Favorite folk monsters, cryptids, mythical beings, and beasts! .. AND WEAPONS OF LORE.

I am obsessed with fairy tales yet retain more about the critters than the stories in a lot of cases.

Some of my favorites are kelpies, selkies, different interpretations of gnomes and fae and elves. Absolute favorite are carnivorous mer.

All kinds of cryptids fascinate me, even the ones that are Insanely Obviously Made Up On The Spot, but I love out of place/time dinosaurs, humanoids, WhyIsThisNormalCreatureGigantic. I also love when an extinct animal keeps getting spotted, only to be later proven NOT quite extinct yet with documented proof. Or when skeletal remains are misinterpreted as monsters, like cyclopses from mammoths!

There are so many interpretations of actual animals made out like mythical beasts in the distant past because nobody on that continent had ever seen the animal, only interpretations or heard stories. Telephone Game animal creations are fascinating when you sort out what they were originally trying to talk about, especially elephants!

 

My faves: any kind of fae, selkies, mermaids, bigfoot, and basically anything that was on the sci fi channel.

I like the more fantasy-supernatural ones the most though. Stories about ones that range from sweet to trickster to murderous little monster are soooo great :D because theres a bazillion myths for fairies and things. Although I think more predatory, eat-your-face instead of wreck-your-ship mermaids are called merrows. But then generally the sing-y ones are called sirens so are normal fish-beings that just do fish-being stuff called mermaids and if so can they decide to do the siren thing and still be mermaids? is it an occupation/title or are the sirens considered a different species in the myths, or are there only one myth about the creature in each culture and they are either sirens or mermaids?? I think about really convoluted stuff like this, it drives my friends crazy.

 

Oooh, more things to look up. And yes gosh, I like the supernatural ones a good deal as well. Also some of the.. stranger versions of common ones? Like the were that leaves fish for the hungry on their windowsills? I can't remember its name but I remember hearing about him.. Or the beautiful young man covered in diamonds who tempts holy men, if memory serves?

Also dang, why not try writing it out sometimes. Publish a cross reference of this kind of stuff, because you're not the only one who really likes it, but I get really brain fogged and get confused/lost if I get very deep because there's a -lot- of back and forth on some things. (That or even a parody, Job Options For Sirens.)

 

Hmm, might be a thing to do on a rainy day with a mug of tea :D

:o I've not heard of either of them but they sound really interesting

 

And have you seen The Cannibal in the Jungle? I may have the title wrong but it's a recent documentary about a group of scientists/researchers who went into a south american rainforest in the 80s or something to try and find a rare owl and they found all these weird marks on trees and heard these weird noises at night and they went back two years later with a guide to look for the owl again because they didn't get any pictures or recordings or anything of it last time and people thought it was extinct. So they went and they apparently pissed off the local population of frickin' hominids/monkeys because by the end of that trip the guide had died and the other (2? can't remember) researcher had died and only one guy was able to get away and he was chased off in the middle of the night because the hominids were making a hell of a ruckus and finally he made it to a village and told the local police about these hominids in the jungle who killed the rest of his group and ate at least part of one of them and they didn't believe him and he ended up in jail for like..12 or more years? A south american jail, which was really shitty. At least compared to american ones.

So these documentary people went back to the jungle to retrace the researcher's steps and see if they could find out if the guy was innocent and the hominids existed, because his group managed to get recordings and ACTUAL FOOTAGE of the little guys. But the footage had never been gone through appropriately apparently and so it wasn't part of the court proceedings that ended up with him in jail. So they went to the jungle and managed to get recordings of the sounds the hominids made. T least they thought so. And then another few years later after working with the local government and the US government they found the researcher's sister who had a box of the evidence from the trial but she'd never gone through it because it really messed up fear family. I mean you have this great, loving, smart little brother who loved birds and made bird houses and stuff and then you found out that he cannibalized and murdered people? It really screws a family up.

But they managed to get the evidence and the documentary team went through it and it matched up to the guy's story, right down to the footage they managed to get of the rare owl (yay!) to the recordings of the hominids screeching near their campsite at night (creepy) to the hominids themselves (ohgod) and finally

Spoiler: CHRIST ON A CRACKER (tw)

footage of the little hominid shits who'd dug up their guide (because after he died they weren't sure what had caused his death but they were really freaked out but managed to cover his body with stones to make a kind of cairn and put a stick-cross on it) and were eating him and one was throwing a rock down at his head so they could get at his nummy brain and HOLY JESUS gore and creepiness all over this scene, be warned

Parts of this documentary are hells of scary, be warned and watch with the lights on and maybe a pet to cuddle.

The happy part is they take this new evidence around to the people involved with the case and everyone agrees that if they'd known they wouldn't have put him in jail. The not happy part is the guy died in jail a few months before the footage and everything was found :(

I'm pretty sure this was true, at least from the disclaimer shown before and after the film, but I am going to google this right now to check and I'll get back to this thread when I know. But even if it wasn't true, it still makes for a good story and the documentary is really good, I recommend it.

 

It's fictional but based on actual myths and findings. Darn it they made me care about the guy. Oh well.

(Animal Planet stop confusing me with your misleading disclaimers)

 

:DDDDDD This sounds ten kinds of interesting, I'm gonna have to look it up. I don't scare/flinch easily when watching things and I've exhausted my actual stock of horror flicks, so having this on standby may prove a good late night viewin' with some popcorn for me and the hubbo.

 

It is incredibly interesting :D hope you enjoy it. I think they did a good job, obviously ,they got me to believe until a google search XD

 

I like a good fictional beast / monster as well, some authors really have a knack for it.

And looking through medieval bestiaries and other works is fascinating; they were convinced these things were real, and sometimes you can kinda spot what real creature was the inspiration, but game-of-telephone'd into something quite different.

And I love that the platypus was considered a fake by many who saw the first specimen brought back to Europe.

 

I looooove wendigo myths, they're just so spooky, esp considered in the context of wild thing in pre-colonial Americas, lurks in woods, very Pan-like in terms of fear and panic and all that jazz. Good shit.

 

Me and my dad have a family bonding through mothman jokes thing, it's great.
I really like selkies, just because.

 

I remember reading about the werewolves who leave fish on the windowsills of poor families! Faoladh in Irish myth, I think, and there's versions of it up in the Shetlands and Orkneys too, maybe? And thinking of the Orkneys, the nuckelavee is a wonderfully horrific beast.

When I was a kid, we had a book called A Promise Is A Promise, about Inuit monsters called qallupilluit that come up from under the ice and steal children who've wandered away from their parents.

 

*crashes into the thread like the motherfucking kool-aid man*

LEANAN-SIDHES BITCHES. For the unaware the leanan-sidhe is a type of Fae. Specifically they are exceptionally beautiful women of the Fair Folk who take artists, and particularly poets, for lovers. While the poets' lives are cut dramatically they gain an exceptional amount of imbas in exchange, the divine inspiration. All their work from that point on is glorious and inspired and wondrous. Now as for why the poets die that varies. In some cases it's because the women are vampiric in nature and are sucking away their lovers' life force. In others it's because wow shit fairy taxes came up and I can't pay. SORRY BOYFRIEND DUDE BUT I HAVE TO SELL YOU INTO SLAVERY TO KEEP THE HOUSE. Sometimes they just make the girl made and she kills him or something. I also like to think of the poets just being driven to a madness so strong that they just. Wither away. They're stuck in such a state of emotional frenzy that they just fade away and burn out in like maybe 3 years at best.

Love is best when it's killing you.

 

OH. OH. I forgot about my favorite reason they kill their lovers. Namely the idea that the Fair Folk take the humans that they're fond of and that they talk to a lot. So the poet goes off with his lover into the bogs or onto a hill and then she kills him and places him in a fairy body like her own. And they go off to Otherworld together to live long and blissful lives with the best ale in all existence. They love them so much that they spirit them away so they can sing for them forever. This is exceptionally romantic and also cute.

 

That just reminds me of how much I love changelings, and that trepidation in stories over 'shit this person/baby is acting weird as fuck, I think they're not the original DDDDDDD: Just gonna have to deal I guess, that ship had fucking sailed and they're never coming back' versus "this person is acting strange. QUICK, KILL IT SO WE GET THE ORIGINAL BACK."

I also love Will 'o The Wisps!

 

Is this the thread where legendary weapons go, as well? Like the venomous spear Birgha, with the forty rivets of Arabian gold in her socket, that had to be kept chained to the wall with her head in a bucket of water and a blanket over her, just to keep her from getting up and killing people out of spite? (and also because the head gave off such a terrifying stench that having it near your face would keep you awake through magic Sidhe music that was putting everyone in the whole palace to sleep.)

 

IT SURE AS HELL IS NOW :chinhands: :DDD

 

LUGH'S SPEARS YO. Also his son's spear. The fucking thing has to be doused in a river to keep it from burning the wielder. It's that badass.

 

And Gae Bolg, the Deadly Spear, that if thrown properly exploded into thorn vines running all through its victim's veins and arteries. And Gae Buidhe, the Yellow Spear of Diarmuid ua Duibhne (aka The Unluckiest Bastard In All Of Irish Mythology, but that's another story) that left wounds that couldn't be healed, ever, by any means.

But anyway, Birgha! Birgha belonged, at first, to a Lord of the Sidhe named Aillen mac Midna, who was not a nice man at all. Eventually Birgha was stolen by Uail mac Baiscne, and when the sons of Morna were hunting him he gave it to his comrade Fiacuil, a big boisterous bear of a man, and after the sons of Morna had found and killed Uail, Fiacuil took to the hills and became a robber, living in a cave. In the mean time, Aillen mac Midna had developed a charming habit of coming out of his Sidhe every Samhain, and lulling all the inhabitants of the High King's palace at Tara to sleep with his music, and then burning the place down. The High King, Conn of the Hundred Battles (and given that the High King of Ireland had to be without mark or blemish anywhere on his body, that's kind of fucking saying something there) offered a reward to anyone who could prevent his palace from being burned, but no one could withstand the magic of Aillen's music.
All this time, Uail's son Fionn was growing up under the tutelage of his aunt, the druid Bodhmal, and her wife, the warrior woman Lia Luachra. (okay the version I read had them as "lifelong companions" and maybe I'm just reading things into things, but given that a lot of these were collected and set down in print by Victorians and all, I'm going with "wife") When he grew to be a strapping youth, and the sons of Morna were starting to close in on their hiding place deep in the forest, he set out to find a new place so they would have to search for him all over again, and on his way he found the robber Fiacuil. Fiacuil recognised him instantly as the son of his friend and took him in and trained him even more in all the arts of fighting and hiding that a warrior and robber could need.
When Fionn had grown to be a man he set out for Tara, and he arrived about the feast of Samhain, and volunteered to defend it against Aillen mac Midna. As he stood guard, Fiacuil came to him with Birgha, and told him how its stench would keep him awake, and then left again in a hurry, for even such a great robber as Fiacuil was afraid to be about on the night of Samhain. Fionna stood with the flat of the blade against his forehead, and indeed, Aillen mac Midna's music could not lull him to sleep. When Aillen had played his music and blew a jet of flame at the palace, Fionn caught it in his cloak and it vanished, for he had learned a thing or two from his aunt. Aillen realised that something was amiss and turned to flee, but Fionn flung Birgha and struck him square between the shoulderblades, and that was the end of Aillen mac Midna and his burnings of Tara. And that is the story of how Aillen mac Midna got his spear back and how Fionn mac Uail won the leadership of the Fianna of Ireland that had been his father's before him.

 

Lugh's stuff is best though because he's fucking Lugh Lamhfhada. He is also the best mythical being. Because seriously. Look at that man. He can do all the stuff. Not just competently but masterfully. He is also exceptionally devoted to those he cares for and family in particular. Lugh devoted an entire day to his foster mother, allowed his son the rest he needed, killed his grandfather to avenge the death of Nuada, and horribly tortured and destroyed an entire family out of revenge for killing his father. He invented fidchell and is the foster son of Manannán so he must have a damned fine sense of humor. When he wars thunder crashes and he kicks up his great winds, but he also gives us light rains. Lugh is splendid and magnificent. He is the spear-wielder and the stone-flinger, the story-teller and the poet, the knower of herbs and the healer, the game-maker and prank-master, the son of Ethliu and the father of Cú Chulainn. He is the master of all skills and former High King of Ireland.

And I love him so dearly. With such an intensity that it makes me cry out of sheer awe.

LUGH MAC ETHLINN AN ILDANACH.