Professor Ronald Hutton, a leading expert on ancient and medieval paganism and magic, shares an Otherworldly encounter which took place near the Ring of Kerry on the west coast of Ireland, during his twenties.
We discuss his personal experience and he offers what traditional fairylore can tell us about modern encounters with the Unseen.
A video version of this interview is available on Patreon. An exclusive bonus episode will follow this coming week!
Warning: These are not fairytales. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for viewers and listeners 16 years and older. This show is unsuitable for children or anyone who might be sensitive to creepy content.
If you enjoy the show, please consider sharing your favourite episodes with friends. Don't forget to rate and subscribe wherever you listen, and if you can, please support by joining The Curious Crew on Patreon
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If you love the show and want support it and join our loving community you can find us at Patreon
A plethora of encounters and experiences from two sisters who grew up in the Staffordshire Moorlands. Twins, Gemma and Kate lived on a farm in Leek and their experiences shared here include: trooping gnomes, lights in trees, a visitation from a Raven at a funeral, spectral chanting monks, disappearing and reappearing objects and much much more!
⭐️In the exclusive bonus on Patreon, our guests share further spooky events which took place at a haunted hotel in Devon that used to be owned by a member of her family. Plus, I will read some supernatural lore and weird tales of Staffordshire including the headless horseman of Onecote, local fairies dancing in a ring near Leek, the Black Mere of Morridge and Lud’s Church. Staffordshire seems to be quite a hot spot!⭐️
Main Image: “Pro Pàtria” fragment of verses from the same chapter of Liliana. by Apel les Mestres 1907
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Warning: These are not fairytales. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for viewers andlisteners 16 years and older. This show is unsuitable for children or anyone who might be sensitive to creepy content.
Show notes
A photo I took on the path to Tintagel Castle in Cornwall (the legendary place of King Arthur’s conception and birth!). I think it’s a raven. Or is it a crow?
Ravens
Ravens, the largest birds in the corvid family, are well known in folklore as psychopomps – creatures who lead the recently deceased souls to and from the afterlife as part of the transmigration process.
The Morrigan famously takes the form of the raven as does the Welsh god, Bran the Blessed. In Native American mythology they are known as messenger spirits and guardians of magic. In Northern European folklore, ravens were viewed as guides for the dead. Odin himself had two ravens, Huginn (thought) and Muninn (memory) who flew around the world gathering knowledge on his account, similar to Lugh the Irish God who also had two ravens.
Processional Gnomes
It was the Irish poet, William Butler Yeats who originally divided the fairies into ‘trooping’ and ‘solitary’ in his book, Irish Fairy and Folk Tales. The general sense is that the troopers are largely benevolent while the solitary folk can be mischievious or dangerous. However, from my own pleasant experience with what appeared to be a solitary Fae man, the above does not necessarily ring true!
Gem talks about some anomalous lights in her shed, which I will upload on Monday 24th April. In the meantime, check out this strange photo which seems to capture a being with a hat wandering around her garden!! If anyone out there is an expert on photos and videos, please contact me.
If you enjoy the show, please consider sharing your favourite episodes with friends. Don't forget to rate and subscribe wherever you listen, and if you can, please support by joining The Curious Crew on Patreon
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Contact me at: scarlettofthefae@gmail.com
If you love the show and want support it and join our loving community you can find us at Patreon
Following Episode 55: Terrified by Goblins in my London Flat, in this second part of our interview, my guest reveals what was going on in her life at the time of the encounter. She describes the sense of trauma that these types of experiences can sometimes leave you with.
We also discuss her childhood and how home environment, family traditions and beliefs can encourage children’s imaginations to foster a sense of limitless possibility, which can continue into adulthood.`
⭐️ In the bonus episode on Patreon, we hear some further reflections from our guest about the location where the events took place. Join us there for just £3 a month and get access to the Discord group, Zoom chats and meet each other at exclusive events ⭐️
This episode features amazing FAN ART inspired by the previous episode by artist and listener of the show, Jonathan Dodd. Thank you Jonathan for allowing me to share your creation! Our guest said that she felt the artwork will either help listeners visualise the situation or give them nightmares! She said she remembers them, “looking a bit different to this (much more evil, dirty and intense) but the green bodies, angle and the window behind is really very good and it’s a wonderful picture.”
Main image: ‘The Goblins That Watch You Poo’ by Jonathan Dodd inspired by the previous episode.
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Warning: These are not fairytales. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for viewers andlisteners 16 years and older. This show is unsuitable for children or anyone who might be sensitive to creepy content.
Show notes
Image Reddit: https://i.redd.it/mamehuq8as141.jpg
Hypnopompia
Our guest rising in the night to use the loo provides a potential hypnopompic aspect to the event. The state when we are still heavy with sleep and not quite awake is called hypnopompia relating to the Greek words hýpnos, meaning “sleep,” and pompḗ, meaning “a sending away”.
We may gain access to the unconscious mind during these times as we’re not fully integrated in the material world but hovering at an etheric level where we can access enlightening information and visions.
Visionaries such as Salvador Dali, Mary Shelley and Thomas Edison enlisted these states for inspiration, by holding objects in their hands while relaxing. When their hands became limp as they fell into a sleep state, the object’s falling clattering noise would arouse them. That altered state allowed them to access ideas and visions from deep within their consciousness.
If you enjoy the show, please consider sharing your favourite episodes with friends. Don't forget to rate and subscribe wherever you listen, and if you can, please support by joining The Curious Crew on Patreon
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Contact me at: scarlettofthefae@gmail.com
If you love the show and want support it and join our loving community you can find us at Patreon
In 2018, after months of unusual phenomena in her London flat, a woman finally came face to face with the troublesome culprits. During a night time trip to the bathroom she was horrified to see two goblins, stacked one atop the other, peering at her from the threshold of the door.
Since that time, she has struggled to come to terms with the reality of what happened. In our western society, people are wholly unaccepting that these experiences take place, least of all that they could ever happen in urban areas.
We discuss the events that finally led to that night, her relationship with the flat, which had always unnerved visitors and how the decision to share her story was not taken lightly.
Is it purely location that invokes these visitations? What other factors are involved? We discuss aspects of liminality including thresholds, stages of life and geographical landmarks.
✨In the bonus episode on Patreon, I narrate several other modern encounters which bear a striking resemblance to our guest’s experience. Join us there for just £3 a month and get access to the Discord group and regular events.✨
Main image: Created by the guest as a close likeness of the one of the goblins she saw in her flat.
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Warning: These are not fairytales. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for viewers andlisteners 16 years and older. This show is unsuitable for children or anyone who might be sensitive to creepy content.
Show notes
Briggs, K. (1976) An Encyclopedia of Fairies: Hobgoblins, Brownies, Bogies and Other Supernatural Creatures. New York: Pantheon Books.
Goblin Market, Christina Rossetti (composed in 1859 and published in 1862)
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If you enjoy the show, please consider sharing your favourite episodes with friends. Don't forget to rate and subscribe wherever you listen, and if you can, please support by joining The Curious Crew on Patreon
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If you love the show and want support it and join our loving community you can find us at Patreon
A relaxing chat with Claire Casely, known as The Fairy Whisperer. Claire lives in Magical Dartmoor and is an intuitive artist, researcher, and storyteller, engaging people with faery enchantment through nature, the landscape and creativity. She has a podcast called Faery Whispering and she also writes and makes faery art.
Claire shares the pixie experience that she had alongside her mum and reveals a mini initiation she was called to, as an introduction to a Fae being, in a local walking spot that she visited.
We also discuss how it’s sometimes difficult to discuss our fairy interests with loved ones and how we can manage those situations. Plus pre-cognitive dreams, fairy guides and much much more!
The bonus for members of Patreon is an exclusive faery guide audio pathworking from Claire’s Faery Journey of Heart Awakening which she talks about during our chat.
This episode was also released on the Modern Fairy Sightings YouTube channel.
https://youtu.be/wlraJt9IpzQ
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Warning: These are not fairytales. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for viewers andlisteners 16 years and older. This show is unsuitable for children or anyone who might be sensitive to creepy content.
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Show notes
I’m Claire Casely, a Faery Whisperer, take my hand and I’ll guide you through the twilight woodland, where They are waiting to meet you…listen for the whispers from your heart and be the change.
Claire’s Faery Whispering Podcast explores the multi-sensory pathways into the Otherworld of faeries and other Supernatural beings, from listening to messages in owl hoots, singing to the sea in a moonlit cove, seeing through the eyes of a faery artist, or what to give a gnome when they come to dinner…
Photos from the Show
The naturally formed ‘fairy door’ discussed in the episode with the ‘bow tie’ rune: Dagaz ᛞ meaning “day”, “dawn”, “awakening” :
A selection of Claire’s insightful artwork is available at Etsy.com
Another delve into the original interview recordings I made in early 2017 when the Modern Fairy Sightings Project first launched. Mark Norman and I were at the time researching for the Devon chapter in Simon Young’s book Magical Folk.
One particular woman responded to a poster I’d pinned up in Dartmoor, calling for people to contact with their fairy encounters! We spoke about her family history with fairies and her own understandings of the Otherworld.
In the bonus episode on Patreon, we explore 20th century Dartmoor folklore by Theo Brown, which mentions a few stories of sightings in Postbridge, not far from Bovey Tracey, where our guest had lived.
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Warning: These are not fairytales. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for viewers andlisteners 16 years and older. This show is unsuitable for children or anyone who might be sensitive to creepy content.
If you enjoy the show, please consider sharing your favourite episodes with friends. Don't forget to rate and subscribe wherever you listen, and if you can, please support by joining The Curious Crew on Patreon
Want to report a sighting?
Contact me at: scarlettofthefae@gmail.com
If you love the show and want support it and join our loving community you can find us at Patreon
I speak with paranormal investigator, Kate ‘Hare Girl’ Ray from her excellent YouTube podcast show, Hare in the Hawthorn.
Originally hailing from Nottingham, Kate has a particular interest in the Wollaton Gnomes case, and is a published author on the subject. She also writes for Haunted Magazine and creates magnificent mushroom-related art pieces in her spare time!
Kate shares a gnome encounter that took place in her teens at the Uffington White Horse and describes the time she acted as a mediator between a troubled home owner and an angry French Fae being, for the TV show Help my House is Haunted. We also discuss the strange potency of this time we are living through.
In the bonus episode waiting for you on Patreon, Kate shares a shocking experience which left her terrified but offered a greater understanding and respect for the Fae. Join us there for access to a whole back catalogue of bonus episodes.
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Warning: These are not fairytales. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for viewers andlisteners 16 years and older. This show is unsuitable for children or anyone who might be sensitive to creepy content.
Shownotes
In the main episode, Kate describes a being she saw on the way down to Wayland Smithy from the Uffington Horse. Here’s what she created in its likeness:
Likeness of a Fairy Being seen by Kate Ray in the bushes near Wayland SmithyBy Kate HareGirl Ray of Hare in the Hawthorn
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If you enjoy the show, please consider sharing your favourite episodes with friends. Don't forget to rate and subscribe wherever you listen, and if you can, please support by joining The Curious Crew on Patreon
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If you love the show and want support it and join our loving community you can find us at Patreon
A multiple witness sighting of a walking tree trunk in the grounds of a university in Brazil, in around 1999/2000.
A Brazilian man and his companion simultaneously observed the tree trunk walking along the side of the road. They caught up with it after losing sight and felt certain he had changed into an old man with leathery lined skin “like the tree trunk“.
It’s a fascinating share. I describe my own sighting of one of these beings, which I also witnessed with two other people. A further example of these stick men/Ents/tree men is described in Episode 4: Mysterious Illuminations, which again, was a multiple witness sighting. From reported observation in all three instances, these beings appear to have a notably strange or comical gait when they move.
This interview is from the archives. I began interviewing people about their fairy encounters in 2016 when folklorist, Mark Norman and I were researching for our Devon chapter in Magical Folk: British and Irish Fairies: 500 AD to the Present. In those days, I conducted interviews on Skype, took notes and audio-recorded on my phone. I have since contacted this man and he is happy for his story to be shared on the podcast.
Warning: These are not fairytales. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for viewers andlisteners 16 years and older. This show is unsuitable for children or anyone who might be sensitive to creepy content.
Show notes
This submission of a gnome appearing to change into a tree trunk, was made to The Fairy Society’s Fairy Census 2014 – 2017 collected by Dr Simon Young.
§18) England (Cornwall). Female; 1970s: I was on holiday in Cornwall with my family. I think I was about thirteen. We’d been on holiday in Cornwall before, and had joked about the ‘Little People’ who lived in the tin mines etc. I think we’d also bought souvenir Cornish Piskies in the past. The first proper day of our holiday we went for a walk on a clear sunny day. It was very rural; I remember we were walking down a grassy track with large banks of wild hedges running alongside. It could’ve been somewhere near Polperro. I am not sure. I was walking a few steps ahead of my mum and sisters, excited about having a whole week off, when I saw a gnome sitting by the side of the path. It was so unexpected; I think I remember feeling scared – or wondering if I was seeing things or going mad? I took another couple of steps and I saw his nut brown wizened face in detail. He was cheekily grinning at me. He had a mossy brown beard and dark brown shining eyes; he was wearing a peaked hat (brown) and a shiny jacket and trousers in shades of brown and ochre. I’d say he was about twelve- to fourteen-inches tall. I (literally) could not believe my eyes. I was even too amazed (dumbstruck is apt here) to turn around and tell my family to ‘look at the gnome’ by the path. Then the gnome cocked his head (again, cheekily), turned his back on me and kind of changed/melted (transmogrified??) into an old tree stump. This must’ve all happened in a second, just as I found the breath to say ‘Mum! Look…!’ But, of course, there was nothing to see but a tree stump. I felt really stupid then, so I ‘muttered something non-consequential as we walked past. I was almost panicking, trying to make sense of what I had just witnessed. I was quite shaken. It was a breathtaking experience. It seemed so silly, (and I felt so silly) that I didn’t tell anyone what I’d just seen. Yet I really believed I had witnessed a spirit of nature, or a gnome, or something… but I also felt stupid. Like a trick and been played on me, and I had fallen for it. I felt like the joke was on me and the gnome was having a laugh about it.’
This one is a similar description to our guest’s observation:
§39) England (Devon). Female; 2000s; aged 41-50 ‘Was sat on my stairs on the telephone looking out of the hall window that looks across my front garden (no hedges), and onto the second main route into town. Time would be approximately 10.30 pm but visibility is good on the road as it is the secondary main route into the town centre. The road was quiet as it is a seaside town and it was out of season. The road is well lit by streetlights. As I was talking on the telephone I watched a ‘tree-man’ walk slowly down the road. There were no hedges in my field of vision and I could clearly see any foliage that is across the road in the gardens opposite as ‘he’ walked past them. This tree-man took so long (approximately up to two minutes) to pass I actually had time to mention it to my husband on the telephone and describe what I was seeing. The figure was approximately seven-foot tall, slim, I could clearly see a trunk like body from the waist up, branch-like arms and a quite haggard face with short branches coming from the top of the head and sides, but not like a true tree, they didn’t seem to taper to twigs. It walked in a measured way, as though putting one foot down and then making effort to pull forward, arms swinging. The figure was slightly leaning forwards. It passed my field of vision and I stood up to look down the road, but next door’s hedge blocked my view. I did not feel it was threatening in any way, but it just seemed to be going about its business.’
If you enjoy the show, please consider sharing your favourite episodes with friends. Don't forget to rate and subscribe wherever you listen, and if you can, please support by joining The Curious Crew on Patreon
Want to report a sighting?
Contact me at: scarlettofthefae@gmail.com
If you love the show and want support it and join our loving community you can find us at Patreon
After suffering serious illness, our guest involved shamanic approaches in his quest to return to full health. During his successful process of recovery he discovered a deep resonance with chanting, which led to an extraordinary experience.
Later, on a trip to Iceland, he encountered a couple who showed up out of the blue and disappeared just as curiously. He has always felt, that they were not of this world.
In the Bonus Episode on Patreon, our guest describes a mysterious face which appeared in a fire.
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Warning: These are not fairytales. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for viewers andlisteners 16 years and older.This episode is particularly unsettling and is unsuitable for children or anyone who might be sensitive to creepy content.
Show notes
A similar experience of ‘knowing’ to that which our guest describes. This submission was made to The Fairy Society’s Fairy Census 2014 – 2017 collected by Dr Simon Young.
§426) France (Ardèche). Male; 2010s; 61-70 ‘The beings that I saw appeared to be fell walkers. They wore walking gear. They had knapsacks. But their knapsacks seemed to be empty. They carried no bottles of water. There were about fifteen to twenty of them. I had just pushed my bike up a mountain and I was sitting on the grass at the top of it. They appeared, walking down from a path above me, and stood around me in a circle, chattering and laughing, ignoring me, as I sat in the centre of them. Behaving in a way, as a friend who lives in France commented, that no French person would. ‘The French would never do that.’ I chatted to three of the group, in broken French. First, a man who seemed to be their leader, the dominant male. Then a taciturn and sad looking man, and finally a woman. At that time I was on a spiritual quest that has been on-going for about twenty years. I felt that they were there to support me and to prove to me that my quest was not a fatuous one. One of them, the woman, came over to me and took from me a possession I carry that has tremendous spiritual significance for me. I was still sitting down. She stood over me. She had the strongest, most muscular legs I have ever seen – but in proportion. They were not grossly muscular. They looked like ordinary legs but I doubt that they were. They were the legs of someone who has walked everywhere, on every day of her life. This may seem preposterous, but I cannot stress enough the significance of her clearly not human legs. It was one of the things that truly made me realise I was with people who were not people. She took the possession I carry that has ‘tremendous spiritual significance’, said its name and then kissed it. At which point, as if their mission was over, the group turned and walked away. After they had gone I came back to ‘this reality’, realising that I had been Outside of Time, a state that I have experienced before, always while undergoing unusual and significant events of a spiritual nature. When the group left me they were chattering and laughing. I heard them doing so as they turned a corner and left my sight. Scarcely less than ten seconds after they had gone, and realising that something truly strange had occurred, I got up and followed them. I turned the same corner. There was no sight of them. They had vanished.,
If you enjoy the show, please consider sharing your favourite episodes with friends. Don't forget to rate and subscribe wherever you listen, and if you can, please support by joining The Curious Crew on Patreon
Want to report a sighting?
Contact me at: scarlettofthefae@gmail.com
If you love the show and want support it and join our loving community you can find us at Patreon
A beautiful in-depth chat with Brett Manning – a well known and much admired artist of the strange. Her new book, One Foot in the Green presents insightful and characterful interpretations of the Fae and cryptid beings.
Brett’s sense of the Otherworld is inspired by her own dreams and personal experiences. This chat is a really generous and open hearted discussion about her relationship with these beings and their realms.
Hop over to the Patreon BONUS EPISODE to hear excerpts from Brett’s book, One Foot in the Green.
Brett Manning’s Art
Content warning: These are not fairytales and the content is unsuitable for children. Some episodes may contain details which some may find unsettling or frightening. The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast is designed for listeners 16 years and older.
Please do subscribe, rate and share this episode and support the podcast by joining Patreon if you can. Thank you
Podcast intro music: Transmutate by Snowflake (c) copyright 2020 Licensed. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
