The Cat Sídhe ('fairy cat') appears in both Irish and Scottish folklore as a supernatural black cat of unusual size. It was associated with the fairy realm and was believed to have the power to steal the soul of a recently deceased person before proper burial could take place. This belief led to the practice of 'Feill Fheadha' — keeping constant watch over a corpse (a wake) specifically to prevent the Cat Sídhe from jumping over it.
A large black cat, about the size of a dog, with a distinctive white spot on its chest. Its eyes were described as unnaturally large and its movements were wrong somehow. In some traditions it was a transformed witch.
Could steal the soul from a corpse if it jumped over the body before burial. Was drawn to warmth — so fires were not lit near the laid-out dead (which would attract the Cat Sídhe) but games and music were performed to keep it distracted. On Samhain, it would bless any house that left out a bowl of milk.
Weaknesses
- conditionConstant watch over the corpse prevents it acting
- ritualGames, riddles, music during the wake distract it
Wards
- ritualTraditional Irish/Scottish wake practices
- conditionNot leaving the corpse unattended
Anu
Anu (also Ana, Anann, Anand) is a mother-figure in early Irish tradition associated with nourishment, territorial fertility and prosperity—especially in Munster—and is variably conflated with other maternal or war-related goddesses in later sources.
Baobhan Sith
A Scottish Highland vampire fairy — a beautiful woman in a green dress who appears to men alone in the wilderness and drains their blood, her deer hooves hidden beneath her skirts.
Caoineag
The 'Weeper' of Scottish Highland tradition — an invisible spirit heard wailing near waterfalls before a disaster befalls a clan, a Highland variant of the Irish Banshee.
Cú Chulainn
A legendary Irish warrior-hero and demigod of the Ulster Cycle, Cú Chulainn is the central martial protagonist of the Táin Bó Cúailnge and a culture-constituting figure whose stories were preserved in multiple medieval manuscripts and continue to appear in modern memorial and institutional contexts.
Cú Sídhe
The supernatural fairy hound of Celtic tradition — enormous, dark green or white, who hunts in eerie silence and whose triple bark is a death omen.
Dobhar-chú
The 'water hound' of Irish folklore — a ferocious hybrid creature, part otter and part dog, lurking in Irish lakes, known to have killed people and capable of pursuing its hunters at terrifying speed.
Dullahan
The headless horseman of Irish legend who carries his own rotting head under one arm, stops at the door of those about to die, and cannot be kept out by any lock.
Each-Uisge
The most dangerous water horse in Scottish Highland folklore — haunting sea-lochs and mountain lakes, more violent than the river kelpie, known for consuming its victims whole.
Ecne
Ecne is the personification of wisdom in Irish/Celtic mythic tradition, attested in modern summaries as a member of the Tuatha Dé Danann and glossed in Old Irish as 'wisdom' (ecna, ecne). Sources present Ecne genealogically as the offspring of three brothers and as connected to the goddess Anu/Ananna, with variant accounts assigning ambiguous gender and, in one later report, an association with poetry.
Fairy
A class of anthropomorphic supernatural beings found across multiple European folk traditions, fairies are magical, liminal entities variously described as spirits, an older race, or enchanted people; their depiction ranges from human-sized to diminutive and their attributes and moral alignment vary by region and period.
Kelpie
A Scottish shape-shifting water horse that appears as a beautiful tame horse near lochs and rivers, then drowns and devours any rider foolish enough to mount it.
Selkie
A seal-being from northern Atlantic coastal folklore said to shift between seal and human forms by removing or donning a seal skin. Tales focus on intimate relations with humans, the selkie's longing for the sea, and the narrative motif of a hidden skin that prevents return to the ocean.
Community Record
- [1]Carmina Gadelica. Carmichael, Alexander. 1900. Carmina Gadelica, Vol. 1. T. & A. Constable.folk
- [2]Celtic Mythology. MacKillop, James. 1998. A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. Oxford University Press.academic