Thank you for making this year's #31DaysofHaunting our biggest yet! Halloween season is always better with you! This is more than a hashtag to me, it's a community! I appreciate the effort you put into your contributions and enjoyed chatting with you about them!
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Illes is a species of nocturnal Troll from Icelandic and Scandinavian folklore. It is able to lure humans into its lair by shapeshifting into the form of an attractive human.
art: Brian Froud
Drake is a little household spirit in the form of a dragon that keeps the hearth burning, only trouble is, he smells of rotten eggs
from: 'Boggarts, Brownies, Hobs and their Goblin Kin' by Stephen G. Rae
link: https://t.co/CMK9DSvw6l
art: Stephen G. Rae
Grendel’s mother in Beowulf is not just a monster seeking revenge. She is a grieving parent, moving through the marsh to avenge her son, her fury rooted in something deeply human but expressed in a way the world cannot accept. #WyrdWednesday
Art: Joseph Ratcliffe Skelton
The fox appears in the folklore of many cultures and is associated with cunning and tricks or as a familiar animal possessed of magic powers #FolkloreThursday
Silk embroidered fox by Helen Richman, professional hand embroiderer, UK #WomensArt
#FairyTaleTuesday
“There is an old woman who lives in a hidden place that everyone knows but few have ever seen. . . .
The sole work of La Loba, (the Wolf Woman), is the collecting of bones. She is known to collect and preserve especially that which is in danger of being lost creatures: the deer, the rattlesnake, the crow.
But her specialty is said to be wolves. She creeps and crawls and sifts through the montañas, mountains and arroyos, dry river beds, looking for wolf bones.
When she has assembled an entire skeleton, when the last bone is in place and the beautiful white sculpture of the creature is laid out before her, she sits by the fire and thinks about what song she will sing.
And when she is sure, she stands over the creatura, raises her arms over it, and sings out. That is when the rib bones and leg bones of the wolf begin to flesh out and the creature becomes furred.
La Loba sings some more, and more of the creature comes into being; its tail curls upward, shaggy and strong.
And La Loba sings more and the wolf creature begins to breathe. And still La Loba sings so deeply that the floor of the desert shakes and as she sings, the wolf opens its eyes, leaps up, and runs away down the canyon”
- Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Women Who Run With the Wolves
Witches use cleaned deer skulls for spiritual & symbolic reasons, focusing on honouring the animal spirit.
It is a stark reminder of mortality, but in witchcraft
this is not negative. It represents the transformation from life to death & the continuation of the cycle of life.
The Smurl Haunting of 1970s Pennsylvania blended poltergeist and possession, growls in pipes, sulfur smells, levitations. A priest performed exorcisms. The family moved. The noises didn’t stop. #31DaysofHalloween#31DaysofHaunting
Many possession accounts begin with sleep paralysis or the sense of a presence on the chest. Science calls it REM disorder. Folklore calls it the Old Hag. Both explanations leave the room cold. #31DaysofHalloween#31DaysofHaunting
Art: Henry Fuseli
When death comes knocking
I can hide
I can run, but the beast
Smells my blood in the wind
Hear the gasp
Hear it roar
This is my primal fear from within..🎵
#Halloween#31daysofhaunting#31daysofhalloween
🖼️The Univited Guest, 1844: Adolph Menzel(1815-1905)
The 1949 case that inspired The Exorcist involved a 14-year-old boy in Maryland. Witnesses said the words hell and evil appeared scratched into his skin, furniture moved on its own, and priests performed more than 20 rites. #31DaysofHalloween#31DaysofHaunting
Many ghost sightings happen at the edge of vision - a shadow in the doorway, a reflection that moves on its own. Folklore calls it second sight: not imagination, but the moment the unseen looks back. #31DaysofHaunting#31DaysofHalloween
Art: Sir Alfred Munnings
Welcome October 🍂🎃🧡
The thing with October is, I think, it somehow gets in your very blood. Unapologetically. Almost ruthlessly.
~ Anne Sexton
#SeasonOfTheWitch#31DaysOfHaunting 🎃
#WitchWednesday 🖤
"Ridley was inspired after becoming stranded overnight at Mangotsfield railway station (a now abandoned station) on the defunct Midland Railway Company's Bristol and Gloucester railway line."
"The Ghost Train" (play)
#BookWormSat#31DaysofHaunting
🖼️ Spögelsestoget (1976)