| Next, Wentz tells us about the Tylwyth Teg, who appear to be the same as our UFO occupants. In the area of Wales: “Mr. Louis Foster Edwards, of Harlech, recalling the memories of many years ago, offers the following evidence: ‘Tylwyth Teg’ and their World. –‘There was an idea that the Tylwyth Teg lived by plundering at night. It was thought, too, that if anything went wrong with cows or horses the Tylwyth Teg were to blame. As a race, the Tylwyth Teg were described as having the power of invisibility; and it was believed they could disappear like a spirit while one happened to be observing them. The world in which they lived was a world quite unlike ours, and mortals taken to it by them were changed in nature. The way a mortal might be taken by the Tylwyth Teg was by being attracted into their dance. If they thus took you away, it would be according to our time for twelve months, though to you the time would seem no more than a night’.” (119) The following excerpt I believe, is from Bospowes, Hayle, Cornwall, July 1910. Regardless, it is included in Wentz’s book: “There seems to have been always and everywhere (or nearly so) a belief in a race, neither divine nor human, but very like to human beings, who existed on a ‘plane’ different from that of humans, though occupying the same space. This has been called the ‘astral’ or the ‘fourth-dimensional’ plane. Why ‘astral’? why ‘fourth-dimensional’? why ‘plane’? are questions the answers to which do not matter, and I do not attempt to defend the terms, but you must call it something. This is the belief to which Scott refers in the introduction to The Monastery, as the ‘beautiful but almost forgotten theory of astral spirits or creatures of the elements, surpassing human beings in knowledge and power, but inferior to them as being subject, after a certain space of years, to a death which is to them annihilation.’ The subdivisions and elaborations of the subject by Paracelsus, the Rosicrucians, and the modern theosophists are no doubt amplifications of that popular belief, which, though rather undefined, resembles the theory of these mystics in its main outlines, and was probably what suggested it to them.” (120) We can see the author, Wentz, is deeply knowledgeable of Rosicrucian ideas. The next extract from Wentz’s book presents a fascinating insight, in that mushrooms are finally discussed: “Our next place for an investigation of the surviving Cornish Fairy-Faith is Marazion, the very ancient British town opposite the isle called St. Michael’s Mount. … To Mr. Thomas G. Jago, of Marazion, with a memory extending backwards more than seventy years, he being eighty years old, I am indebted for this statement about the pisky creed in that locality: ‘I imagine that one hundred and fifty years ago the belief in piskies and spirits was general. In my boyhood days, piskies were often called ‘the mites’ (little people): they were regarded as little spirits. The word piskies is the old Cornish brogue for pixies. In certain grass fields, mushrooms growing in a circle might be seen of a morning, and the old folks pointing to the mushrooms would say to the children, ‘Oh, the piskies have been dancing there last night’.” (121) |
Mushrooms and their connection to fairy tales is something most people are vaguely familiar with. That is nothing new, although I attempted to truly flesh it out in this book. It is no small surprise then that stories would arise with instances of mushrooms being associated with fairies. Not too extraordinary, I would say, but it is relevant, as we will soon see. There was something very special about that “fairy ring of mushrooms,” which has been overlooked by every researcher I know of. First, this next extract mentions the use of a special magical salve placed on the eyes which allows one to see and dance with the pixies. Continuing with Wentz: “At his home in Penzance, Mr. Maddern dictated to me the very valuable evidence which follows: Two Kinds of Pixies.—‘In this region there are two kinds of pixies, one purely a land-dwelling pixy and the other a pixy which dwells on the sea-strand between high and low water mark. (1) The land-dwelling pixy was usually thought to be full of mischievous fun, but it did no harm. There was a very prevalent belief, when I was a boy, that this sea-strand pixy, called Bucca, (2) had to be propitiated by a cast (three) of fish, to ensure the fishermen having a good shot (catch) of fish. The land pixy was supposed to be able to render its devotees invisible, if they only anointed their eyes with a certain green salve made of secret herbs gathered from Kerris-moor. (3) In the invisible condition thus induced, people were able to join the pixy revels, during which, according to the old tradition, time slipped away very, very rapidly, though people returned from the pixies no older than when they went with them.” (122) In a completely different part of Europe, another story comes to us of the “ointment” variety, however, this story combines another popular theme presented, that of having the eye which one sees the fairies with, stolen from the seer, leaving the seer with just “one eye.” This brings us right back to the Odin, Cyclops mythology and the “disembodied eye.” (119) Fairy Faith, p. 144 (120) ibid, p. 167-68 (121) ibid, p. 173 (122) Fairy Faith, p. 175 |