JC'S Fairy Catalog Part I

Hello JC here bringing up this magical blog, lets get charm with this fantastical creatures!

Intro

Fairy, fay or faerie are mythical creature found in the folklore of many cultures across very different and also distant places, the small femmenine magical creature with colorful fly or butterfly wings, is the usual portrait of nowadays we associate to a fairy, but their concept has evolved, not always had looked like that, and as they have variants of many different cultures and mythologies, there are so many variants that fairy is often a term to call a breed, race or type of mythical creatures.

The fairy or fae, the term i will use from now to call the wide category of this creatures, have the following features and characteristics

-Closely related to magic: as being a magical entity, using magic and charms, having magical features or abilities

-Nature related: being spirits of nature, a personification of a nature phenom, dwelling and protecting certains nature places or sacred nature places.

-Hidden: most of them could be invisible, move thought invisible realms to humans, or parallel realms that humans cannot see and access

-Mischievous and prankster: most of them can have a prankster attitude towards humans, sometimes benevolent pranks, sometimes deadly, the malevolent or benevolent attitude toward humans can vary

With that said, other things like their physical appareance, physical features, size, habitat can vary a lot between them.

Lets start with the blog!

Peri / Pari

Origin: Persian mythology, Zoroastrian religion

Myth/folklore: Peri or Pari are supernatural beings, originally were evil spirits, later evolved to benevolent spirits, specially during Islam period, they became guardians of nature. They live in a spiritual/celestial realm, they sometime abduct people, they are able to cast love spells, protect human from other evil spirits and also punish people for social transgressions.

Characteristics: They are winged, there are male and female, but the female ones are more common in the myths and literature across persians, turkish and central asia. They have a extremely beauty, they can shapeshift into birds.

Extra: They are the possible mythological origin of the western european fairy

Fairy

Origin: European folklore (specially celtic, germanic, slavic and french tradition)

Myth/Folklore: early fairy was a spirit of nature or lesser deities, then with christianism the nature of this beings changed to a "demoted angel" or fallen angels that were neither too good to be in heaven or too evil to be in hell. Overall they are benevolent, in many literature and myths being helpful for the hero of the story using their magic abilities and most notable giving or producing some kind of magic item or weapon for the hero. They can also be prankster, making travellers astray, among other things, also do the "changelling" that consist of swap a baby human with a baby fae.

Characteristics: they are described similar to humans, tiny size with insect-wings, always dressed elegantly and looking beautiful, they usually gather to dance in circle, know as fairy-ring, trespassing into it could be very dangerous to a human.

Pixie

Origin: Celtic and south England

Myth/Folklore: small creatures, protectors of nature, lives in the wild, specially mossy woods, stone circles and burial mounds, they can be mischievous, usually do harmless pranks to humans, most famous "pixie-led" wich consist of astray travellers, to procted agaisnt the spells of pixies the method was wearing clothes "inside-out" and carrying a piece of iron, also placing iron near doors, also farmers tend to do offerings to them to receive a little domestic help.

Characteristics: early depictions they were wingless, later they appareance evolved to a very similar fairy look, with the difference of being undressed or poorly dressed, contrasting with elegantly dressed fairy.

Extra: In some literature, contrasting with Fairy, Pixies are less interested and had much less participation with humans in stories, althought they are benevolent focus more on protecting nature and wild life.

Household Spirits

Origin: England and Scotland (Brownie), Germany (Kobold) and Slavic (Domovoy)

Myth/Folklore: small creatures that protect home, they can do task and chores in exhange of food or clothing, generally they are protective with the children and pets, and protect the family home from evil spirits, althought in cases the family is wrong doing or the household spirit is not treated well, he can abandon the house and leave unprotected the family from evil spirits, diseases or bad harvest

Caracteristics: usually similar to moderns gnomes, they appareance can vary from looking childish or very old, from humanoid to hairy creature, the Brownie version usually is depicted with pointy ears and wearing pointy hats, the Kobold version appareance has changed to a more reptile-skin creature look.

Kelpie / Each-Usige

Origin: Scottish (Kepie) Ireland and Scotland (Each-Usige)

Myth/Folklore: a malevolent water spirit that tricks people to drown them on lakes or rivers.

Characteristics: a shape shifter being, it can take human form, usually male, in his horse form it stuck people on its back and ride them to the closest water body, drown them, and sometimes devouring its victims.

Pooca

Origin: Celtic and Ireland's folklore

Myth/Folklore: a shape shifter spirit/creature, of mischievous personality but in general benevolent, they protect the crops and the harvest, being beneficial for farmers. Considered bringers of both good and bad fortune, they help or hinder rural and marine communities.

Characteristics: described of having dark fur skin, usually shape to wild and farm animals form, most notably a horse, in wich he can prank people doing a "wild ride" but not causing harm like the Kelpie. When he took human form, always include an animal feature like tail or ears

Keep in touch for more magic, part II will come soon!

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