Fairy Women of Scotland

There are many similarities to be found in the fairy lore of Scotland, no doubt due to the migration of peoples back and forth between Scotland and Ireland. Most people know about the last wave of Gaelic incomers into Scotland from Ireland in the fifth century, but for many centuries before this the Irish were intermarrying with the Cruithne (Picts) of Scotland and this is mentioned in some early texts. Thus there has been a long interchange between the two lands which has led to a mingling of folklore and belief.

The most well known of the fairy women both in Ireland and Scotland has to be the Bean Sidhe, the Banshee. In Ireland she is the ancestress of the old aristocratic families, the Irish clans. When any death or misfortune is about to occur in the family, she will be heard wailing her unearthly lament. It was considered something of a status symbol to have a banshee attached to your family! She is more often heard than seen, though if you do catch sight of her she may be combing her long hair with a silver comb. She is also known as the bean chaointe, the wailing woman, and also as badhbh chaointe. Badhbh is the Irish for a scald crow, but more interestingly it is the name of one of the Celtic war goddesses who would shriek over the battlefields in the form of a crow.

In the Highlands of Scotland this type of banshee is known as the bean tighe, the fairy housekeeper, or in some places as the Glaistig Uaine, the Green Lady, who is often sighted in the rooms and the grounds of the old castles of the Scottish clans, keeping watch over everything. There is also the wilder type of banshee found in the remoter places. This type of banshee wanders through the woods and over the moors at dusk, luring travellers to their doom.

The gruagach is the fairy woman who watches over the cattle fold at night and protects the goodness of the milk. On Skye, Tiree and other islands are to be found 'gruagach stones', stones with hollows in where libations of milk were poured as an offering to her. If this daily offering was neglected, the best cow of the fold would be found dead in the morning. The Book of Arran mentions such a gruagach who minded the cattle in the district of Kilmory.

There are many stories of sidhe women who help households with spinning, housework, threshing corn and so on. However, if they are interfered with in any way, even by the offering of a present, they will never return again. Alexander Carmichael mentions the 'bean chaol a chot uaine 's na gruaige buidhe', the slender woman of the green kirtle and yellow hair, who can turn water into wine and weave spider's webs into plaide, and play sweet music on the fairy reed.

We also find in Scotland the dreaded bean nighe, otherwise known as the Washer at the Ford. She may be seen at midnight washing the death shirt of someone about to die. Usually the person who meets her knows that it is his own fate that she foretells. As she washes she sings a dirge: "Se do leine, se do leine ga mi nigheadh" (It is your shirt, your shirt that I am washing).

Many spirits of rivers and mountains in Scotland appear in the shape of an old hag, the Cailleach. The most famous is the Cailleach bheara who washes her clothes in the whirlpool of the Corryvreckan off Jura, and rides across the land in the form of the 'night mare'.

There is another sidhe being that is mentioned in the writings of Fiona MacLeod and is greatly feared among the Gaels. He is the Amadan Dubh, the Fairy Fool, bringer of madness and oblivion. Sometimes he appears as a darkly clad figure on the slope of a hill after sunset, playing on his reed pipes a fairy enchantment.

We may conclude, then, that within the fairy lore of Scotland and Ireland are to be found the remnants of the old pagan religion, with gods and goddesses being remembered as the guardian ancestors of the clans. In fact, all the clans once claimed descent from a particular deity, so this is nothing new. The old gods still appear in local tales, as kings and queens of fairy palaces, or as guardians of lakes. In other words, they are still very much part of the land and the folk memory of the people. Belief in the sidhe has been steadily diminishing, however, not least through the decline in the Gaelic language, and with it so many of the folk tales that were only ever told in the Gaelic. It is sad that the attitude of so many people of today is that these tales are merely children's stories, to be put aside when we grow older and wiser in years. How far from the truth this is, if only they could see it. The fairies are the elemental powers of the land, the ancient Earth Shapers who live in the hollow hills, to whom the world of Mankind is but a dream...

Hyperspace Celtics

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