Where Fairies Meet: The Relevance of Comparative Material

There is a sense of delight that I feel, as I hold the author copy of “Where Fairies Meet: Parallels between Irish and Romanian Fairy Traditions.” It is the first comparative study that brings side to side Irish and Romanian fairy folklore, and as I sit here, with the hard copy in hand, I can only think of why and how “Where Fairies Meet” came to be. The book came to life in his format because They (by ‘They’ I mean fairies[1]) wanted it so. I’ll give you the full story, shortly. My personal motivations however, lay along the lines of wanting to offer a useful resource to those who are interested to pursue a fairy-based spiritual path or have an interest in researching fairy lore cross-culturally. 

 

Being one such a path myself, I found it very important to have access to authentic fairy lore and folklore, especially to resources that examine similar traditions across two or more cultures.  I will underline the words authentic and cross-cultural, and here’s why: I needed more context for my own experiences as well as a better understanding of who and what was I dealing with. I needed a solid framework, one built on scholarship as opposed to speculative interpretation of lore, on traditions – such as those of fairy seers from places in Southern and Central Europe, that still survive today albeit scanty- as opposed to fakelore. 

 

More than once, I found myself running circles while trying to piecemeal an approach to working in partnership with fairies. I shall explain. I found excellent guidance through the work of Morgan Daimler, Lora O’Brien, Cat Heath, Sabina Magliocco, Dr. Simon Young, whose blogs, papers, books, and webpages I am adding to the list of resources at the end of this post. I also have had the memories from the times I apprenticed with my grandmother, herself a fairy seer and medicine woman. But the path I found myself treading over the past few years is an eclectic one, so I needed, and still need, resources that present information more in the fashion of comparative studies. I also believe with all my heart that I am not the only one trying connect bits and pieces into something coherent, into something that makes sense from a broader perspective and in the same time feels true to me. To all those seekers like myself, here’s one resource which I truly hope you may find useful.

 

I am aware that comparative studies can be problematic due the tendency to whitewash differences and present for example deities and fairy beings form various cultures as one and the same under different aspects. In the vast majority of cases this is not accurate, and in my opinion, it is offensive to the cultures as well as to the deities themselves to be conflated, squashed together as just one thing disregarding individuality. 

 

Yet those studies that present various elements and practices from different cultures using comparison instead of leveling of differences, that treat with care and consideration the uniqueness of each culture, are useful resources. In her excellent class “Charms, Wihta, and Story: An Animistic Approach to Modern Heathen Magic”, Cat Heath explains why comparative material is important.  Viewing the same practice (healing charm or ritual element, for example) through different cultural lenses offers different angles and perspectives that are oftentimes converging.  This in turn help seekers shed light especially over the cases where material is scanty or very fragmented.  Since modern personal practice is not a one hundred percent replica of something done in the distant past, comparative studies can help one’s personal practice to grow through the integration of various elements. Integration is different from slamming things together into a hodge-podge. Integration of elements coming from different cultures is based on understanding of how things evolved over time in response to the changes that occurred within society. Knowing the background gives a thorough understanding which is very important as one seeks to connect with theses practices, (healing, protective charms, ritual elements, propitiatory offerings, etc.) at deeper levels. Deep connection leads to internalizing the material which then can be adapted and incorporated into personal practice to create an organic blend.

 

I admit to the fact that I was not planning to write this book: not the way it came out anyway. Initially, I was focusing on a conference paper to present at Mystic South, Atlanta, 2022. I initially wrote the abstract of what I believed would be my paper, and then let it percolate before submitting it. That very night, one of my fairy guides told me in unequivocal terms that I was not going to submit that abstract. What I began as a paper had to be expanded into a book. I agreed to the undertaking, but I also made it clear that I needed ASAP a new idea for a paper as well as an abstract; you see, I had less that twenty-four hours till deadline.  Reassured by the fairy ally that it’ll all work out, I went back to sleep. In the morning, I woke up with a new paper title, and as soon as I sat down in front of the computer, the abstract began to flow through as if under dictation. (The link to the paper, which was accepted to the conference, is in the list of resources at the end of this post.)

 

Next, I focused on writing the book. As I expanded the initial outline, it became increasingly clearer that I have to go beyond focusing exclusively on scholarship which had been my initial intent. Thoroughly researched and complete with a long Bibliography section, the book offers study material for everyone interested in authentic fairy traditions, past and present. It also invites pondering over the reality behind the phenomena described in the collected material, since it includes the testimony of fairy seers of the twenty-first century, and personal experiences. This last aspect may be of use especially to those who have a more eclectic take to working in partnership with fairies. 

 

There’s never too much material to equip us for functioning in the space where the fairies meet, the space where fairy and fairy-like beings tug at one’s sleeve, inviting (I put this in the mildest possible terms) a partnership. For all those needing such material, I was thus guided to write “Where Fairies Meet: Parallels between Irish and Romanian Fairy Traditions.”

 

Thank you for reading, and until we next meet, bright fairy blessings.

Daniela Simina

Notes

[1] The term fairy/fairies as I use it here is intended as an umbrella term to include beings that are strikingly similar yet unique to the cultures they come from, and are known as the Aes Síde, Na Daoine Maithe in Ireland and zâne, either Rusalii or Sânziene, in Romania. 

 

Resources

Daimler, Morgan “A New Dictionary of Fairies: A 21^st Century Exploration of Celtic and Related Western European Fairies” , 2020

Daimler, Morgan “Living Liminally” https://lairbhan.blogspot.com

Heath, Cat “Elves, Witches, and Gods: Spinning Old Heathen Magic in the Modern Day”, 2021

Heath, Cat “Charms, Wihta, and Story: An Animistic Approach to Modern Heathen Magic”, https://www.eventbrite.com(contact Cat Heath for class recordings)

Magliocco, Sabina “Magliocco, Sabina, “The Taming of the Fae: Literary and Folkloric Fairies in Modern Paganism”, Magic and Witchery in the Modern West edited by Shai Feraro and Ethan Doyle White (Palgrave MacMillan, 2019) 

O’Brien, Lora, and Jon O’Sullivan,  “Irish Pagan School: Authentic Connection to Ireland” https://irishpaganschool.com

Young, Simon, Ceri Houlbrook, “British and Irish Fairies -500AD to the Present”, 2017

Young, Simon, Ceri Houlbrook, “Magical Folk: A History of Real Fairies, 500 AD to the Present”, 2022