Creatures in the Mist by Gary R. Varner

One of my Christmas presents this year was a copy of Gary R. Varner’s Creatures in the Mist: Little People, Wild Men and Spirit Beings around the World, A Study in Comparative Mythology. At less than 200 pages, the book is only slightly longer than the title, and I’m finding a very good read about faeries, mermaids, giants, and other mythological creatures and their striking similarities across many lands and cultures.

Although Varner is an academic type, this book is written at a very accessible level. Despite a few editorial miscues, I’m finding it to be a very enlightening read. Varner highlights broad themes–for example, the connection between faeries and children, both positively via their associations with childbirth and negatively because of the whole child-stealing thing–that keep showing up in myths from all over the world.

I’m less than halfway through, but I can definitely see this being the sort of book I keep coming back to as I wonder about mythological creatures and their cultural significance.

Sunday Inspiration: Love

We are all a little weird and life’s a little weird, and when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall in mutual weirdness and call it love.
—Theodor (“Dr. Seuss”) Geisel

Update 12-27-13

As you may have gathered, Children of Pride was not ready for Christmas, as I had at one time hoped. It will almost surely be available some time in January. I’m just waiting for my crack design team to finish work on the cover, and I’d much rather wait a bit and get something we all like than try to rush the process. Creativity tends to work on its own schedule, no matter how much one might wish it were otherwise.

In other news, this morning I passed the 55,000 word mark on the first draft of The Devil’s Due, the sequel to Children of Pride. I’m having fun with this one, getting to show a little more of how magic works in the Wonder as well as some of the differences between the magic of the fae, little folk, and even human wizards and witches. I think those who enjoy Children of Pride (current count: one teenager and three very supportive editors/beta readers) will appreciate how the story expands in this second installment.

Brazil and Hy Breasail

Might the nation of Brazil have been named after a mythical Island in the North Atlantic? The Celtic Myth Podshow lays out the theory:

So how did the country called Brazil end up with it’s name ? One theory says that Brazil was initially colonized by people coming from Viana do Castelo (in northern Portugal), and that through the knowledge of legends from the Celts in Galicia, they would have been aware of the lost continent of Brazil. And not only Columbus, but other early explorers from England knew about the lost land of Brazil. According to”The Island of Brazil”, a contemporary account written by William of Worcester (and published in the late 18th century) recalled that when word of a “new land to the west” reached Bristol in the late 1470s this was presumed to be Brazil. In 1480, a Bristol merchant John Jay outfitted at great expense an 80-tonne ship to sail to the island of Brazil, described as “a name often given in medieval European tales to a land far to the west of Ireland”. Setting sail in July 1480 from Bristol, Jay’s ship voyaged west, intending to “traverse the seas.” But the journey ended in failure. English crews had yet to master the new methods of astronomical navigation devised in Portugal and Spain: open, oceanic voyaging – as opposed to island hopping by way of Iceland and Greenland.

In the Welsh and Cornish myths, Bresal was a High King who made his home in the Otherworld “which is sometimes called Hy- or I-Breasal in his honor”. Like in the Irish myth, “His world is visible on only one night every seven years”. Thus, it is clear that the Celts of Galicia, Cornwall, Wales, Ireland and sailors from England all knew of the legend of the lost land of Brazil. Would it then be unreasonable to assume that when Portuguese explorers reached South America they mistakenly thought they had landed on Breasal’s world and named the land they discovered “Brazil” in his honour?

A contradictory theory sets the name in a different context:

Of course, it is possible that the name of the country called Brazil is not connected with the Celtic myth – but in my opinion this theory is not convincing. In this account, the word “Brazil” is derived from the Portuguese and Spanish word “Brasil”, the name of an East Indian tree with reddish-brown wood from which a red dye was extracted. The Portuguese found a New World tree related to the Old World brasil tree when they explored what is now called Brazil, and “as a result they named the New World country after the Old World tree”.

Quite interesting.

 

 

 

Ireland’s National Leprechaun Museum

File this away with the Cryptozoology Museum in Maine. According to Atlas Obscura:

By day, this family friendly museum is a lighthearted journey through the myths of the Emerald Isle. The exhibits include the history of the leprechaun from the first sighting in the 8th century to Walt Disney’s visit to Ireland, where he found the inspiration for his 1959 film, Darby O’Gill and the Little People. The tour includes rooms full of incredibly over-sized furniture and other optical illusions, as well as an exhibit that features rainbows and pots of gold after a rain shower. Still others reveal cautionary tales, like what happens when you try to catch a leprechaun and additional stories of mishaps and tragedy like the Children of Lir. The tour mixes predictable exploitation of the infamous little legend with mysteries such as Newgrange and other lesser known Irish myths. It ends in an all-too-bright gift shop full of tourist fare and glitter.

Congratulations to Neil Gaiman

Via Fantasy Faction:

Good news Fantasy fans: Fantasy has proven its place at the forefront of British Literature as Neil Gaiman’s The Ocean at the End of the Lane wins the public’s vote in The National Book Award. The Award’s subsequent Press Release makes for good reading:

Neil Gaiman became the author of Britain’s favourite book today, as his contemporary fantasy The Ocean at the End of the Lane was named Specsavers Book of the Year for 2013. Neil was crowned overall victor by the public in a vote comprising of winners from all ten categories from this year’s Specsavers National Book Awards.

Noteworthy is that Gaiman won the public vote by a considerable margin, beating substantial competition from the likes of Malala Yousafzai, Robert Harris, Kate Atkinson and David Walliams.

The Darkling Diet, Revised

I have added a little bit of information about foods that enhance night vision to my thoughts about a possible diet for Norse trolls, dwarves, and other sunlight-averse creatures. If you liked the first version, perhaps you’d like to visit it again to see what’s new.

Inspiration: Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all who are celebrating.

I wonder as I wander out under the sky
How Jesus the Saviour did come for to die
For poor on’ry people like you and like I;
I wonder as I wander out under the sky

When Mary birthed Jesus ’twas in a cow’s stall
With wise men and farmers and shepherds and all
But high from God’s heaven, a star’s light did fall
And the promise of ages it then did recall.

If Jesus had wanted for any wee thing
A star in the sky or a bird on the wing
Or all of God’s Angels in heaven to sing
He surely could have it, ’cause he was the King

I wonder as I wander out under the sky
How Jesus the Saviour did come for to die
For poor on’ry people like you and like I;
I wonder as I wander out under the sky

I Had Always Assumed Adult Beverages Were Involved

Apparently, some of those weird monsters from Dungeons & Dragons were made in China–literally! According to Tim Kask, a D&D play tester,

There once was an unknown company in Hong Kong that made a bag of weird animal-things that were then sold in what once were called dime stores or variety stores for like $.99. I know of four other very early monsters based on them.

Gary and I talked about how hard it was to find monster figures, and how one day he came upon this bag of weird beasts… He nearly ran home, eager as a kid to get home and open his baseball cards. Then he proceeded to invent the carrion crawler, umber hulk, rust monster and purple worm, all based on those silly plastic figures.

The one that I chose was known in the Greyhawk campaign as “the bullet” (for it’s shape) but had only amorphous stats and abilities, not being developed. Gary told me to take it home, study it, and decide what it was and what it could do.

Yunwi Tsunsdi: Cherokee Little Folk

In addition to the nunnehi, who are powerful supernatural warriors, there is another group of faery beings in Cherokee folklore. These are the yunwi tsunsdi or “little people” (the singular form is yvwi usdi). Like the nunnehi, the yunwi tsunsdi prefer to be invisible, although they do sometimes appear to humans as miniature people—child-sized or smaller. They are well-proportioned and handsome, with hair that reaches almost to the ground. It is said that twins are especially adept at seeing these tiny creatures.

Yunwi tsunsdi are depicted as helpful, kind, and magically adept. Like many faery creatures, they love music and spend much of their time singing, drumming, and dancing. For all this, they have a very gentle nature and do not like to be disturbed. Even so, they are said to harshly punish those who are disrespectful or aggressive toward them.

In Cherokee lore, the yunwi tsunsdi are divided into three “clans”:

• The Rock clan is the most malicious, quick to get even when offended. Some say they are like this because their space has been invaded. Like many types of European fae, they are known to steal human children.
• The Laurel clan is generally benevolent, humorous, and joyful. They are also mischievous, however, and love to play tricks on the unsuspecting.
• The Dogwood clan is the most favorably disposed to humans, though they are also stern, serious, and prefer to be left alone.

Each of these clans, it is said, teaches a moral lesson. The Rock clan teaches not to mistreat others lest misfortune come back against us in return. It is important to respect the limits and boundaries of others.

The lesson of the Laurel clan is not to take the world too seriously. People must always have joy and share that joy with others.

Finally, the Dogwood clan’s lesson is to treat others kindly out of the goodness of one’s heart and not in hope of reward.

Yunwi tsunsdi are perhaps the most common type of faery being in the American Southeast. Legends about the Choctaw hatak awasa and the Muskogee este lopocke, both also meaning “little people,” are quite similar to what the Cherokee say of the yunwi tsunsdi. The Catawba know of creatures that are essentially identical, which they call yehasuri (“not human ones”).