THE ELEMENT ENCYCLOPEDIA OF FAIRIES: An A-Z of Fairies, Pixies, and other Fantastical Creatures

When Elsie’s father developed the photographs in his darkroom, he dismissed the initial picture—of Frances watching four fairies dancing on a bush—as the girls fooling around with paper cut-outs. However, a couple of months later the girls went on to produce a second photograph, of Elsie sitting on the lawn with a gnome.

In 1919 Elsie’s mother showed the photographs at a meeting of the Theosophical Society at a lecture on “Fairy Life.” A few months later, the photos were displayed at the Society’s annual conference, where they caught the eye of Edward Gardner, an eminent member. His interest was piqued and he sent the images and the glass-plate negatives to a photography expert, who was of the opinion that the photographs were genuine. Gardner then used enhanced negatives to reproduce the images, which he used to deliver illustrated lectures around the country.

The editor of the Spiritualist magazine Light drew the photos to the attention of renowned author and Spiritualist Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. He had been commissioned to write an article on fairies for the Christmas edition of the Strand magazine. He contacted Gardner to find out who had taken the photos and subsequently got in touch with the Wrights to ask for permission to use the two photos to illustrate his article. Impressed that such an eminent figure as Conan Doyle was interested, Elsie’s father agreed that the photos could be used, but refused to accept any money for them, stating that if they were in fact genuine, then they shouldn’t be sullied by the exchange of money.

Conan Doyle was preoccupied preparing for a lecture tour of Australia, so Gardner went to meet with the Wright family. Elsie’s father told him that he been convinced there was some trick involved in the photographs, but when he had searched the girls’ room for evidence—scraps of pictures or cut-outs—he had found nothing incriminating. As further verification of the photographs’ authenticity, Gardner returned to Cottingley with two cameras and some photographic plates, which had secretly been marked to reveal any tampering. Frances was invited to stay to see if the girls could repeat their feat and again take pictures of the fairies.

Insisting that the fairies would not show themselves if other people were watching, the two girls set off alone to the stream, where they took several photos, three of which appeared to show fairies. “Frances and the Leaping Fairy” showed Frances in profile looking at a winged fairy sitting on branch; in “Fairy Offering a Posy of Harebells to Elsie,” a fairy is offering Elsie flowers. The final photo, “Fairies and their Sun Bath,” showed the fairies, without either of the girls, frolicking in the sunshine.

Packed in cotton wool, the plates were sent back to Gardner, who wrote to Conan Doyle in Australia expressing his joy that the experiment seemed to have worked.

The Christmas edition of the Strand in which the original photos were published sold out in two days. Elsie and Frances’ names were changed to protect their privacy and they were referred to as Iris and Alice Carpenter. Conan Doyle concluded his article by writing he hoped that if the photographs helped to convince people of the existence of fairies it would jolt the materialistic twentieth-century mindset out of its rut and into acknowledging the glamor and mystery of life. It was his hope that the images would encourage people to open up to other psychic phenomena too.

Initial reactions to the images were mixed. Skeptics noted that the fairies conformed to the images in traditional nursery tales and sported suspiciously fashionable hairstyles, while others took the girls and their photos at face value, welcoming the images as evidence of the existence of supernatural beings.

Conan Doyle used the second batch of photographs to illustrate another article in the Strand in 1921. This article went on to form the basis of his book, The Coming of the Fairies, published in 1922.

In 1921 Gardner made a final visit to Cottingley, this time accompanied by a clairvoyant named Geoffrey Hodson. On this occasion neither Frances or Elsie claimed to see fairies; however, Hodson professed to observe many of the winged creatures. Frances and Elsie later denounced him as a fake.

Public interest in the Cottingley Fairies phenomenon gradually died down after 1921. Elsie and Frances married and lived abroad for many years. It was not until 1966 that the fairies—and Frances and Elsie—found themselves once again in the limelight, when a reporter for the Daily Express tracked down Elsie, now living back in England. In an interview, she admitted that the fairies might have been figments of her imagination, but said that what she saw in her mind had somehow been captured on the photographic plate. The article triggered more media interest and scientific investigations into the photographs, most of which concluded that they were fakes.

In 1983, in an article in the Unexplained magazine, the cousins admitted that the photos had been fabricated. However, they maintained that the fairies were real and they had genuinely seen them. Elsie, a skilled artist from a young age, had copied out illustrations of fairies from Princess Mary’s Gift Book (1914), a popular children’s book, which they had then made into cardboard cut-outs, being careful to dispose of all traces of anything that could be used as evidence. However, a question mark remains over the fifth and final photograph, “Fairies and their Sun Bath.” Both girls claimed to have taken it, and Frances always maintained that it was genuine.

In an interview on Arthur C. Clarke’s World of Strange Powers, Elsie explained that she and Frances had been too embarrassed to say anything after the highly esteemed Arthur Conan Doyle had championed the pictures as genuine evidence of fairies. What had started out as an attempt to prove their parents wrong had taken an unexpected turn that they could never have predicted. They had never thought of it as fraud, Elsie said, just two cousins having a bit of fun. She couldn’t understand how so many people—and very highly regarded figures at that—were taken in. She believed they had wanted to be taken in.

Prints of the photographs, two of the cameras the girls used, and watercolors of fairies painted by Elsie are displayed at the National Media Museum in Bradford.

Co-walker

An apparition of one’s double or doppelgänger. In the north of England it is known as a waff and portends death. In The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Fairies (1691), Robert Kirk believes it to be a type of fairy that can be seen by those with second sight. This double resembles a person in every way, like a twin or shadow, and can be seen before and after that person is dead. It is often sighted eating at funeral banquets or bearing the coffin to the grave.

See alsoFetch (#litres_trial_promo), Swarth (#litres_trial_promo).

Cowlug Sprites

In the villages of Bowden and Gateside, on the border between England and Scotland, the cowlug sprites haunt the villages on Cowlug Night. These strange sprites are aptly named, with ears said to be shaped like the ears of cows.

Crimbil

Welsh for changeling.

Crodh Mara

Scottish sea-dwelling fairy cattle. These hornless cattle sometimes bestow the gift of their milk on humans.

One story tells of the Hero of Clanranald, who lived with his wife and their cow. The cow gave very little milk. One day the hero’s wife saw three crodh mara and went to milk them. That night she heard a voice that told her to spill some milk on the fairy hill. She did, and from that day on the cows appeared for her to milk every day. When she died, they never returned.

In another tale, a couple spotted crodh mara on an island at Lochmaddy. The milk from the fairy cattle supplied the couple with butter and cheese for half a year.

Croker, Thomas Crofton (1798–1854)

The antiquarian and folktale collector Thomas Crofton Croker was born in Cork, Ireland. After a sporadic local education, he joined a mercantile firm in 1813, but soon became more interested in artistic pursuits and developed an interest in the folk and fairy traditions of Ireland. In 1819 he obtained the position of clerk at the Admiralty in London, where he continued to work until his retirement.

His writings were influenced by visits to the province of Munster in the south of Ireland where he collected legends, folk songs, and tales. He wrote the first volume of Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of Ireland in 1825. The book proved to be very successful; it garnered praise from Sir Walter Scott and was translated into German by Jakob Grimm. The second and third volumes were published in 1828. Croker’s wife, Marianne, was a painter and provided the illustrations for the books. Croker himself is regarded as the first field-collector of folk tales in Ireland.

Croquemitaine

French bogeyman, literally, the “cruncher of mittens.” When French children misbehave, their parents threaten to send them to the croquemitaine, who will gobble them up.

Cú Chulainn

SeeCuchullin (#ulink_837cf44f-1338-5477-87c0-f7d34d270a66).

Cú Cuchaind

SeeCuchullin (#ulink_837cf44f-1338-5477-87c0-f7d34d270a66).

Cù Sith

(Pronouced coo-shee.) Scottish fairy dog. His dark green color marks him out as distinct from other Celtic fairy hounds. Other fairy dogs are generally described as either white with red ears, or black; the most common type in England are black dogs. As described by J. G. Campbell in Superstitions of the Highlands and Islands of Scotland (1900), the cù sith is the size of a young bull, with a shaggy coat and a long tail coiled or plaited on his back; his huge footprints can often be seen in the mud or the snow. He runs silently, gliding along in a straight line. Three loud barks, which can be heard by sailors far out at sea, are the signal that the cú sith is out hunting.

See alsoYeth Hound (#litres_trial_promo).

Cuachag

(Pronounced cooachack.) A Scottish river sprite or fuath. It haunted Glen Cuaich and takes its name from this place. Like all fuathan, it is a pernicious spirit.

Cúchulainn

SeeCuchullin (#ulink_837cf44f-1338-5477-87c0-f7d34d270a66).

Cuchullin

(Also Cú Chulainn, Cú Cuchaind, or Cúchulainn.) Hero of the Ulster Cycle, one of the first collections of Irish heroic legends, he also appears in Manx and Scottish folklore.

Cuchullin was born a mortal, his name was Sétanta, but he was the son of the god Lugh of the Long Arm and even as a child he displayed great strength. When he was seven years old he killed Culain the Smith’s fierce hound, who guarded the King of Ulster’s court. To make amends he offered to guard Ulster until his death. He was given the name Cuchullin, “Culain’s Hound.”

From the outset, Cuchullin’s striking appearance set him apart as different. He had seven toes on each foot, seven fingers on each hand and seven pupils in each eye. His red shock of hair was dark brown at the roots, light blond at the tips. He wore 100 strings of gems on his head, his chest glittered with a hundred brooches, and he had many admirers. However, he was prone to fits of battle frenzy. During such fits, he transformed into a monster, turning himself around inside his skin, so that his feet and knees faced backward and his calves and heels faced forward. Each strand of his hair stood up on his scalp with rage, a flame leapt from his mouth, and a jet of black blood spouted from the top of his head. His eyes displaced themselves, one to his cheek, the other the back of his skull. He fought from his chariot, driven by Laég, his faithful charioteer, drawn by his gray and black horses Liath Macha and Dub Sainglend. In this fevered, crazed state, he had to be dipped into three vats of ice-cold water to return him to normal temperature.

When he was 17 years old, he single-handedly defended Ulster against Queen Medhb in the epic battle of the Cattle Raid of Cuailane. Eventually it was Queen Medhb who brought about his demise. Cuchullin bound himself to a pillar or standing stone so that he might stand up and fight his enemies to the very end and thus he died a hero.

See alsoLug (#litres_trial_promo), Raven (#litres_trial_promo).

Curupira

Brazilian guardian spirit of the forest. In Brazilian mythology he is most often depicted as a red-headed boy, with the distinguishing feature of backward-facing feet. The name comes from curu, meaning “boy,” and pira, meaning “body,” in the language of the Tupi people of the Brazilian rainforest. Curupira safeguards trees, plants, and animals from the destructive activities of humans, using his backward feet to confound hunters who try to follow his tracks.

Cutty Soams