Fairy ring
Encyclopedia
- For the Neolithic archaeological monument, see HjaltadansHjaltadansHjaltadans, also known as Fairy Ring or Haltadans stone circle, is a stone circle on the island of Fetlar in Shetland, Scotland. This site is a ring of 38 stones, of which 22 are still fixed in the soil, and it is in diameter. Inside this is an earthen ring in diameter, with a gap in the...
.
A fairy ring, also known as fairy circle, elf circle, elf ring or pixie ring, is a naturally occurring ring or arc of mushroom
Mushroom
A mushroom is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground on soil or on its food source. The standard for the name "mushroom" is the cultivated white button mushroom, Agaricus bisporus; hence the word "mushroom" is most often applied to those fungi that...
s. The rings may grow to over 10 metres (32.8 ft) in diameter, and they become stable over time as the fungus grows and seeks food underground. They are found mainly in forest
Forest
A forest, also referred to as a wood or the woods, is an area with a high density of trees. As with cities, depending where you are in the world, what is considered a forest may vary significantly in size and have various classification according to how and what of the forest is composed...
ed areas, but also appear in grassland
Grassland
Grasslands are areas where the vegetation is dominated by grasses and other herbaceous plants . However, sedge and rush families can also be found. Grasslands occur naturally on all continents except Antarctica...
s or rangelands. Fairy rings are detectable by sporocarp
Sporocarp (fungi)
In fungi, the sporocarp is a multicellular structure on which spore-producing structures, such as basidia or asci, are borne...
s in rings or arcs, as well as by a necrotic zone
Necrotic zone
A necrotic zone an area in which grass or other plant life has withered or died due to fairy rings. It also refers to in dental health to gums that have started to decay from gingtivis...
(dead grass), or a ring of dark green grass. If these manifestations are visible a fairy fungus mycelium
Mycelium
thumb|right|Fungal myceliaMycelium is the vegetative part of a fungus, consisting of a mass of branching, thread-like hyphae. The mass of hyphae is sometimes called shiro, especially within the fairy ring fungi. Fungal colonies composed of mycelia are found in soil and on or within many other...
is likely to be present in the ring or arc underneath.
Fairy rings also occupy a prominent place in European folklore as the location of gateways into elfin kingdoms, or places where elves gather and dance. According to the folklore, a fairy ring appears when a fairy, pixie, or elf appears. It will disappear without trace in less than five days, but if an observer waits for the elf to return to the ring, he may be able to capture it.
Genesis
There are two theories regarding the process involved in creating fairy rings. One states that the fairy ring is begun by a sporeSpore
In biology, a spore is a reproductive structure that is adapted for dispersal and surviving for extended periods of time in unfavorable conditions. Spores form part of the life cycles of many bacteria, plants, algae, fungi and some protozoa. According to scientist Dr...
from the sporocarpus. The underground presence of the fungus can also cause withering or varying colour or growth of the grass above. Mushrooms, the fruiting bodies of fungi that poke their heads up out of the soil after rainstorms, tell only part of the fungi's story. Hidden in the soil is a huge network of threadlike mycelia. Mushrooms are not individual organisms. Rather, they are just one part of the mycelia lurking beneath the ground.
The second theory, which is presented in the investigations of Japanese
Japanese people
The are an ethnic group originating in the Japanese archipelago and are the predominant ethnic group of Japan. Worldwide, approximately 130 million people are of Japanese descent; of these, approximately 127 million are residents of Japan. People of Japanese ancestry who live in other countries...
scientists on the Tricholoma matsutake species, shows that fairy rings could be established by connecting neighbouring oval genets of these mushrooms. If they make an arc or a ring, they continuously grow about the centre of this object.
Necrotic or rapid growth zones
One of the manifestations of fairy ring growth is a necrotic zone—an area in which grass or other plant life has withered or died. These zones are caused by the mycelia which, during a very dry year, coat the roots of grasses and other herbs in meadowMeadow
A meadow is a field vegetated primarily by grass and other non-woody plants . The term is from Old English mædwe. In agriculture a meadow is grassland which is not grazed by domestic livestock but rather allowed to grow unchecked in order to make hay...
s. After some time they are removed by biotic factors from the ground, at which stage a zone on the surface soil becomes visible. Patterns other than the basic ring or arc are also possible: circles, doubled arcs, sickle-shaped arcs, and other complicated formations are also formed by this process. Fungi can deplete the soil of readily available nutrients such as nitrogen
Nitrogen
Nitrogen is a chemical element that has the symbol N, atomic number of 7 and atomic mass 14.00674 u. Elemental nitrogen is a colorless, odorless, tasteless, and mostly inert diatomic gas at standard conditions, constituting 78.08% by volume of Earth's atmosphere...
, causing plants growing within the circle to be stressed which leads to plant discoloration. Some fungi also produce chemicals which act like hormones
Plant hormone
Plant hormones are chemicals that regulate plant growth, which, in the UK, are termed 'plant growth substances'. Plant hormones are signal molecules produced within the plant, and occur in extremely low concentrations. Hormones regulate cellular processes in targeted cells locally and, when moved...
called gibberellin
Gibberellin
Gibberellins are plant hormones that regulate growth and influence various developmental processes, including stem elongation, germination, dormancy, flowering, sex expression, enzyme induction, and leaf and fruit senescence....
s, which affect plant growth, causing rapid luxuriant growth.
Long-term observations of fairy rings on Shillingstone Hill
Shillingstone
Shillingstone is a village in the Blackmore Vale area of north Dorset, England, situated on the River Stour between Sturminster Newton and Blandford Forum...
, England, further suggested that the cycle depended on the continuous presence of rabbits. Chalky soils on higher elevations in the counties of Wiltshire and Dorset (U.K.) used to support many meadow-type fairy rings. Rabbits crop grass very short in open areas and produce nitrogen-rich droppings. Mushrooms need more soil nitrogen than grass does. A ring can start from a single spore from which the mycelium develops; the fruiting bodies of the mushrooms only appearing later, when sufficient mycelial mass has been generated to support them. Subsequent generations of fungi grow only outwards, because the parent generations have depleted their local nitrogen levels. Meanwhile, rabbits keep cropping the grass, but do not eat the fungi, allowing them to grow through their competition to tower, relatively, above the grass. By the time a circle of mushrooms reaches about 6 metres (19.7 ft) in diameter, rabbit droppings have replenished the nitrogen levels near the centre of the circle, and a secondary ring may start to grow inside the first.
Types
There are two generally recognised types of fairy ring fungus. Those found in the woods are called tethered, because they are formed by mycorrhizal fungi living in commensalismCommensalism
In ecology, commensalism is a class of relationship between two organisms where one organism benefits but the other is neutral...
with trees. Meadow fairy rings are called free, because they are not connected with other organisms. These mushrooms are saprotrophic.
The effects on the grass depend on the type of fungus that is growing; when Calvatia cyathiformis
Calvatia cyathiformis
Calvatia cyathiformis, or Purple-spored Puffball, is a large edible saprobic species of Calvatia. This terrestrial puffball, has purplish or purple-brown spores, which distinguish it from other large Lycoperdales. It is found mostly in prairie or grasslands of North America, Australia, and probably...
is growing in the area grass will grow more abundantly; however, Leucopaxillus giganteus
Leucopaxillus giganteus
Leucopaxillus giganteus, commonly known as the giant leucopax or the giant funnel, is a saprobic species of fungus in the Tricholomataceae family. As its common names imply, the fruit body, or mushroom, can become quite large—the cap reaches diameters of up to...
will cause the grass to wither.
Species involved
There are about 60 mushroom species which can grow in the fairy ring pattern. The best known is the edible Scotch bonnet (Marasmius oreadesMarasmius oreades
Marasmius oreades is also known as the scotch bonnet or fairy ring mushroom. The latter name tends to cause some confusion, as many other mushrooms grown in fairy rings .-Distribution and habitat:Marasmius oreades grows extensively throughout North America...
), commonly known as the fairy ring champignon.
One of the largest rings ever found is in France. Formed by Clitocybe geotropa, it is thought to be about 600 metres (1,968.5 ft) in diameter and over 700 years old. On the South Downs
South Downs
The South Downs is a range of chalk hills that extends for about across the south-eastern coastal counties of England from the Itchen Valley of Hampshire in the west to Beachy Head, near Eastbourne, East Sussex, in the east. It is bounded on its northern side by a steep escarpment, from whose...
in southern England, Calocybe gambosa has formed huge fairy rings that also appear to be several hundred years old.
List of species
- Agaricus arvensisAgaricus arvensisAgaricus arvensis, commonly known as the Horse Mushroom, is a mushroom of the genus Agaricus.-Taxonomy:Described as Agaricus arvensis by Jacob Christian Schaeffer in 1762, and given numerous binomial descriptions since. Its present name arvensis means 'of the field'.-Description:The cap is similar...
- Agaricus campestrisAgaricus campestrisAgaricus campestris is commonly known as the field mushroom or, in North America, meadow mushroom. It is a widely eaten gilled mushroom closely related to the cultivated button mushroom Agaricus bisporus.-Taxonomy:...
- Agaricus praerimosus
- Amanita muscariaAmanita muscariaAmanita muscaria, commonly known as the fly agaric or fly amanita , is a poisonous and psychoactive basidiomycete fungus, one of many in the genus Amanita...
- Amanita phalloides
- Bovista dermoxanthaBovista dermoxanthaBovista dermoxantha is a small, white, nearly round puffball, recognized when young by a cottony-felty outer surface that becomes inconspicuously warted, eventually leaving fine, pallid, scales on an ochre to brown endoperidium. Bovista plumbea is similar, but has a smoother surface when young, and...
- Calocybe gambosa
- Calvatia cyathiformisCalvatia cyathiformisCalvatia cyathiformis, or Purple-spored Puffball, is a large edible saprobic species of Calvatia. This terrestrial puffball, has purplish or purple-brown spores, which distinguish it from other large Lycoperdales. It is found mostly in prairie or grasslands of North America, Australia, and probably...
- Clitocybe dealbataClitocybe dealbataClitocybe dealbata, also known as the ivory funnel, is a small white funnel-shaped toadstool widely found in lawns, meadows and other grassy areas in Europe and North America. Also known as the sweating mushroom, it derives this name from the symptoms of poisoning...
- Clitocybe nebularisClitocybe nebularisClitocybe nebularis or Lepista nebularis, commonly known as the clouded agaric or cloud funnel, is an abundant gilled fungus which appears both in conifer-dominated forests and broad-leaved woodland in Europe and North America...
- Clitocybe rivulosaClitocybe rivulosaClitocybe rivulosa, commonly known as the false champignon or fool's funnel, is a poisonous basidiomycete fungus of the large genus Clitocybe. One of several species similar in appearance, it is a small white funnel-shaped toadstool widely found in lawns, meadows and other grassy areas in Europe...
- Chlorophyllum molybditesChlorophyllum molybditesChlorophyllum molybdites, which has the common names of false parasol or green-spored parasol is a widespread mushroom. Highly poisonous and producing severe gastrointestinal symptoms of vomiting and diarrhea, it is commonly confused with the shaggy parasol, and is the most commonly consumed...
- Chlorophyllum rhacodes
- Cyathus stercoreusCyathus stercoreusCyathus stercoreus, commonly known as the dung-loving bird's nest, is a species of fungus in the genus Cyathus, family Nidulariaceae. Like other species in the Nidulariaceae, the fruiting bodies of C. stercoreus resemble tiny bird's nests filled with eggs...
- Disciseda subterranea
- Entoloma sinuatumEntoloma sinuatumEntoloma sinuatum is a poisonous mushroom found across Europe and North America. Some guidebooks refer to it by its older scientific names of Entoloma lividum or Rhodophyllus sinuatus...
- Gomphus clavatusGomphus (fungus)Gomphus is a small genus of cantharelloid fungi in the family Gomphaceae. The genus has a widespread distribution in temperate regions, and contains 10 species. Once presumed to be related to chanterelles, molecular study has shown them to be allied with stinkhorns and fairy clubs...
- Infundibulicybe geotropaInfundibulicybe geotropaInfundibulicybe geotropa, also known as the trooping funnel or monk's head, is a funnel-shaped toadstool widely found in Europe and in North America. A large sturdy cream- or buff-coloured funnel-shaped mushroom, it grows in mixed woodlands, often in troops or fairy rings, one of which is over...
- Lepista nuda
- Lepista personataLepista personataLepista personata is a species of fungus...
- Lepista sordida
- Leucopaxillus giganteusLeucopaxillus giganteusLeucopaxillus giganteus, commonly known as the giant leucopax or the giant funnel, is a saprobic species of fungus in the Tricholomataceae family. As its common names imply, the fruit body, or mushroom, can become quite large—the cap reaches diameters of up to...
- Lycoperdon gemmatum
- Marasmius oreadesMarasmius oreadesMarasmius oreades is also known as the scotch bonnet or fairy ring mushroom. The latter name tends to cause some confusion, as many other mushrooms grown in fairy rings .-Distribution and habitat:Marasmius oreades grows extensively throughout North America...
- Sarcodon imbricatusSarcodon imbricatusSarcodon imbricatus, commonly known as the shingled hedgehog or scaly hedgehog, is a species of tooth fungus in the order Thelephorales. The mushroom itself is edible. Many sources report it has a bitter taste, but others have found it delicious and suspect that the bitter specimens may be similar...
- Tricholoma albumTricholoma albumTricholoma album, commonly known as the white knight, is an all-white mushroom of the large genus Tricholoma. It is found in Europe, India, and possibly North America. The cap and gills are white...
- Tricholoma orirubensTricholoma orirubensTricholoma orirubens, commonly known as blushing tricholoma, is an edible gilled mushroom native to Europe. The grey-capped fruit bodies are generally found singly or in small groups in deciduous and coniferous woodland in autumn.-Taxonomy:...
- Tricholoma pardinumTricholoma pardinumTricholoma pardinum, commonly known as spotted tricholoma, tiger tricholoma, tigertop or dirty trich, is a gilled mushroom widely distributed across North America and Europe, as well as parts of Asia. It is generally found in beech woodland in summer and autumn...
- Tricholoma matsutake
- Tuber melanosporum
- Vascellum curtisii
Oral tradition and folklore
A great deal of folklore surrounds fairy rings. Their names in European languages often allude to supernatural origins; they are known as ronds de sorciers ("sorcerers' rings") in France, and Hexenringe ("witches' rings") in German. In German tradition, fairy rings were thought to mark the site of witches' dancing on Walpurgis NightWalpurgis Night
Walpurgis Night is a traditional spring festival on 30 April or 1 May in large parts of Central and Northern Europe. It is often celebrated with dancing and with bonfires. It is exactly six months from All Hallows' Eve.-Name:...
, and Dutch superstition claimed that the circles show where the Devil
Devil
The Devil is believed in many religions and cultures to be a powerful, supernatural entity that is the personification of evil and the enemy of God and humankind. The nature of the role varies greatly...
set his milk churn. In Tyrol, folklore attributed fairy rings to the fiery tails of flying dragons; once a dragon had created such a circle, nothing but toadstools could grow there for seven years. European superstitions routinely warned against entering a fairy ring. French tradition reported that fairy rings were guarded by giant bug-eyed toads that cursed those who violated the circles. In other parts of Europe, entering a fairy ring would result in the loss of an eye. Fairy rings are associated with diminutive spirits in the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...
.
Western Europe
Western Europe
Western Europe is a loose term for the collection of countries in the western most region of the European continents, though this definition is context-dependent and carries cultural and political connotations. One definition describes Western Europe as a geographic entity—the region lying in the...
an, including English, Scandinavian and Celtic, traditions claimed that fairy rings are the result of elves
Elf
An elf is a being of Germanic mythology. The elves were originally thought of as a race of divine beings endowed with magical powers, which they use both for the benefit and the injury of mankind...
or fairies
Fairy
A fairy is a type of mythical being or legendary creature, a form of spirit, often described as metaphysical, supernatural or preternatural.Fairies resemble various beings of other mythologies, though even folklore that uses the term...
dancing. Such ideas dated to at least the mediæval period; The Middle English
Middle English
Middle English is the stage in the history of the English language during the High and Late Middle Ages, or roughly during the four centuries between the late 11th and the late 15th century....
term elferingewort ("elf-ring"), meaning "a ring of daisies caused by elves' dancing" dates to the 12th century. In his History of the Goths (1628), Olaus Magnus
Olaus Magnus
Olaus Magnus was a Swedish ecclesiastic and writer, who did pioneering work for the interest of Nordic people. He was reported as born in October 1490 in Östergötland, and died on August 1, 1557. Magnus, Latin for the Swedish Stor “great”, is a Latin family name taken personally, and not a...
makes this connection, saying that fairy rings are burned into the ground by the dancing of elves. British folklorist Thomas Keightley noted that in Scandinavia in the early 20th century, beliefs persisted that fairy rings (elfdans) arose from the dancing of elves. Keightley warned that while entering an elfdans might allow the interloper to see the elves—although this was not guaranteed—it would also put the intruder in thrall to their illusions.
The folklore
Folklore
Folklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
s of the British Isles
British Isles
The British Isles are a group of islands off the northwest coast of continental Europe that include the islands of Great Britain and Ireland and over six thousand smaller isles. There are two sovereign states located on the islands: the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and...
contain a wealth of fairy lore, including the idea from which fairy rings take their name: the phenomena result from the dancing of fairies. In 19th-century Wales, where the rings are known as cylch y Tylwyth Teg, fairies were almost invariably described as dancing in a group when encountered, and in Scotland and Wales in the late 20th century, stories about fairy rings were still common; some Welsh even claimed to have joined a fairy dance. Victorian folklorists regarded fairies and witches as related, based in part on the idea that both were believed to dance in circles. These revels are particularly associated with moonlit nights, the rings only becoming visible to mortals the following morning. Local variants add other details. An early 20th-century Irish tradition says that fairies enjoy dancing around the hawthorn tree so that fairy rings often centre on one. One resident of Balquhidder
Balquhidder
Balquhidder is a small village in the Stirling council area of Scotland. It is overlooked by the dramatic mountain terrain of the Braes of Balquhidder, at the head of Loch Voil. Balquhidder Glen is also popular for fishing, nature watching and walking...
, Scotland, said that the fairies sit on the mushrooms and use them as dinnertables, and a Welsh woman claimed that fairies used the mushrooms as parasols and umbrellas. Olaus Magnus
Olaus Magnus
Olaus Magnus was a Swedish ecclesiastic and writer, who did pioneering work for the interest of Nordic people. He was reported as born in October 1490 in Östergötland, and died on August 1, 1557. Magnus, Latin for the Swedish Stor “great”, is a Latin family name taken personally, and not a...
in "De Gentibus Septentrionalibus" wrote that the brightness of the fairy ring comes not from the dancing of the fairies, who harm it with their feet, but from Puck
Puck (mythology)
In English folklore, Puck is a mythological fairy or mischievous nature sprite. Puck is also a generalised personification of land spirits. In more recent times, the figure of Robin Goodfellow is identified as a puck.-Etymology:...
, who refreshes the grass. A Devon legend says that a black hen and chickens sometimes appear at dusk in a large fairy ring on the edge of Dartmoor
Dartmoor
Dartmoor is an area of moorland in south Devon, England. Protected by National Park status, it covers .The granite upland dates from the Carboniferous period of geological history. The moorland is capped with many exposed granite hilltops known as tors, providing habitats for Dartmoor wildlife. The...
. A Welsh and Manx variant current in the 1960s removes dancing from the picture and claims that fairy rings spring up over an underground fairy village. These associations have become linked to specific sites. For example, "The Pixies' Church" was a rock formation in Dartmoor surrounded by a fairy ring, and a stone circle tops Cader Idris in northern Wales, believed to be a popular spot for fairy dances.
Many folk beliefs generally paint fairy rings as dangerous places, best avoided. Sikes traces these stories of people trespassing into forbidden territory and being punished for it to the tale of Psyche and Eros
Cupid and Psyche
Cupid and Psyche , is a legend that first appeared as a digressionary story told by an old woman in Lucius Apuleius' novel, The Golden Ass, written in the 2nd century CE. Apuleius likely used an earlier tale as the basis for his story, modifying it to suit the thematic needs of his novel.It has...
. In it, Psyche is forbidden to view her lover, and when she does so, her palace disappears and she is left alone. Superstition calls fairy circles sacred and warns against violating them lest the interloper (such as a farmer with a plough) anger the fairies and be curse
Curse
A curse is any expressed wish that some form of adversity or misfortune will befall or attach to some other entity—one or more persons, a place, or an object...
d. In an Irish legend recorded by Wilde, a farmer builds a barn on a fairy ring despite the protests of his neighbours. He is struck senseless one night, and a local "fairy doctor" breaks the curse. The farmer says that he dreamed that he must destroy the barn. Even collecting dew from the grass or flowers of a fairy ring can bring bad luck. Destroying a fairy ring is unlucky and fruitless; superstition says it will just grow back.
A traditional Scottish rhyme sums up the danger of such places:
- He wha tills the fairies' green
- Nae luck again shall hae :
- And he wha spills the fairies' ring
- Betide him want and wae.
- For weirdless days and weary nights
- Are his till his deein' day.
- But he wha gaes by the fairy ring,
- Nae dule nor pine shall see,
- And he wha cleans the fairy ring
- An easy death shall dee.
Numerous legends focus on mortals entering a fairy ring—and the consequences. One superstition is that anyone who steps into an empty fairy ring will die at a young age. A 20th-century tradition from Somerset
Somerset
The ceremonial and non-metropolitan county of Somerset in South West England borders Bristol and Gloucestershire to the north, Wiltshire to the east, Dorset to the south-east, and Devon to the south-west. It is partly bounded to the north and west by the Bristol Channel and the estuary of the...
calls the fairy ring a "galley-trap" and says that a murderer or thief who walks in the ring will be hanged. Most often, someone who violates a fairy perimeter becomes invisible to mortals outside and may find it impossible to leave the circle. Often, the fairies force the mortal to dance to the point of exhaustion, death, or madness. In Welsh tales, fairies actively try to lure mortals into their circles to dance with them. A tale from the Cambrian Mountains
Cambrian Mountains
The Cambrian Mountains are a series of mountain ranges in Wales, reaching from, and including, the South Wales mountains of the Brecon Beacons, north Carmarthenshire and Ceredigion, the Black Mountains of eastern Wales, to Snowdonia in North Wales...
of Wales, current in the 19th century, describes a mortal's encounter with a fairy ring:
Entering the ring on May Eve or Halloween
Halloween
Hallowe'en , also known as Halloween or All Hallows' Eve, is a yearly holiday observed around the world on October 31, the night before All Saints' Day...
night was especially dangerous. One source near Afon fach Blaen y Cae, a tributary of the Dwyfach, tells of a shepherd accidentally disturbing a ring of rushes where fairies are preparing to dance; they capture him and hold him captive, and he even marries one of them. In variants from Scotland recorded by Edwin Sidney Hartland
Edwin Sidney Hartland
Edwin Sidney Hartland was an author of works on folklore.His works include anthologies of tales, and theories on anthropology and mythology with an ethnological perspective. He believed that the assembling and study of persistent and widespread folklore provided a scientific insight into custom...
in 1891, the ring is replaced by a cavern or an old mill.
Freedom from a fairy ring often requires outside intervention. A tactic from early 20th century Wales is to cast wild marjoram
Marjoram
Marjoram is a somewhat cold-sensitive perennial herb or undershrub with sweet pine and citrus flavours...
and thyme
Thyme
Thyme is a culinary and medicinal herb of the genus Thymus.-History:Ancient Egyptians used thyme for embalming. The ancient Greeks used it in their baths and burnt it as incense in their temples, believing it was a source of courage...
into the circle and befuddle the fairies; another asks the rescuer to touch the victim with iron. Other stories require that the enchanted victim simply be plucked out by someone on the outside, although even this can be difficult: A farmer in a tale from the Langollen region has to tie a rope around himself and enlist four men to pull him from the circle as he goes in to save his daughter. Other folk methods rely on Christian faith to break the enchantment: a stick from a rowan
Rowan
The rowans or mountain-ashes are shrubs or small trees in genus Sorbus of family Rosaceae. They are native throughout the cool temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere, with the highest species diversity in the mountains of western China and the Himalaya, where numerous apomictic microspecies...
tree (thought to be the wood from which the cross of Jesus Christ was built) can break the curse, as can a simple phrase such as "what, in Heaven's name", as in a 19th century tale from Carmarthenshire
Carmarthenshire
Carmarthenshire is a unitary authority in the south west of Wales and one of thirteen historic counties. It is the 3rd largest in Wales. Its three largest towns are Llanelli, Carmarthen and Ammanford...
. A common element to these recoveries is that the rescuer must wait a year and a day from the point where the victim entered the ring.
Mortals who have danced with the fairies are rarely safe after being saved from their enthrallment. Often, they find that what seemed to be but a brief foray into fairyland was indeed much longer in the mortal realm, possibly weeks or years. The person rescued from the fairy ring may have no memory of their encounter with the sprites, as in a story from Anglesea recorded in 1891. In most tales, the saved interlopers face a grim fate. For example, in a legend from Carmarthenshire
Carmarthenshire
Carmarthenshire is a unitary authority in the south west of Wales and one of thirteen historic counties. It is the 3rd largest in Wales. Its three largest towns are Llanelli, Carmarthen and Ammanford...
, recorded by Sikes, a man is rescued from a fairy ring only to crumble to dust. In a tale from Mathavarn, Llanwrin Parish, a fairy-ring survivor moulders away when he eats his first bite of food. Another vulnerability seems to be iron; in a tale from the Aberystwyth
Aberystwyth
Aberystwyth is a historic market town, administrative centre and holiday resort within Ceredigion, Wales. Often colloquially known as Aber, it is located at the confluence of the rivers Ystwyth and Rheidol....
region, a touch from the metal causes a rescued woman to disappear.
Some legends assert that the only safe way to investigate a fairy ring is to run around it nine times. This affords the ability to hear the fairies dancing and frolicking underground. According to a 20th-century tradition of Northumberland
Northumberland
Northumberland is the northernmost ceremonial county and a unitary district in North East England. For Eurostat purposes Northumberland is a NUTS 3 region and is one of three boroughs or unitary districts that comprise the "Northumberland and Tyne and Wear" NUTS 2 region...
, this must be done under a full moon, and the runner must travel in the direction of the sun; to go widdershins
Widdershins
Widdershins means to take a course opposite the apparent motion of the sun, to go counterclockwise or lefthandwise, or to circle an object by always keeping it on the left...
allows the fairies to place the runner under their sway. To circle the ring a tenth time is foolhardy and dangerous. Thomas Keightley recorded a similar tradition from Northumberland
Northumberland
Northumberland is the northernmost ceremonial county and a unitary district in North East England. For Eurostat purposes Northumberland is a NUTS 3 region and is one of three boroughs or unitary districts that comprise the "Northumberland and Tyne and Wear" NUTS 2 region...
in 1905: "The children constantly run this number [nine times], but nothing will induce them to venture a tenth run." A story from early 20th century England says that a mortal can see the sprites without fear if a friend places a foot on that of the person stepping beyond the circle's perimeter. Another superstition says that wearing a hat backwards can confuse the fairies and prevent them from pulling the wearer into their ring.
Although they have strong associations with doom, some legends paint fairy circles as places of fertility and fortune. Welsh folk belief is that mountain sheep that eat the grass of a fairy ring flourish, and that crops sown from such a place will prove more bountiful that those from normal land. A folk belief recorded in the Athenian Oracle claims that a house built on a fairy circle will bring prosperity to its inhabitants. Likewise, a legend from Pont y Wern says that in the 13th or 14th century, the inhabitants of the town of Corwrion watched fairies dancing in a ring around a glow worm every Sunday after church at a place called Pen y Bonc. They even joined the sprites in their revels. The legend survives in a rhyme: "With the fairies nimbly dancing round / The glow-worm on the Rising Ground." A Welsh tale recorded by Rhys in 1901 tells of a man who supposedly lived on the side of the Berwyn
Berwyn range
The Berwyn range is an isolated and sparsely populated area of moorland located in the north-east of Wales, roughly bounded by Llangollen in the north-east, Corwen in the north-west, Bala in the south-west, and Oswestry in the south-east.The Berwyn range also played its part in causing King Henry...
, above Cwm Pennant, in the early 19th century. The man destroyed a nest of rook
Rook (bird)
The Rook is a member of the Corvidae family in the passerine order of birds. Named by Carl Linnaeus in 1758, the species name frugilegus is Latin for "food-gathering"....
s in a tree surrounded by a fairy ring. In gratitude, the fairies gave him a half crown every day but stopped when he told his friends, "for he had broken the rule of the fair folks by making their liberality known". Nevertheless, fairy boons are not without their curses, and tales often tell of the sprites exacting their revenge.
Literature
Fairy rings have featured in the works of European authors, playwrights, and artists since the 13th century. In his Arthurian romance Meraugis de Portlesguez, Raoul de HoudencRaoul de Houdenc
Raoul de Houdenc , 12th-century French trouvère, takes his name from his native place, generally identified with Houdain , though there are twelve places bearing the name in one or other of its numerous variants....
describes a scene clearly derived from Celtic fairy-ring lore: The title character visits the Château des Caroles and sees a circle of women and a knight dancing around a pine in the castle courtyard. Meraugis is unable to fight the intense desire to join in, thus freeing the previous knight from the spell. Meraugis is helpless to leave the dance until, ten weeks later, another knight joins it and frees him. Fairy circles feature in works by several Elizabethan
Elizabethan era
The Elizabethan era was the epoch in English history of Queen Elizabeth I's reign . Historians often depict it as the golden age in English history...
poets and playwrights. William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
alludes to them in A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Midsummer Night's Dream is a play that was written by William Shakespeare. It is believed to have been written between 1590 and 1596. It portrays the events surrounding the marriage of the Duke of Athens, Theseus, and the Queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta...
, Act II, Scene I ("And I serve the fairy queen, / To dew her orbs upon the green" and "To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind"), and The Tempest
The Tempest
The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. It is set on a remote island, where Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place,...
, Act V, Scene I:
- ... you demi-puppets that
- By moonshine do the green sour ringlets make,
- Whereof the ewe not bites, and you whose pastime
- Is to make midnight mushrooms, that rejoice
- To hear the solemn curfew ...
Shakespeare's contemporary Thomas Randolph
Thomas Randolph (poet)
Thomas Randolph was an English poet and dramatist. He was baptized on 18 June 1605 and was the uncle of American colonist William Randolph.-Education:...
speaks of fairy rings in his Amyntas, or the Impossible Dowry (1638), and Michael Drayton
Michael Drayton
Michael Drayton was an English poet who came to prominence in the Elizabethan era.-Early life:He was born at Hartshill, near Nuneaton, Warwickshire, England. Almost nothing is known about his early life, beyond the fact that in 1580 he was in the service of Thomas Goodere of Collingham,...
describes one in Nymphidia: The Court of Fairy:
- And in their courses make that round
- In meadows and in marshes found,
- Of them so called the Fairy Ground,
- Of which they have the keeping.
Fairy imagery became especially popular in the Victorian era
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
. Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy, OM was an English novelist and poet. While his works typically belong to the Naturalism movement, several poems display elements of the previous Romantic and Enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.While he regarded himself primarily as a...
uses a fairy ring as a symbol of lost love in The Mayor of Casterbridge
The Mayor of Casterbridge
The Mayor of Casterbridge , subtitled "The Life and Death of a Man of Character", is a tragic novel by British author Thomas Hardy. It is set in the fictional town of Casterbridge . The book is one of Hardy's Wessex novels, all set in a fictional rustic England...
(1886); the character Michael Henchard passes a fairy ring and remembers that he last saw his wife Susan there when he sold her to a sailor in a drunken rage. Victorian poets who have referred to fairy rings in their works include Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Elizabeth Barrett Browning was one of the most prominent poets of the Victorian era. Her poetry was widely popular in both England and the United States during her lifetime. A collection of her last poems was published by her husband, Robert Browning, shortly after her death.-Early life:Members...
, Eliza Cook
Eliza Cook
Eliza Cook was an English author, Chartist poet and writer born in London Road, Southwark.- Background :...
, Robert Stephen Hawker
Robert Stephen Hawker
Robert Stephen Hawker was an Anglican priest, poet, antiquarian of Cornwall and reputed eccentric. He is best known as the writer of The Song of the Western Men with its chorus line of And shall Trelawny die? / Here's twenty thousand Cornish men / will know the reason why!, which he published...
, Felicia Hemans
Felicia Hemans
-Ancestry:Felicia Heman's paternal grandfather was George Browne of Passage, co. Cork, Ireland; her maternal grandparents were Elizabeth Haydock Wagner of Lancashire and Benedict Paul Wagner , wine importer at 9 Wolstenholme Square, Liverpool. Family legend gave the Wagners a Venetian origin;...
, Gerald Massey
Gerald Massey
Gerald Massey was an English poet and self-educated Egyptologist. He was born near Tring, Hertfordshire in England.-Biography:...
, and Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson, FRS was Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom during much of Queen Victoria's reign and remains one of the most popular poets in the English language....
. W. H. Cummings composed the cantata The Fairy Ring, and William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and playwright, and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms...
wrote of them in The Land of Heart's Desire
The Land of Heart's Desire
The Land of Heart's Desire is a play by Irish poet, dramatist, and 1923 Nobel laureate William Butler Yeats. First performed in the spring of 1894, at the Avenue Theatre in London, where it ran for a little over six weeks, it was the first professional performance of one of Yeats' plays.In this...
(1894).
Art
Fairy circles have appeared in European artwork since at least the 18th century. For example, William BlakeWilliam Blake
William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age...
painted Oberon, Titania and Puck with Fairies Dancing, depicting a scene from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, around 1785, and Daniel Maclise
Daniel Maclise
Daniel Maclise was an Irish history, literary and portrait painter, and illustrator, who worked for most of his life in London, England.-Early life:...
painted Faun and the Fairies around 1834. Images of fairies dancing in circles became a favourite trope of painters
Fairy painting
Fairy painting is a genre of painting and illustration featuring fairies and fairy tale settings, often with extreme attention to detail. The genre is most closely associated with the Victorian era in Great Britain, but has experienced a contemporary revival...
in the Victorian period. On the one hand, artists were genuinely interested in the culture such imagery represented, and on the other, fairies could be depicted as titillating nudes and semi-nudes without offending Victorian mores
Victorian morality
Victorian morality is a distillation of the moral views of people living at the time of Queen Victoria's reign and of the moral climate of the United Kingdom throughout the 19th century in general, which contrasted greatly with the morality of the previous Georgian period...
, which made them a popular subject of art collectors. Examples of Victorian fairy-ring paintings include Come unto these Yellow Sands (1842) by Richard Dadd
Richard Dadd
Richard Dadd was an English painter of the Victorian era, noted for his depictions of fairies and other supernatural subjects, Orientalist scenes, and enigmatic genre scenes, rendered with obsessively minuscule detail...
and Reconciliaion of Titania and Oberon (1847) by Joseph Noel Paton
Joseph Noel Paton
Sir Joseph Noel Paton FRSA, LL. D. was a Scottish artist, born in Wooer's Alley, Dunfermline, Fife.Born to a family of weavers who worked with damask, Joseph continued the family trade for a short time...
.
Modern
Modern depictions continue in a similar vein. The online gameMMORPG
Massively multiplayer online role-playing game is a genre of role-playing video games in which a very large number of players interact with one another within a virtual game world....
RuneScape
RuneScape
RuneScape is a fantasy massively multiplayer online role-playing game released in January 2001 by Andrew and Paul Gower, and developed and published by Jagex Games Studio. It is a graphical browser game implemented on the client-side in Java, and incorporates 3D rendering...
features a magical fairy-ring network used for transportation, and Ultima Online
Ultima Online
Ultima Online is a graphical massively multiplayer online role-playing game , released on September 24, 1997, by Origin Systems. It was instrumental to the development of the genre, and is still running today...
includes circles of mushrooms in several locations. The popularity of the garden gnome
Garden gnome
A garden gnome or lawn gnome is a figurine of a small humanoid creature, usually wearing a pointy hat, produced for the purpose of ornamentation and protection from evil sorcery, typically of gardens or on lawns....
in England may be the most visible manifestation of the imprint of fairy-ring imagery on popular culture, as it links the fairy-like gnome
Gnome
A gnome is a diminutive spirit in Renaissance magic and alchemy, first introduced by Paracelsus and later adopted by more recent authors including those of modern fantasy literature...
with imagery of toadstools and mushrooms.
External links
- Fairy Ring information
- Marasmius oreades from California Fungi
- Marasmius oreades as Norwegian fungus of the month, with ring photographs – from webarchiveWebarchiveThe webarchive file format is available on Mac OS X and Windows for saving and reviewing complete web pages using the Safari browser. Support for webarchive documents was added in Safari 4 Beta on Windows; Safari 3 on Windows does not support the format....