The figures beneath each entry give reference numbers for the Bibliography
From ancient times there have been traditions of mortals carried away into Fairyland (Otherworld), or detained there if they ventured into a fairy hill and were inveigled into tasting fairy food or drink, and so partaking of the fairy nature. An early example is the story of Malekin given in the Medieval Cronicle of Ralph of Coggeshall. Here we have an example of the most common form of captive, a mortal changeling, stolen from his mother's side while she was working in the fields, and apparently believing that he had a chance of regaining his freedom every seven years. These little captives, fed from infancy on fairy food and cosseted by fairy mothers, would presumably be accepted in the end as full fairies. There was, however, a more sinister reason given for their capture; it was said both in Scotland and Ireland that, once in a seven years, the fairies had to pay a tribute to Hell, and that they preferred to sacrifice mortals rather than their own kind. It will be remembered that in the ballad of Thomas the Rhymer, the Queen of Elfland had some fears that Thomas might be chosen for the Teind.
According to Lady Wilde, young men are often lured away if they are gifted with powers of song and music, as Thomas the Rhymer was, or especially handsome ones are desired as lovers by fairy princesses. Women, however, are in much more danger of capture by the fairies than men. Nursing mothers are in great demand to suckle fairy babies (for the quality of fairy milk seems to be poor), and the time between child-birth and churching is one of great danger. There are many stories of precautions successfully taken, or of the attempted rescue of wives from the power of the fairies. Sometimes the fairies were intercepted as they were carrying off their victim and never got into Fairyland with her. 'The Laird of Balmachie's wife' is an example of this and an exposure of the fairy method of capture. Sometimes the victim was successfully rescued, as in Scott's story of MARY NELSON.
But there were tragic stories of failure in the attempt. One among many is the tale of THE LOTHIAN FARMER'S WIFE which Douglas tells in SCOTTISH FAIRY AND FOLK TALES, when the husband made an attempt to rescue his wife from the Fairy Rade (an attempt which had succeeded with Young Tamlane): The wife of a farmer in Lothian had been carried off by the fairies, and, during the year of probation, repeatedly appeared on Sunday, in the midst of her children, combing their hair. On one of these occasions she was accosted by her husband; when she related to him the unfortunate event which had separated them, instructed him by what means he might win her, and exhorted him to exert all his courage, since her temporal and eternal happiness depended on the success of his attempt. The farmer, who ardently loved his wife, set out on Hallowe'en, and, in the midst of a plot of furze, waited impatiently for the procession of the fairies. At the ringing of the fairy bridles, and the wild, unearthly sound which accompanied the cavalcade, his heart failed him, and he suffered the ghostly train to pass by without interruption. When the last rode past, the whole troop vanished, with loud shouts of laughter and exultation; among which he plainly discovered the voice of his wife, lamenting that he had lost her for ever.
The capture of beautiful young women to be brides to fairy kings or princes was almost as common as that of nursing mothers, and these seem often to have been the patients for whom fairy midwives were called out. A very clear example of this is J. Rhys' story of Eilian of Garth Dorwen. Here the fairy's bride went willingly and had always had something uncanny about her. Her Golden Hair made her particularly attractive to the fairies. There was no need to rescue her. This is the most complete Midwife to the Fairies Story that we possess. Lady Wilde's ETHNA THE BRIDE is a representative of a Fairy Theft of a young bride and of her rescue out of Fairyland. The classic Irish story of Midhir and Etain is the epic version of the tale, and the medieval King Orfeo, in which Hades becomes Fairyland, follows something on the same lines. The Cornish FAIRY DWELLING ON SELENA MOOR tells of the failure to rescue a human captive, but here the girl seems kept as a nursemaid rather than a bride. Again the eating of fairy food was her undoing. One aspect of the fairy captives is of especial interest and that is the friendly warning they often give to humans who have inadvertently strayed into Fairyland. In THE TACKSMAN OF AUCHRIACHAN it is a neighbour supposed to have been recently dead who warns him of his danger, hides him and helps him to escape. Often the midwife is advised by her patient what to do for her safety.
As a rule this patient is a captive bride, and one can presume that it is so in Lady Wilde's story of THE DOCTOR AND THE FAIRY PRINCESS. In the Irish tales there are many examples of a 'red-haired man' who intervenes to rescue people enticed into Fairyland, and who is supposed to be a mortal captive there. One example is perhaps enough, drawn from Lady Wilde's ANCIENT LEGENDS OF IRELAND, VOL. I. It is about a girl who was enticed into a fairy dance, and, after dancing with the prince, she was led down to a gorgeous banquet: She took the golden cup the prince handed to her, and raised it to her lips to drink. Just then a man passed close to her, and whispered, 'Eat no food, and drink no wine, or you will never reach your home again.' So she laid down the cup, and refused to drink. On this they were angry, and a great noise arose, and a fierce, dark man stood up, and said - 'Whoever comes to us must drink with us.' And he seized her arm, and held the wine to her lips, so that she almost died of fright. But at that moment a red-haired man came up, and he took her by the hand and led her out. 'You are safe for this time,' he said. 'Take this herb, and hold it in your hand till you reach home, and no one can harm you.' And he gave her a branch of the plant called Athair-Luis (the ground ivy). This she took, and fled away along the sward in the dark night: but all the time she heard footsteps behind her in pursuit. At last she reached home and barred the door, and went to bed, when a great clamour arose outside, and voices were heard crying to her 'The power we have over you is gone through the magic of the herb; but wait - when you dance again to the music on the hill, you will stay with us for evermore, and none shall hinder.' However, she kept the magic branch safely, and the fairies never troubled her more; but it was long and long before the sound of the fairy music left her ears which she had danced to that November night on the hillside with her fairy lover.
Thomas the Rhymer is the one mortal-born inhabitant of Fairyland who appears again and again as the leader and counsellor of the fairies, and seems to have no backward looks towards Middle Earth and no remorse for human mortals. Thomas of Ercildoune actually lived in Scotland in the late Middle Ages, and the very tree where he met the Fairy Queen is still pointed out.
Robert Kirk, the seventeenthcentury author of THE SECRET COMMONWEALTH, was another who was believed to have been carried into a fairy hill, the Fairy Knowe at Aberfoyle. He was an unwilling prisoner and was thought to be held because of his betrayal of fairy secrets. It will be seen that various motives were ascribed for captures of mortals: the acquisition of bond-slaves, amorousness, the enrichment brought by musical talent, human milk for fairy babies, but perhaps the chief motive was to inject the dwindling stock with fresh blood and human vigour.
# 100 - 130 - 192 - 201 - 370 - 554 - 728
The marriage of a human man with a fairy wife seems generally to have been a marriage by capture, except for the Gwrachs of Wales, who generally yielded to wooing. Like the captured brides, however, they imposed a taboo, which was in the end always violated. Wild Edric is an early example of a captured fairy bride, complete with the taboo and the wife's final return to Fairyland. Many other wives are Selkies or Seal Maidens, captured by the theft of their seal skins. When, after years of married life, they regain their skins, they hurry down to the sea at once. Ralph of Coggeshall's early tale of the Green Children is an unusual one of fairies captured, for of the pair, the boy pined and died and the girl never went back to her subterranean land, but married and lived on like a mortal, keeping still some of the fairy wantonness. There are scattered tales all over the country of the capture of the small helpless fairies, most of whom escape in the long run. The most famous of these are the Leprachauns. The man who is bold enough to seize one hopes to threaten him into surrendering his pot of gold, for the Leprachaun is a hoarder, but there has been no recorded case of success. The rule first laid down by Kirk that a fairy can only be seen between two blinks of an eye holds good with him. However fast your grip, you must keep your eye on him through rough and smooth, or he will slip between your fingers like water. Perhaps the same rule held good for the pixy at the Ovkerry, of whom William Crossing wrote in his TALES OF DARTMOOR PIXIES. An old woman who lived on the Moors was going home with an empty basket from the market after selling her goods. When she got near the bridge which spans Blackabrook at the Ockerry a small figure leapt on to the road and began capering in front of her. He was about eighteen inches high, and she recognized him as a pixy. She paused for a moment, wondering if she should turn back for fear of being Pixy-Led; but she remembered that her family would be waiting for her, and pressed steadily on. When she got to the bridge the pixy turned and hopped towards her, and she suddenly stooped down, picked him up, popped him into her empty basket and latched down the lid, for she thought to herself that instead of the pixy leading her she would lead the pixy. The little fellow was too tall to leap about in the basket, but he began to talk and scold in an unknown gibberish, while she hurried proudly home, longing to show her catch to the family. After a time the stream of gabbling stopped, and she thought he might be sullen or asleep. She thought she would take a peep at him, and lifted a corner of the lid very cautiously, but there was no sight or feel of him, he was gone like a piece of dried foam. No harm seems to have come to her, and, in spite of losing him, she felt proud of her exploit.
I Skillywidden and Coleman Gray tell of little fairies who were carried into human houses but got back to their own family in the end. In the sadder tale of BROTHER MIKE the little captive never escaped, but pined and died. Ruth Tongue has a story of a rather rare waterspirit, an ASRAI, who pined and melted away under the heat of the sun like a stranded jelly-fish when a fisherman caught it and tried to bring it home to sell. Most of these fairies, great or small, seem powerless to avenge the wrong offered to them, though other fairies avenge much more trifling injuries with Blights and Illnesses, or even death.
# 86 - 100 - 167 - 540
Son of Bran; rules Britain in his father's absence.
# 562
King of Vannes and Nantes, who married the unfaithful Ysaive, niece of Arthur. See: CARADOC BRIEFBRAS.
# 156
His epithet 'briefbras' (short arm) is a pseudo-translation into French of Welsh 'freichfras' (strong-armed). In the romances, he was the son of Eliavres the wizard and Ysaive, wife of King Caradoc of Vannes and Nantes. When Caradoc Briefbras confronted Eliavres about his parentage, Eliavres and Ysaive caused a serpent to twine around his arm and it took the combined efforts of his wife, Guignier, and her brother, Cador, to rid him of it. When King Mangoun of Moraine sent him a horn to expose any infidelity on the part of the wife of him who drank from it, Caradoc's draught showed his wife to be faithful. In Welsh tradition Caradoc's wife was Tegau Eurfon, his father Llyr Marini, his son Meuric and his steed Lluagor. He was the legendary ancestor of the ruling house of Morgannwg and may have founded the kingdom of Gwent in the fifth century.
# 156 - 604
Also called the King of Carados, he was one of those kings who rebelled against Arthur at the outset of his reign. B. Saklatvala (# 574) identifies him with the Saxon leader Cerdic.
# 156 - 574
He had an enchantress for a mother. He captured Gawain and lodged him in a dungeon. Lancelot slew him, striking off his head with the only sword which could kill him, and Gawain and other prisoners were thus freed. Carados was the brother of Sir Turquine.
# 156 - 418
(Sixth century) He was possibly of Welsh origin. Arthur had taken possession of his floating altar, which had gone astray, but he returned it when Carannog drove off a serpent at the king's behest.
# 26 - 156
A historical personage, King of the Catuvellani, a tribe of Britons who lived in the vicinity of modern-day St Albans, at the time of the Roman invasion of Britain in AD 43. He led a hard-fought anti-Roman campaign, but was eventually handed over to his foes by Cartimandua, Queen of the Brigantes. He was then pardoned by the Emperor Claudius. E. Ratcliffe (# 542) argues that the stories of Caratacus became misplaced in folklore and that he was the original of Arthur. A somewhat similar argument is advanced by J. Whitehead. Both Ratcliffe and I. H. Elder regard Caratacus as identical with Arviragus, while E. R. Capt avers that he was Arviragus' cousin.
# 156 - 542 - 726
This castle contained the Palace Adventurous, wherein was the Grail.
# 156
A knight who was brought up secretly after his father, Dondinello, had been poisoned. He went to Arthur's court and then on a quest to succour Beatrice who, with her subjects, had been turned into animals by a wizard. Carduino slew the wizard and restored Beatrice to her former shape by kissing her. They married.
# 156 - 238
Reputed father of Tuan.
# 562
In Thomas's TRISTAN, a knight in love with Iseult who told her that Tristan had married Iseult of the White Hands.
# 156
A giant who was host to Gawain, Kay and Bishop Baldwin. He had become a giant because of a spell which was broken when, at his own behest, his head was duly cut off by Gawain. Gawain married his daughter. Arthur knighted him and made him Lord of Carlisle. He became a Knight of the Round Table.
# 156 - 401
A race or nation. In Irish romance, the King's son, the Black Knight, became one of Arthur's knights and was killed by the Knight of the Lantern.
# 156
At Carnac, Brittany, the Ménec alignment, made after 2500 BC with over a thousand stones, is set with two other alignments in a crowded landscape of dolmens (burial chambers), menhirs (single stones) and cromlechs (groups of stones). The stones are regimented, probably for ritual; but each stone is individual, with an overwhelming personality. At the culmination of the alignments are the presumed stones of sacrifice. Surveys in the 1970s Professor Thom argued for two important astronomical observatories near Carmac. He concluded that the Manio and Grand Menhir Brisé menhirs had been erected as foresights towards the eight major risings and settings of the moon. Several sites, he believed, could have been the backsights
from which observers would have seen these lunar events. Omitted from the gazetteer are some non-megalithic (or non-existing) sites. There are good reasons for doubting the astronomical function of many stones in the two 'observatories'. Not to be forgotten in this prehistoric wonderland is the museum at Carnac-ville. The objects on display, from the flints and the pots to the casts of carved stones, are vividly revealing of the lives of the people who erected and used the menhirs, the rows and the tombs.
# 117 - 342
In Welsh folk belief Arthur was buried under the cairn in Snowdonia.
# 156
Arthur's dagger.
# 156 -346
Earliest home of mountain Celts was ranges of the Carpathians.
# 562
King of Recesse, the brother of King Claudas, he waged war against Arthur, until Gawain persuaded him to stop.
# 153 - 156
Celts conquered Spain from the Carthaginians. Greeks break monopoly of trade of the Carthaginians, with Britain and Spain.
# 562
In the works of Torquato Tasso (1544-95) the Italian poet, a daughter of Morgan Le Fay.
# 156
Son of a minstrel of the Danaan Folk; Cas'corach and St. Patrick.
# 562
Son of Aminabad and ancestor of Arthur according to the pedigree provided by John of Glastonbury. See: GARCELOS, and MANAEL.
# 156 - 344
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