Читать книгу THE ELEMENT ENCYCLOPEDIA OF FAIRIES: An A-Z of Fairies, Pixies, and other Fantastical Creatures - Lucy Cooper - Страница 33

In Welsh tradition, fairyland was once located in the Vale of Neath, in Glamorganshire. A certain steep and rugged crag there, Craig y Ddinas, bears a distinctly awful reputation as a stronghold of the fairy tribe. Its caves and crevices are said to have been their favorite haunt for many centuries, and some believe the last fairy court in Wales was held upon this rock before the Welsh fairies vanished.

Other fairy places include:

Silbury Hill in Wiltshire, where King Sil is said to be buried, wearing his golden armor and sitting astride his steed.

Bryn Yr Ellyllon, “Hill of the Goblins,” near Mold in Clyd Flint, Wales, where an apparition clad in golden armor is said to haunt the hillside. An archeological dig here in the 1800s unearthed a skeleton and gold corselet.

The Rollright Stones in Oxfordshire. The Oxfordshire fairies were last said to be seen here before they vanished.

Glastonbury Tor, Somerset, where St. Collen saw through the fairy glamor of Gwyn ap Nudd’s fairy palace.

Maes-Howe in the Orkneys and New Grange at Boyne, chambered mounds once home to Fians and Picts and later known as fairy mounds or forts.

Tomnahurich Hill, a round, tree-covered hill on the outskirts of Inverness, in Scotland, has long been famed as a haunt of the fairies. In Popular Superstitions and Festive Amusements of the Highlanders of Scotland (1823), Grant Stewart recounts the tale of two fiddlers enticed into the fairy hill.

Two traveling fiddlers came to Inverness one Christmas seeking work. A strangely dressed old wizened gentleman requested that they perform at a gathering that evening and offered them handsome pay. They set out in high spirits, but when they arrived at their destination it appeared more like a rough tower than a fine castle. However, their host reassured them and persuaded them to enter.

Once inside, all misgivings vanished, for never had they seen a more sumptuously furnished hall or a more elegant assembly of guests. They played all night, never growing tired and performing a succession of jigs and reels for the eager dancers.

When morning came, they only wished the night had lasted longer, such was the revelry that they had enjoyed. Their host paid them well, thanked them, and bid them farewell.

But when the fiddlers left the great hall, outside everything was changed. To their consternation, they found that the great tower they had exited was no more than a low hill. When they made their way into Inverness, there were buildings where once there had been trees and fields, and the inhabitants of the town, dressed in strange, fantastical clothes, poked fun at their old-fashioned rags.

A crowd gathered around the musicians and an old man hobbled up and questioned them.

“I know who you are,” he declared, “you are the two men who lodged with my great-grandfather and who, it was supposed, were decoyed by Thomas the Rhymer to Tomnahurich Hill. Sore did your friends lament your loss, but a hundred years have passed since then, and your very names are forgot.”

The fiddlers believed the old man’s story and were glad to have come out from the fairy hill alive. The church bells began to ring and they went to church to give thanks for their safe return. However, when the minister uttered the first word of scripture, they crumbled to dust.

Some say that Thomas the Rhymer (see here), the mortal musician whisked away by the Queen of Elfland, still lives, or sleeps, beneath Tomnahurich Hill.

Rusalka Lake in the Czech countryside, near the town of Pribram, was the inspiration for the composer Dvorak’s opera Rusalka. Based on folk beliefs about the water sprite Rusalka, it tells the story of her unhappy love affair with a mortal man. The composer’s house, Vysoka mansion, is nearby, and is now a museum.

Yoro waterfall, located on the slopes of the Tagi mountain in Mino province, Japan, is known as a magical Fountain of Youth. According to Japanese legend, a woodcutter discovered the waterfall’s youth-giving properties.

The woodcutter lived with his elderly father the mountains. One cold winter’s day he was out looking for wood when he came across a golden waterfall. He drank from it and was surprised to discover that it was not water, but sake (rice wine). He filled his gourd and took it back to his elderly father, who drank it with delight and immediately felt many years younger.

News of the magical waterfall reached the Empress, and she journeyed to Mino to drink from it. She named it Yoro—water of life, or regeneration.

Other fairy places include the forest of Paimpont in France, which is all that remains of an ancient woodland thought to have once covered much of inland Brittany. Legend has it that it is home to Brocéliande, Forest of King Arthur, the Fountain of Youth, and the Val sans Retour (Valley of No Return), where Morgan le Fay enchanted her victims.

Transylvania is usually associated with vampires; however, in Hungarian folk belief it was inhabited by fairies. Transylvania, now part of Romania, and Csallóköz, now part of Slovakia, were traditionally identified as the Hungarian fairyland. Almas cave near Baraolt in central Romania is reputed to be a fairy haunt. The cold wind known as the Nemere is said to blow when the fairy in the cave feels cold. In one tale, when plague was raging in the neighborhood, the people ascribed it to the cold blast emanating from the cave, so they hung shirts before the cave mouth and it is said the plague ceased. Some say this is also the cave from which the children led away by the Pied Piper of Hamelin re-emerged.

The fairy mountain Ngongotaha stands on the North Island of New Zealand, overlooking the big blue lake of Rotorua. The peak is known as Te Tuahu a te Atua (the Altar of the God) and was said to be one of the principal homes of the patupaiarehe, the fairy people of New Zealand. The tribe that lived on Mount Ngongotaha were known as the Ngati-Rua, their chiefs were named Tuehu, Te Rangitamai, Tongakohu, and Rotokohu.

It is said that the Maori ancestor Ihenga became thirsty while exploring the mountain and a patupaiarehe woman offered him a drink from a calabash, which he accepted. However, when the fairy people began to crowd around him, curious at seeing a mortal, he became scared that they might attempt to capture him. Smearing himself with kokowai, a mixture of shark oil and red ochre, the stench of which offended the patupaiarehe, he repelled the inquisitive creatures and ran away down the mountain. Later, he went on to be on friendly terms with the patupaiarehe and named the mountain Ngongotaha, meaning “drink from a calabash.”

The Majlis al Jinn in Oman, “Meeting Room of the Spirits” or “Gathering Place of the Djinn,” is the second-largest cave chamber in the world. The colossal chamber is large enough to house over a dozen Boeing 747s or a 50-story skyscraper. Its name comes from the belief on the Arabian peninsula that djinn inhabit caves.

Trollkyrka (Troll’s Church) in Sweden is located in the heart of Tivden National Park. A trek up the trail to the “tower” of the church reveals a rocky outcrop where pagan fairy rituals took place in years gone by. A poem by folklorist Carshult describes the procession up into the troll hills, where a secret password was uttered, a fire was lit, and spirits summoned.