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(Also Alp-luachra or Alpluachra.) Also known as Joint-eater or Just-halver, an Alp luachra is a greedy fairy from Irish mythology. When a person falls asleep beside a stream or a spring, the Alp luachra appears in the form of a newt and crawls into their mouth, feeding on the food that they have eaten.

In Robert Kirk’s Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Fairies (1691), the Joint-eater is described as a kind fairy that sits invisibly next to its victim, sharing their food, thus accounting for how someone with a large appetite—a Great-eater—can remain skinny:

They avouch that a Heluo, or Great-eater, hath a voracious Elve to be his attender, called a Joint-eater or Just-halver, feeding on the Pith or Quintessence of what the Man eats; and therefore he continues Lean like a Hawke or Heron, notwithstanding his devouring appetite.

Douglas Hyde’s Beside the Fire (1890) tells of how one poor soul was infested by a pregnant Alp luachra and her children. To get rid of the mother and her brood, he ate a large quantity of salted meat without drinking anything, then lay down by a stream with his mouth open. After a while the Alp luachra were forced to leap out into the water to quench their salt-induced thirst.