It’s time for fun! Whether you want to create a character for a story or you need to come up with a party game or a way to entertain the kids on a rainy day, this week’s post is for you. I’ve written several posts about Celtic folklore characters because they’re just so varied and cool! This week, I thought it would be fun to explore how to create a new character inspired by Celtic folklore.
Why would you want to do that? Well, perhaps you’re a writer like me and need a springboard to help you develop a character. Or maybe you are having a party and want an idea for a fun yet different party game. (And if you just want to do this for fun to entertain yourself, I won’t tell anyone.)
Below, I have three lists: Benevolent Faeries, Scary Faeries, and Lesser-known Faeries. Look at the characteristics of each, then mix and match to create a whole new character.
To do this as a party game, you could write the characteristics on individual slips of paper and put the slips in a bowl. Have each person pull a few slips from the bowl and give them a time limit (say ten minutes) to create the character from the characteristics. The players can add physical features and behaviors from their own imagination too. Each player should give the new creation a name. Whoever creates the most intriguing, coolest character wins!
Ready? Here are the lists:
Benevolent Faeries
(Note: no faerie is entirely benevolent. They’re capricious, easily insulted, and respond by cursing the offending human.)
Irish Trooping Faeries / Scottish Faeries of the Seelie Court: These faeries look like humans and don’t have wings (most Celtic faeries don’t.) Although they are usually small in stature, they can glamour (appear different than they actually are: big when they’re small, beautiful when they’re ugly, young when they’re old, and so on). These faeries enjoy life, traveling around the countryside in processions. At night, they party—feasting, making music, and dancing. While they tend to take little notice of humans, they sometimes play tricks on them or even invite them to join in their revels. That rarely ends well for the human.
The Welsh Telewyth Teg are similar. They like to ride horses in faerie processions and dance outside on moonlit nights dressed in flowing robes. Generally, they are kindly disposed towards humans and enjoy staying in their homes overnight, especially if the home is well-kept and there is an offering of cream for the Fair Folk (though most faeries would prefer something stronger). But not all the members of the Telewyth Teg are friendly. Click the link at the bottom of this page to read my post on the five different types.
Leprechauns and Clurichauns: Leprechauns are small-sized, industrious shoemakers. Note: they are not dwarves or gnomes. According to Irish folklore, leprechauns are faeries. They tend to keep to themselves and prefer to avoid humans, but sometimes, they enjoy playing tricks on humans. Leprechauns are blarney experts and can talk their way in or out of anything. If you capture or corner them, they will promise you anything in order to get away. Don’t believe a word! And if they give you silver or gold to appease you (and get away), after they’re gone, the money will turn to ashes.
Clurichauns, cousins to the leprechauns, don’t like to work. They prefer to take up residence in your wine cellar and get drunk. At night, they steal livestock, go for wild rides through the countryside, make messes, and create chaos. This is not malicious; they’re just having a good time.
Scottish Brownies and the Irish Grogoch: Short-statured domestic faeries, they take up residence in human homes and like to be helpful. Brownies work at night while the family sleeps, washing dishes, cleaning, the house, and so on. They are reputed to be quietly efficient. The Grogoch similarly tries to help—and he means well—but he is in the daytime, getting underfoot, being clumsy, breaking dishes (accidentally), and making a blame nuisance of himself. He’s a rather filthy-looking too—naked and hairy with leaves and debris stuck in his tangled hair. You can get rid of him (carefully!) by offering him a gift of clothes. This usually will get him to leave forever. You also can offer clothes to Brownies, who will be insulted and leave. But this is risky as some Brownies respond to this gift by staying then, each night, they tear up the house and break things. Insulting a faerie is always a risky business!
Puca: Mischievous but usually not malevolent, the Puca is a trickster. He enjoys giving humans incorrect directions then watching them get lost. But if a Puca takes a liking to a particular human, he can be quite helpful, a kind friend, and a wise advisor. Pucas are shapeshifters, so they can take any form they like. Usually, however, they will appear as animals. When they appear in human form, they often will have some animal feature, such a rabbit ears or a cat’s tail.
Scary Faeries
Banshees: Despite what American pop culture might say, Banshees are not predatory hags who kill people with their screams. I might have put them on the “Benevolent Faeries” list if it weren’t for one thing: they’re messengers of death. But they neither bring nor cause the death of humans. They warn of it. And they grieve about it by wailing. That’s what banshees do. They wail in grief. At times, they also magically assist humans they like.
Banshees don’t always look like ugly hags. Sometimes they appear as beautiful young women. At other times, they look like mature, dignified women of noble bearing. To find out more about banshees, read my post, “The Banshee and the Blarney Stone.”
Bean Nighe: Similar to the banshee, the Scottish Bean Nighe warns of death. She always appears as an old hag washing bloody clothes in a stream. If they’re your clothes, the warning is for you. She beats the clothes with a stick and, if you get too close to her, she’ll hit you with the stick. As a result, whatever part of your body is hit will be paralyzed. This is a faerie you will want to steer clear of.
Cat Sith (Scottish) / Cat Sidhe (Irish): This faerie appears in the form of a black cat. Its preferred occupation is to go into bedrooms where someone is laid out for a wake. The faerie walks over the corpse to steal away the person’s soul. On Samhain’s Eve (Oct. 31st), this faerie goes from house to house. If the family has left out a bowl of cream for the faerie, the Cat Sith will bless the household. If they’ve neglected this offering, they can expect to be cursed with lifelong misfortune.
Cu Sith (Scottish) / Cu Sidhe (Irish): This faerie dog is the size of a calf and covered in shaggy green fur. The Cu Sith’s long tail is curled upward and its hair often is braided. In the lore, it is a silent hunter that stalks the highlands. When it finds its quarry, the faerie dog lets out three long bays. Anyone who hasn’t reached a safe shelter by the third one will die.
Sluagh Sidhe: Among the most terrifying of Celtic faeries, this faerie collective looks like a murder of crows or a swarm of bats flying in the night sky. Up close, though, they have a skeletal human form with only bits of flesh hanging from their bones. A few strands of dark hair hang from their skulls. Pointed teeth protrude from their beak-like mouths. Their hands and feet are nothing more than bony claws. They have large, bat-like wings. When closed and held around the body, these wings resemble a cloak. They fly into sickrooms to suck out the souls of the sick.
Celtic Creatures and Lesser-known Faeries
The Blue Men of Minch: In the channel waters between the Scottish mainland and the Outer Hebrides, live the Blue Men. They are exclusively male and physically resemble humans in every way except for their blue skin. They spend their time floating in the water, swimming, or sleeping. When they swim, they keep their torsos above water, then leap into the air and dive like dolphins. When a ship enters the channel, the chief of the Blue Men will call to its captain two lines of poetry and challenge the captain to complete the quatrain. If the captain fails to do so competently, the Blue Men will destroy the ship and its crew, laughing, and often using their chief talent: the ability to create storms.
Arkan Sonney
A pig-shaped faerie from the Isle of Man. It is a good omen just to see this white pig. Catching it brings even better luck. Folklore says, if you catch it, a silver coin will appear in your pocket.
Afanc
The Afanc is a giant predatory beaver that inhabits Welsh lakes. Laugh if you will, but this beaver is far from cute and cuddly. It will attack and destroy anyone who trespasses in its waters, whether swimming or fishing (or just dangling a toe).
So, there are the lists. Here are three examples of how to create a new Celtic faerie or folklore creature by mixing and matching elements.
1) Muckie (moo-key from the Scots Gaelic and Irish word for “pig”: muc). He is a faerie pig who takes up residence in your basement, gets drunk every night, then runs amuck through the house, breaking things and making a mess. But you put up with this because he can speak and gives you good advice on investments and life in general.
2) Curiad (from the Welsh for beat): a magical giant-sized beaver who appears at your house whenever someone’s in danger of dying. He warns the family by beating his large tail against the ground with a steady rhythm.
3) Caoimhe (kweeva a wonderful Irish name meaning beautiful and noble): A faerie woman (based on a banshee) who is either mature and noble or young and exquisitely beautiful. She appears to those humans she chooses and tells them there is a pot of gold hidden in the forest (leprechaun vibes). Once in the forest (which is misty and mysterious), she gives them a series of directions which will send them in the wrong direction and / or into obstacles (Puca). Depending on how the human behaves (and how Caoimhe feels), ultimately a) the human will find the gold as a reward, b) find the gold but it will turn to dust, or) be lost in the forest forever.
So, there you have it—a way to use Celtic folklore to create new characters as a party game or for fiction stories. Have fun with it! Note: There are more Celtic faeries than the ones I’ve listed, such as Kelpies and Silkies, so check out some of my many posts on the subject. Here are just a few links.
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Slán go fóill
All artwork for this post (except for the Ukranian flag and the GIF) by Christine Dorman via Bing Image Creator.
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