johnstone of Castlebay, on Barra. This is just one of several dozen tunes (at least) which are reputed to have entered the human repertory from a faery origin.
Music can connect our Middle Earth and Faery in several ways. Whilst the faeries most commonly played their music inside their knolls (into which they would lure people and musicians) they sometimes used human homes for their celebrations. A story from Winnington Rig in Teviotdale indicates what a nuisance this could turn out to be. The faeries were generally helpful around the house, but one morning they decided to play the bagpipes in the kitchen. This was too much for the human inhabitants to cope with and they rushed downstairs and chased the faery musicians up the chimney. In revenge, the faeries made the farm pigs and donkeys squeal and bray all day- and chased them around inside the house for good measure.
As we know, striking the right balance with the faeries can always be tricky: a Manx cottager who had similar faery parties in his kitchen wisely decided to join in. He went downstairs, but instead of confronting them and complaining, he asked to join the dancing. After a few lively reels he was able to go to bed and sleep soundly through the remainder of the celebrations- for which the faeries respected his good humour- and never troubled him again.
Faery tunes and songs are a fascinating subject and remain to this day one of the commonest points of contact between us. No Earthly Sounds- Faery Music, Song & Verse is available as an e-book and paperback from Amazon/ KDP.
Cicely Mary Barker, endpaper from the Book of Flower Fairies
Following on from my recent posting featuring the seventeenth century text ‘On Fairies,’ we get another mid-seventeenth century description of faeries from a further Stuart manuscript, this one dating to about 1649 (in other words, just about the point that Stuart Britain ceased, strictly speaking, to be ‘Stuart’ at all, but became a Commonwealth under Parliament and Cromwell, following the beheading of Charles Stuart).
The document in question, Sloane MS 3824, provides a very fulsome description of the huge variety of faeries and elves as they were understood in England at the time. The entire text can be found in David Rankine’s A Book of Treasure Spirits (2009) but, although the principal focus of the manuscript is on faeries that guard treasure- and ways to get them to guide humans to those non-ferrous metals- the catalogue of supernaturals set out is far broader.
The first section of the document discusses ‘terrestrial spirits’ but, in context, this pretty obviously means faeries: there has previously been some discussion of devils, but the author has moved on from that topic, as we can see. Secondly, his list follows the lay-out of another manuscript of the same period, Sloane MS 3825, which is much clearer in allocating the faeries, nymphs and other such supernaturals to their particular habitats: “Fairies, Hobgoblins, Elves (fields), Naiads (fountains), Potamides (rivers), Nymphs (marshes & ponds), Oreads (mountains), Hamedes (meadows), Dryads & Hamadryads (woods), Satyrs & Svlvani (trees, breaks & Bushes), Napta & Agapta (flowers), Dodona (acorns, fruits), Palea & Foeniliae (straw & flowers).” Sloane MS 3824 tells us that:
“There are another Sort of terrestrial spirits, whose residence is upon the superficies of the Earth, who also have power to Keep hidden treasures; but then it is thus: [during war or other civil disturbance, people hide their wealth in some secret place] where some or other of these spirits hath Residence… [and then] they may die without making any discovery where they have hid or Buried their Substance: the which when those Kind of spirits, who by their orders Resideth or frequently delighteth in Such a place, finding Such a thing as treasures, to be hidden, or buried there, without any owner left, immediately seize thereon. And Keep the Same &c:
Those spirits are by nature both good & bad, but Generally they are not So noxious, offensive, hurtful or vexatious [as the devils that had been discussed previously], but more near to men, and are affected with human passions, Delighting much in man’s Society, and do willingly Dwell with him, and will serve him well & faithfully in all things, wherein they are entrusted, and often times do meet poor honest men, women & Children, and are willing to be very Courteous to them, to serve them, doting on such Kind of honest and harmless people, but at such unusual Sights and accidents, for want of prudence and confidence, ignorantly stand amazed and astonished, frightening themselves, being possessed with a vain fear, so then the spirit vanisheth and leaves them, which peradventure otherwise might reveal something to them, that might do them and their posterity good: Some others there be that Delight in the company of diverse domestic and wild animals, Some reside […] in and about much delight to be about woods, Parks & such kind of places, Some about Champion fields, some about fountains, Some about Rivers, Some about Bogs, Marshes & ponds, Some about mountains, Some about meadows, some about trees, brakes & bushes, some about flowers, some about fruit, some about Barns, Stables, Cow-houses, dovecotes, Sheepfolds, and places where Implements for Husbandry is Laid up, Some in dwelling houses, Some in one place & some in another;
All which is upon the superficies of the Earth… & those Spirits Do never Keep such noises, nor make Such hideous disturbances, nor terrify amaze & affright people with their Ghastly and strange Apparitions & Dreadful uproars, but are abundantly more mild, and the noises they make are not at all Dreadful nor Astonishing, as that of the Aerial and the other terrestrial spirits aforementioned, but more softly mutely & Silently, Sometimes by Knocking at or against some Door, Wall, or table, or partition, sometimes by the Clattering of pewter, Brass, Iron, or Chairs & Stools, or working tools together, & then soon cease & Depart, it may be they may appear to some, whom they had a good liking for, willing to disclose somewhat to them [about the hidden gold], but through a vain fear Ignorantly, that benefit is Lost; At which the spirit being somewhat moved to a Kind of passion, seldom or never proffers the like again, & So may keep the Treasures hidden in such A place, firm out of mind; because it is not either Regarded, or not Rightly and Artificially Sought after.”
These descriptions will be very familiar. They tally with the accounts given by a range of other contemporary writers, including the poets Thomas Heywood, Thomas Nash and Thomas Churchyard, Reginald Scot in the Discoverie of Witchcraft (1594), John Aubrey, Robert Burton, Thomas Hobbes in Leviathan and the Presbyterian professor of philosophy, George Sinclair, in Satan’s Invisible World Discovered (1685). The writer of the Sloane manuscript text recognises that the faeries can inhabit a range of environments, but that they have a special fondness for human habitations, which they may visit at night and which they may also dwell in, appearing to us as the brownies, the lobs and the hobs. Consider, for example, the words of English writer Thomas Heywood in The Hierarchie of Blessed Angels (1635); he wrote that there were spirits that we:
“Pugs and Hob-goblins call. Their dwellings bee In corners of old houses least frequented, Or beneath stacks of wood: and these convented [gathered together], Make fearefull noise in Buttries and in Dairies; Robin good-fellowes some, some call them Fairies. In solitarie roomes These uprores keepe, And beat at dores to wake men from their sleepe…”
Heywood, Book 9, p.574
The author of Sloane MS 3824 is especially interested in precious metals underground, as we’ve seen. So far he’s talked about hidden riches, but he then moves on to consider the mine spirits, what are often called the knockers in the South West and in the coblynau in Wales:
“Some of those spirits there are, that Do Inhabit, Dwell in & Delight in Mines, & also under those mountains, and other such like places, where there is gold & silver &c: and in places where Treasures & other things are hidden: & that lie nearer to the bowels of the Earth; And these kind of spirits are said to be possessed with all temporal things And the Riches & treasures of the Earth, and are much Delighted therewith, And carefully Keep the same, and do not willingly neither part nor depart the same therefrom:
Those who work & dig in mines, & Search in the Bowels of the Earth, for Such of nature’s Benignities as it affordeth, have great Knowledge of these spirits; sometimes they are very Courteous & Benevolent, & will go to the Master of mines of such works, & will Desire to work for them amongst the Rest of their Labourers, and for the same wages, and are often times by them accordingly Employed & Set on works, and prove very faithful And Laborious there, in doing such work as two men, but they will neither talk nor associate themselves with any, but when their work is Done, and their wages paid them, according to the Custom of the Master and the Labourers, away they go, & are seen no more, till they Come to work again:
& they are not to be taken notice of, nor talked to, or in the Least affronted by any workman, & those spirits being Known by very many miners, both masters & others, they do much observe them, and give Orders to all Such Other workmen, that either has no Knowledge of them, and otherwise through Ignorance apt to Displease them, to Do So to at their Perils: As other times they will forewarn the Labouring Miners, of any Dangers or Perilous accidents, that may be near and ready to befall them, as when they are heard once, twice, thrice Or oftener, to Knock or strike in the same place, which foretelleth the Death of him that Dig & Labour there, if they haste not the sooner away from thence, for either they are buried by the fall of a mountain, or perish by the Suffocation of an Earth, Damp, Or some other Dangerous Accident: And at some times they are as Vexatious and Troublesome to the Laborious Diggers, molesting & persecuting them with pinches, blows and stripes, and other torments, to such which in any otherwise abuse them all: for the nature of these Kind of Terrestrial spirits, is Really to affect & Love all those that Love them, and that Keep their words & promises, & that are just & honest in their Dealings and actions, and they hate all Such as hate & abuse them, Smiling & proclaiming and believing them to be, what in truth by nature they are not, as infernal Devils &c: these spirits never show themselves to any shape and effect, & in Love with, In any shape but what is human, and altogether indiscernible from us Mortals, but to such as they have any Antipathy to, they appear either in Several forms, which often times doth much astonish, amuse, and affright them, yet nothing So hideous or terrible As the Aerial, and the other Degree of terrestrial Spirits forespoken of, &c: Or else they seldom or never appear to them at all &c: they are Knowing in all arts And, or Can be found out, in all the Light of nature, and contain the Knowledge of All things, and understandeth what appertaineth to the Earth, or the Studies of all In the Liberal Sciences, and in all other their Curious Arts, mysteries & Vocations, and have the Keeping and command of many Mines Royal, & of great store of treasures, hidden & buried in the Earth, and are many times beneficent to men as aforesaid, they Know the thoughts & inclinations of men in a great moment whereby It comes to pass, that we may possibly move them to come to us With far more ease and serenity, than any of the Aerial, forespoken.”
It is fascinating to observe that the character of the knockers and other mine faeries, as we would still describe it today, is here so fully set out. Perhaps because the miners laboured at such close quarters with these spirits, and were, as the text describes in such detail, so dependent upon them- not just for their livelihood but for their physical safety- that they made a very close study of their supernatural helpers’ and protectors’ nature and character.
The Sloane text then proceeds to a discussion of the faery court and its connection to buried treasure. ‘Court’ is used here, I think, in a general sense of community rather than necessarily implying any royal entourage, as the affection shown by the faeries to the humble serving staff in houses affirms.
“There are also another sort of terrestrial spirits of the nature of these next forespoken of, that Dwell on the Superficies of the Earth, & in the Caves & Caverns thereof, who Likewise haunteth houses and other places, & have the Keeping of Treasures, that are hidden or Buried therein, who are somewhat more humane & courteous by nature than the former, and are more feminine And delight in the Company of women & Children, and more Especially of Such who are wholly inclined to housewifery, as maidservants &c: but they poor souls being by fear and ignorance also, many times affrighted & astonished, at the Least unusual Sight or Noise, of any of them, Do thereby Lose many Benefits [that is, finding out about hidden gold]; Yet, not withstanding, to such as they bear Love & Kindness too, they are very benevolent and friendly &c: and are again as obnoxious and offensive to them as they hate, And they are avespertine Nocturnal wandering spirits [active during the evening and at night], who many times will come to some, even from Sun Setting to its Rising the next morn:
These Kind of spirits are more frequently visible than any others, and are the Least of the Hierarchies, and where they Haunt or do Keep any hidden Treasures, they make no great matter of Noise or Disturbance; their Noise Seemeth much as the treadings of many people, & sometimes as if there were a preparation to some great feast, as if there were two or three Cooks at work in the Kitchen, and the jack going [this is the machine to turn roasting meat on a spit over the fire], the Bread Rolling to & fro in the Oven, and all such Kind of Noises, as if many folks were all at work, which are not so hideous or terrible as other spirits Do make.
Those Kind of Terrestrial spirits are vulgarly Called of all people generally Fairies or Elves, and the natures and Quality of them are well Known to many, those spirits there are too who are Set over the Hierarchy as the Supreme head thereof, whose names are Mycob and Oberion[the faery queen and king], under whom again are Seven Sisters, placed as the next principal, whose names are Lilia, Rostilia, Foca, Folia, Africa, Julia, Venulla [we’ve met these before in the spells to get a faery lover], under whom again are many Legions as Subjects and Subservient &c: who (as aforesaid) wander to & fro upon the Earth, and have the Keeping also of many Treasures that are hidden or Buried, especially such as are hidden in those places that they frequent, inhabit, or Delight in, and that Are innocently hidden by good honest people…”
A lengthy spell then follows to get the faeries to appear and to reveal the hiding place of these treasures. It has to be recited on seven successive nights, and then, on the eighth night, nine times an hour for three hours (evidently, even lost gold has to be earned).
The domestic faeries described in this later section of the manuscript again will be familiar to longstanding readers, what with their attachment to human homes, their particular affection for women, children and the maid servants (most particularly those who are houseproud and conscientious) and their tendency to play pranks by making noises around the house in empty rooms. The information provided here complements and tallies with several other seventeenth century texts that I have discussed here and in books like my British Fairies (Green Magic, 2017), something which lends credence to the presumption that we have a pretty definitive summary of English faery knowledge of the time in Sloane MS 3824.
Most interesting, perhaps, is the insistence in this manuscript that the faeries would like to help us and make us rich, if only we’d pay attention. People become too frightened or shocked by the appearance of the faeries in their homes that they don’t take in the messages being conveyed to them. The key message of the document, therefore, is to befriend and listen to the supernaturals who are making an effort to contact you. It may be surprising, given the religious fervour of the times, that such a message was recorded- for many would, indeed, have treated these beings as emissaries of the devil- but we are told to place material gain over Puritan proprieties, it seems. If the faeries go to the trouble of communicating- pay them the courtesy of listening… if we don’t, the offer won’t be repeated.
I’ve recently published this new book through Amazon/ KDP. Although only just available, it’s been substantially written and completed for four years or so. I started writing it back in 2017, not long after I finished work on my British Fairies (Green Magic, 2017), but subsequent faery projects relegated the text to an overlooked folder on my laptop and I forgot about it.
Rather than the book sitting on my machine, taking up disc space, I thought it might as well be published for anyone interested to read. Its background was the sense I got, as I read up on the subject for this blog and for that first book, that there was a gulf between what the sources of traditional folklore had to say about faeries in Britain and what many contemporary writers said. I wanted to understand how that seeming disparity had arisen.
Although folklore has never been hermetically sealed against external ideas, from late Victorian times onwards a lot of ‘elite’ and literary ideas started to influence accounts of the British faery, many of them not traditional to these islands. Some were made up (Paracelsus‘ gnomes, for example), some came from other traditions (Hindu devas and Germanic dwarves are good instances). Literature, in all its forms, seems to have had a notable impact: mass education made books more accessible and new sources started to shape a wider public perception of faeries- J M Barrie‘s Tinker Bell, Cicely Mary Barker’s Flower Fairies and, more recently, Tolkien and his elves. The flower fairies are an excellent example of this: pictures and rhymes devised for small children seem almost to be mistaken now for another authentic faery source. Hand in hand with this has gone the increased miniaturisation and feminisation of faery kind, so that they are widely viewed as being kindly, winged girls, not at all like the contrary and dangerous creatures of British folklore that I describe in my Darker Side of Faery.
It was these contradictions and complexities of evolving imagery that surprised and fascinated me and which I wanted to explore and explain for myself. The Modern Fairy Faith is available now as an e-book and paperback.
Joseph Noel Paton, Study for The Quarrel of Oberon & Titania
When, in 1600, Shakespeare chose to give the faery king in Midsummer Night’s Dream the name Oberon, he simply followed a very common practice in England at the time. As I’ve mentioned previously, Oberon is a continental figure who first appeared in Germany; his original name was, in fact, not a name at all, but a simple description- albe-rich– the elf-king (compare the Anglo-Saxon Aelfric, meaning elf-rule). By way of French Aubert, followed by the diminutive form Auberon, he became better known and, in his pre-Shakespearian incarnation, was famous for his magical functions rather than his specifically faery activities. Oberon (the English spelling of the French name, which is also found as Oberion and Oberyon) made his debut in a book of spells as early as 1494 and, for the next 150-200 years or so, this was his main cultural role. Perhaps as science displaced magic- certainly, as Shakespeare’s character assumed a greater significance- Oberon’s image in public consciousness changed as it grew. To begin with, though, outside the magical specialists, only a very few members of the public would have been dimly aware of his name and perceived purpose. Once the playwright had made him a lead figure in one of his most popular comedies, Oberon’s fate- and his public image- were sealed.
The magical Oberon is a person rather different to that we know from Midsummer Night’s Dream. True, the king in the play performs some magic, but this is arguably little different to that which would have been expected of any British faery at the time: his transformation of Bottom into a donkey and his conjuring of a mist are but the glamour of faery tradition and one of the essential elements of any ‘pixie leading‘ episode. In the various grimoires, however, Oberon is more the object of spells rather than the magus casting them. He becomes the servant of magicians, conjured by them to answer their questions and give other assistance (see, for example, the spell to summon him in the Bodleian manuscript e Mus 173 reproduced by Dan Harms in Of Angels or the ritual procedure set out in British Library Sloane MS 3826).
Oberon is dealt with most fully in the Folger Shakespeare Library manuscript V.b.26, from which we may gather some idea of how he was perceived before Shakespeare got involved. He is described in the following terms:
“Oberyon Rex– he appeareth like a kinge with a crowne on his heade; he is under the governmente of the sun & moon; he teacheth a man knowledge in physicke & he sheweth the nature of stones, herbes & trees & of all mettalls; he is a great & mighty kinge & he is kinge of the fayries; he causeth a man to be Invisible, he sheweth where hiding treseuer is & how to obtain the saime; he telleth of thinges present paste & to comm; and, if he be bounde to a man, he will carey or bringe treasuer out of the sea- his burden is £1000000. He howeldes [commands] the wateres & lowe partes of the earth.”
Folger MS V.b.26, f.80
This Oberon is a quite a different character to the one we now tend to imagine. He seems to be rather more powerful and wise than the individual we’re acquainted with- his knowledge of ‘physick’ (medicine) is especially notable, not least because the summoning ritual in the Sloane manuscript 3826 is explicitly for the purpose of asking him questions on that subject. Of course, readers may recall that the Oberon of Midsummer Night’s Dream uses the juice of wild flowers to enchant Titania’s sight, indicating a good knowledge of herbal charms on his part. Considering his skills in a wider context, we know as well that the faeries are renowned for their knowledge of healing and their cures made from herbs: stories from ‘The White Powder’ of East Yorkshire to several of the Scottish witch suspects, such as Alisoun Peirsoun, attest to this expertise.
The Oberon of the Folger text is also very, very rich, a fact that will prove to be extremely significant. His million pounds of treasure are impressive today, but in early Stuart terms this is, needless to say, a colossal fortune- about £241 million at current prices. No wonder the magi were keen to make his acquaintance. This Oberon is an extreme example of an acknowledged trait- the faeries were widely reported to have access to buried treasure.
Oberon doesn’t come alone either: there are also “Mycob [who] is queene of the fayres, & is of the same office that Oberyon is of. Shee appeareth in greene with a crowne one hir head, & is very meeke & gentell. Shee showeth the nature off hearbes, stones, & trees. Shee sheweth the usse of medicines & the truth. She causeth the ringe of invisibility to be given to the invocator.” With the queen come Lillia, Restillia, Fata, Falla, Afria, Julya and Venalla, the seven faery sisters whose role is “to shewe & teache a man the nature of hearbes, & to instruct a man in physicke; alsoe they will bringe a man the ringe of invisibility. They are under Micob, the queene of fayryes” (Folger V.b.26 f.81). For reasons best known to himself, Shakespeare decided to wed his Oberon to Titania (Diana) rather than Mycob or any of the other faery queens who appear in the magical texts- Sybillia, Delforia and others.
Oberon & Titania, by Frank McNab, Saatchi galleries
For all his wealth and his magical and (I presume) political power, the Oberon of the spells is ordered around a great deal by greedy human magicians. In the Folger manuscript a series of spells are given that seek to constrain and command Oberon, obliging him to appear and to comply with the will of the ‘invocator’ (the magus conducting the ritual). So, for example, there is a spell requiring four kings (Oriens, Amaymon, Paymon and Egin, who are ‘spirits of the air’ and command the four directions) to constrain and urge Oberon to attend before the magician. Specifically, they are ordered to “constrain that most obstinate spirit Oberion at once and without any delay to come before this circle in our sight in a beautiful form, like a child three years old, and to fulfill our will, without any deformity and crookedness…” The faery king is, in fact, addressed as if he was a fallen angel: being told to comply “because you were driven from heaven by your own fault.” The childlike, rather than kingly, form is- perhaps- a way of asserting greater authority over him.
Part of the motivation for all this magical effort is soon revealed by another spell. The four kings and several other spirits are required to oblige Oberon to:
“come & speake with mee [and] that nowe you send to me the spirit N after whome I have soe soare longed, together with one other spirit & one of the best learnedst or most skillfull spirites & an experte messenger, havinge knowledge in every arte or science, & such a one that is meete & able to serve my purpose, & especiallie to ayed & help N if he have anie nead, for the sum of £100000, in gold & silver or gold or silver to the same sum, & further that the sayed N aunswere me truely of all such thinges as I shall demaund of hime & that he maye be a subiecte unto me for a tyme till I shall lysence him to departe, [and] that, in a fayre forme etc, come N come, come, come quickly nowe & that with all speede that maye be thought or done…”
Folger MS f.136.
Rather charmingly, though, the spell recognises that Oberon, king of the faeries, might from time to time be indisposed or otherwise engaged: the spirit helper is told that “if he be otherwies busyed & cannot [come]… then either his or youre messenger [should] com & shewe me the cause of his absence…” The famous folklorist Katherine Briggs also highlighted a rather unsuccessful magician, William Stapleton, who tried to summon Oberion to discover the whereabouts of hidden gold. The faery king refused to speak to him- although in this case, as Stapleton wrote to Thomas Cromwell to explain, this was because he was already (apparently) bound to obey another human and none other- and that person was the powerful Cardinal Wolsey..
Further similar spells are recorded in the manuscript, one calling on Oberon as a noble, excellent and worthy spirit of great power, summoning him into a magic circle in friendship and in the “lovingest shape” possible, there to “make me a true aunswere of all such thinges as I or my fellowes shall aske or demaund of thee, & to doe the uttermost of thy office to fullfill my request & desiere in all thinges that I shall bidd & commaunde thee” (f.117).
A subsequent spell reveals more about the actual ritual process, for it refers to “Oberyon, whose ymage is heere pictured made or fashioned, & his name that is heere written, & his signes here all drawen, graven, written or made in this [tin] plate or tables,” again commanding him to appear in the form of a child or some other Christian or living creature, and to behave obediently, honestly and harmlessly. The materialistic interest here is most starkly pronounced; although Oberon is praised as “the moste shyninge spirrite,” the magus is advised to get down to business: “talke not too much with him, for hee will reporte to thee incredible things, but let it passe, & be not given to listen thereunto, but charge him to fulfill thy desire for £100000 of gold & silver…” Cut the chit-chat, in other words, and come up with the dosh- this is a business transaction, not a social call.
A more general discussion of Oberon- and his wife Titania- will be found in my Who’s Who in Faeryland (Green Magic, 2022).
In a previous post I’ve examined how faery names appear in British place-names and give us a hint of a wider network of faery presence underlying the current landscape. I want to pursue that theme a little further here.
I’ve also observed (many times) how closely linked the faeries are to hills and mounds, especially ancient sites such as barrows and hill forts. It’s notable how frequently there is a coincidence between the two. See, by way of illustration, a succession of sites along the South Downs in Sussex. The faeries have been seen dancing at midnight on Midsummer’s Eve at both Torberry and Cissbury hillforts whilst at Pulborough, a faery funeral was encountered, and Burlow (or Burlough) Castle is associated with a classic ‘broken peel’ story: a ploughman mends a damaged tool for the faeries and is rewarded with some beer; a companion who refuses to assist is struck ill and soon dies. We see how ‘bury,’ ‘borough’ and ‘low’ feature in these examples- from the Anglo-Saxon words burg/ burh (a fort) or beorg (a mound) and hlaew (mound). Faery pipes have been found at Dolbury Camp in Somerset and, at Greenhow Hill in North Yorkshire, a district nurse was called to attend at a faery birth inside the How. So consistent are these matches that it might even be worthwhile (given sufficient time and resources) seeing what correlations could be discovered between such place-name elements and faery traditions. Other examples of this are Yorkshire Elf Howe and Drake Howe (where a dragon guards gold, it seems) and Long Low and Cauldon Low in Staffordshire, where the faeries dance.
Curiously, the faeries aren’t always strict about their dwelling places. However much they may prefer sites with ancient associations, they are known to make do with any suitable mound. Both the aforementioned Pulborough and Burlow Castle in Sussex are, in fact, not prehistoric hills but the remnants of Norman motte and bailey castles. Humans having kindly piled up the earth- and then abandoned the sites, the faeries have moved in- and then will defend what they regard as their property. In County Durham, attempts to remove the old motte at Bishopston were met with a warning voice advising the locals to leave well alone.
Sometimes, the place-name evidence hints at a deeper and more complex story than that passed down to us. At the famous ancient oak wood on Dartmoor, Wistman’s Wood, faeries have been sighted. The name itself doesn’t indicate a wood owned by Mr Wistman, but something much more mysterious or sinister: the first element is the dialect word wisht meaning eerie or uncanny, so that the ‘wisht man’ linked to the spot would seem to be an elf, pixie, or perhaps a demon. Wisht also denotes the mental state of being pixie-led (known as ‘mazey’ in Cornwall) and the wood was identified in 1873 as a haunt of both pixies and derricks (the dwarves of the south-west).
At Horbury in West Yorkshire a hairy boggart with ice-cold skin and glowing eyes was said to attack unwary people. A ‘padfoot‘- a supernatural large dog (which was white instead of the usual black)- would appear as an omen of death, as well as simply scaring people to death. The apparent derivation of the town’s name is from horh-burg (the fort on dirty land) but linguistic expert Eilert Ekwall was reluctant to accept this, given the settlement’s hilltop site; he therefore speculated about its origin being hord-burg- the fort where treasure is concealed- which might well explain the ferocious behaviour of the local beings. Birstall in Leicestershire was named from another burg or fort; perhaps this is why the town is known for the shag dog with glowing mouth that has been sighted there. As we might very well anticipate, at the three Wambarrows in Somerset (it seems they were the ‘womb-like’ mounds) a black hound waylays travellers and protects the hill’s hoard from the greed of treasure hunters.
Cissbury Rings
Other Place Name Evidence
Sometimes, a place name supplements a faery story associated with the place. In other words, rather than being the evidence of a faery connection, the name reinforces the impression that the locale of the account was a place with a genuine and persistent supernatural presence. Many readers may be familiar with the story of the faeries of Inkberrow in Worcestershire who moved away because of the noise from the new church bells. We might well have expected some faery dwelling thereabouts anyway, given that the name derives from an Anglo-Saxon name meaning ‘Inca’s Barrows.’ The ancient burial mounds were evidently a major feature in the landscape during the sixth or seventh centuries when Angles settled there; they very probably guessed too that these were the abode of elves. Rather similar is Harrow Hill near Angmering in Sussex. This is (allegedly) the last place in England where faeries were seen (a debatable claim) but, once again, we could have predicted a supernatural presence by the fact that the Saxon settlers named it after (and, presumably, set up) a hearg- a pagan shrine. They were recognising some numinous quality to the place.
From the Isle of Wight comes a story of a young man who joined a fairy dance on the beach at Puckaster Cove. After a while, he needed a rest and sat on something like a puffball mushroom. It burst under his weight and showered gold dust everywhere, some of which the faeries gave him before he left. Puckaster, as the name suggests, is indeed a faery place name, meaning the ‘tor’ (high rock or hill, as in Torberry) or the steort (a promontory or tail of land) associated with the puca or puckle (that is, with the goblin or puck). Not far away in the same parish is Puckwell Farm, pretty obviously the puca’s spring. It will be evident that Puck had a long association with this area of the Isle of Wight, apparently predating any dancing on the beach.
The Limits of Our Sources
Toponymy can’t answer all our questions, though, because of limitations to the evidence. On the River Teme in Worcestershire there is a spot very closely linked to the local faeries (the so-called farisees). They will mend any broken implements left for them at Osebury or Oseberrow Rock. There seems to be no record of the derivation of this name, although in this case the presence of either burg or beorg as the second element is pretty obvious and correlates with the supernatural connection recorded in folklore.
Another instance of this sometimes frustrating lack of evidence comes from Elbolton Hill in the Craven district of North Yorkshire. This is a very distinctive isolated, round and verdant hill where lights have been seen at night, luring people to join in with the faeries’ dancing. The name may very well not add anything to our knowledge of the spot: the second element is almost certainly botl-tun (village) but we can’t trace the name’s development back sufficiently far to know how it evolved. The earliest record is a tithe award of 1849- by which time the present form was settled. Generally medieval or earlier records are needed to see how a place-name used to be pronounced. The same’s the case on the Isle of Wight: there are several other ‘puck’ place-names, such as Puck Farm, but we can’t confirm their origins because of a lack of records.
British Fairies 