Fairy Customs and Protections
- Item sets
- Folklore
- Name
- Fairy Customs and Protections
- Description
- A system of domestic customs designed to maintain good relations with the fairy world. A fire was kept burning in the house through the night so the fairies might come in and enjoy it. Bread was left out for them. Water crocks were filled with clean water before bed, used by the fairies for bathing and thrown out in the morning, never used for any other purpose. Women would not spin on Saturday evenings as this displeased the Mooinjer Veggey. At every baking and churning a small piece of dough and butter was stuck on the wall for fairy consumption. The mountain ash or cuirn, in the form of a cross made without a knife, was placed over the threshold. Yellow flowers growing in a hedge offered protection. These were not quaint survivals. They were practical measures in a world where the fairy folk were neighbours.
- Place
- Isle of Man
- Period
- Celtic and Pre-Norse Period
- Norse Kingdom of Mann and the Isles
- The Stanley Lordship
- The Trading Era
- Type
- Custom
- Protective Practice
- Source
- Moore, Folk-lore (1891), Ch. III
- Waldron