Category Archives: Folk Beliefs

Flat 7UP Settles a Sick Stomach

Nationality: Irish
Age: 54
Occupation: Homemaker
Residence: Dublin, Ireland
Performance Date: January 21st, 2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Irish

Background: Informant is 54-year-old woman living in Dublin, Ireland. She was born and raised in rural Ireland without access to modern medicine for minor ails, and so knows many folk-remedies for everyday pains. She is married and has one grown daughter. In this conversation, she is signified by the letters C.D.

 

Main Piece:

C.D.: My mam used to always do this when I had a sick stomach. Back home, at the time there was no access to fancy antacids or the like that there is nowadays, so this was pretty much Gospel – all the neighbors used to do it too, and when I asked the other people at school a good few of them had heard of it.

Basically, what you do to settle a sick stomach is you pour out a glass of 7up and just let it sit on a window-sill to go flat. And then you drink it, and your stomach should be all good in about 20 minutes. I think it replaces some of the sugars and fluids you lose when you’re sick too, sure there’s no harm in it anyways.

 

A.: Does it have to be a window-sill?

 

C.D.: Probably not, but that’s how my mam would do it and it seemed to work most of the time so why mess with a good thing, right?

 

A.: True. Where did your mam learn it?

 

C.D.: Would it be a cop-out to say that she learned it from her mam? But I actually think I do remember Granny coming around and minding us when mam went away and she did the same thing for my brother, but I think it was just flat Coke she used. It’s probably just a placebo effect anyways, the fact that we’ve been brought up to believe that it works probably gives you a false sense of feeling better after you drink it.

 

Performance Context: I interviewed the informant over FaceTime due to her being in Ireland and I in California. When I mentioned that I was feeling unwell and she prescribed this remedy. The original context as far back as I could discover was her mother. However, after a quick Google it is clear that this is a common ‘remedy,’ and is particularly associated with Irish folk medicine despite the origination of soft drinks in America.

 

My Thoughts: I’ve actually used this remedy and to an extent it seems to work. Perhaps it’s just because I was brought up in a culture where this was the first port of call when you had a minor stomach upset that it works for me purely based on placebo effect. This is similar to how it has been observed that people whose doctors wear white coats get better faster from the sense of confidence in their treatment the coat symbolizes. Considering the popularity of this remedy in Ireland, I’d be interested as to how someone discovered that flat soft drinks worked as a ‘cure’ in the first place, considering they’re not all that appetizing.

Icelandic Nykur

Nationality: Icelandic
Age: 23
Occupation: Student
Residence: Dublin, Ireland
Performance Date: March 11th, 2017
Language: Icelandic, English

Background Information:

My informant is a 23-year-old student originally from Iceland, but studying in Dublin. She was born and raised in Reykjavik and moved to Ireland in her 20’s to come to University there. She told me about the nykur, a legendary water horse specific to the Nordic countries. She does not personally believe in this legend, but apparently opinion is fairly mixed on whether or not it is real, and belief is higher with children. She believed it as a child, and was told it by her mother possibly in an effort to stop her from wandering near large bodies of water. She agrees that it was a useful way of making her cautious without ruining her innocence about the true dangers of icy cold water.

Main Piece:

A.J.: Have you heard of the Nykur?

A: No, what is it?

A.J.: It’s a mythical creature in Icelandic – well, I think they have it in some places in Sweden and Norway and stuff – but it’s mostly Icelandic. It’s the shape of a horse, and grey, but it’s not a physical thing, more like a kind of ghost horse. They live by lakes, or by waterfalls usually. But they’re pretty scary looking – kind of like if you had a Patronus of a horse, a weird version. They have some scary things about them, like I’ve heard that they have backwards hooves, and sharp teeth and that kind of thing.

A: And do people interact with them at all?

A.J: I don’t think you would want to. They’re not peaceful, they’re a bit like sirens in that they lure people to their deaths in the water. They seem really nice and beautiful, and then you go to pet them and if you ride on them they’ll take you into the water and drown you. They seem to take children in particular.

A: Is there any way to prevent them from taking you underwater if you do come across them?

A.J: Yeah, there is. My mom told me about them and that if you recognize that the horse is a Nykur, you can make them go away by saying their name.

A: And do you believe in them?

A.J.: I did when I was a kid, but not anymore. I think it’s a bit like the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy, you grow out of it when you’ve been to enough waterfalls to know that you’re not going to see any magic horses. But when I was younger I wouldn’t go near the water without someone else with me.

Perfomance Context:

In a phone conversation in which she recounted to me what she knew about the huldufólk, she also told me about this Icelandic mythical creature which I had not heard of before.

My thoughts:

This reminds me a lot of the La Llorona myth. Considering she was told about them by her mother, in a landscape with many lakes and waterfalls, this myth seems to serve the same function as warning children about La Llorona, insofar as it discourages them from wandering by themselves near bodies of water where they could potentially drown. By making the horse scary-looking, they emphasize this warning. By connecting this warning story to the landscape, it makes for a more believable tale. Much of Icelandic folklore is connected to the natural landscape as it is so unusual and striking, which also plays into the fact that much of Icelandic folklore is very different from that which we find in the other Nordic countries. Their landscapes are much more snowy and similar to each other, whereas Iceland is a volcanic outlier.

For the La Llorona myth, see here: http://www.legendsofamerica.com/gh-lallorona.html

Jinn

Nationality: Indian
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: March 29th, 2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Urdu

Background Information:

My informant is a 20-year old student. She is originally from Lucknow in India but is now studying and living in Los Angeles. She is of the Muslim faith and related to me her knowledge of Jinn, which she thoroughly believes in. This piece of folklore was particularly interesting to me as there is nothing like it in the other Abrahamic faiths, and is a distinctive Muslim belief.

Main Piece:

Jinn were created by God alongside humans and angels. Humans were made from clay, and the jinn were made from fire that had no smoke. They are not like the genies that we see in Disney’s Aladdin, despite this being the etymology of the word, that come out of lamps and exist to aid humans. Rather, they are an equally real group of beings who exist in the human world but we cannot see them. They go about their days in the human world but they usually don’t interact with humans, as the majority of them are benign. They can also die, and they have lifespans, and will be judged alongside humans by Allah at the Day of Judgement. They can also be of any Abrahamic faith, and celebrate the rituals and customs, and partake in the social organization that comes along with that faith. In this sense, they’re like ghost-human hybrids, who exist but are invisible to humans, yet are real amongst themselves. The Devil, Shaitan, has also been identified as a member of the jinn, but this is contested. However, Iblis – Satan, rather than the Devil – is a jinn, and is a personal name for the Devil himself, rather than a force to incite evil among men and jinn, which is the Shaitan. Iblis was cast from heaven as he refused to bow before Adam, but again, this is contested depending on which branch of Islam one is a member of.

Performance Context:

This piece of folklore was related to me in person after I asked a few questions of my friend about jinn, as my interest was piqued in class.

My Thoughts:

I found this a particularly interesting piece of folklore to collect, as I had no idea that Jinn even existed outside of Aladdin, never mind that they were an entire species of individual just as real as humanity on top of that, in Islamic thought. It contests the idea that the Earth was made for humans alone in Christian thought, and makes it a very distinct belief among Abrahamic faiths. It is also a complex belief for a person not of the Muslim faith  to understand, especially the distinction between the Devil and Satan, as it is not directly mappable onto any belief in Christianity, and the development of this belief would therefore be a particularly interesting one to trace.

Putting a Child of Prague statue in the garden for good weather at weddings

Nationality: Irish
Age: 56
Occupation: IT Technician
Residence: Dublin, Ireland
Performance Date: February 8th, 2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Irish

Background:

Informant is 56-year old IT technician living in Dublin, Ireland. This piece of folklore has to do with the Child of Prague statues that are so popular in Ireland. The statue is usually less than a foot high and features Jesus Christ dressed as a king, similar to the one indicated above, but with occasional variations in the color of the cloak according to the time of the year. The statue is a replica of the original wax-wooden statue housed in the Disacled Carmelite Church of Our Lady in Malá Strana, Prague. It was said to have belonged to Saint Teresa of Avila, and is now located to the right of the altar, halfway up the Church. This is a tradition the informant is familiar with from his childhood, and is a fond memory. He is signified in this conversation by the initials D.O.

 

Main Piece:

D.O.: Mam would always do this whenever one of my sisters was getting married. You place the Child of Prague statue in the front garden of the bride’s house in a bush or under a hedge – basically somewhere it’s not going to get knocked over. You could even bury it in the ground – that’d happen a lot in the winter. It’s supposed to bring good weather the day of a wedding. Burying it in the winter was a kind of evasive manoeuvre, as if hiding it better would make the weather even better, or rather combat the winter.

 

A: And do you think it worked?

 

D.O.: Maybe half of the time, but sure half of the time it probably wasn’t going to rain anyways. People are more likely to have weddings in the summer, so the weather was going to be fine enough in the first place. There was another superstition actually, about if the statue was missing a head. Some people would say that the statue was luckier, because if it was missing a head that meant that it had been around for a long time and it worked better – tried and tested, like – but some people said it was an omen that the statue was cursed or had been knocked over or broken. Ours had a head but the neighbors swore by the headless statue.

 

A: And would you still do that today?

 

D.O.: I probably would for tradition’s sake if it was someone important to me getting married. I don’t think it’s as prevalent today as it was when I was younger. I suppose Ireland is a less Catholic country now than the one I grew up in.

 

Performance context: I interviewed this informant over the phone considering that I am in California and he in Dublin. He mentioned that there was a family wedding coming up and that, seeing as it’s winter, he joked about putting out a Child of Prague. My resulting questioning forms the rest of this analysis.

 

My thoughts: This is probably one of the more bizarre folk beliefs I have heard from Ireland. I don’t quite understand the connection between this statue and the weather, nor where the belief came from. The idea of hiding or burying the statue seems to be implicit to the success of its weather-controlling powers, which again seems to have no obvious links. The combination of two-fold superstition with not only the weather-controlling aspect of the statue, but the idea that it is ‘luckier’ with its’ head broken off, combines Christian beliefs with superstitions that would perhaps have more to do with Ancient Greco-Roman cult statues than Christianity in a confusing mix. Perhaps this is why Ireland is such an odd and interesting country to examine folklore from – although it seems a canonical and thoroughly Catholicized state, in isolation very unique folk beliefs to do with traditional religion, preexisting culture and superstition have been created in an eccentric and confusing mix.

Fairy Forts

Nationality: Irish
Age: 58
Occupation: Homemaker
Residence: Kerry, Ireland
Performance Date: February 18th, 2017
Primary Language: English
Language: Irish

Background Information:

My informant is my aunt from rural Kerry. She is signified in this conversation by the initials J.O. She lived in a farmhouse growing up which had cows in a cowshed around the back of the house. This cowshed was said to be cursed as it was built on a fairy fort. Often (mis)identified as ringforts, fairy forts are small earthen mounds which are usually about the size of an anthill. They were said to be the homes of the Sí, or the fairy folk, who were the mischievous creatures who roamed pre-Christian Ireland. Belief in the Sí has not entirely died out, although it would rather be classed as legend now, a kind of thing that you “don’t not believe,” and is perhaps more confined to rural Ireland, yet she does not totally disbelieve in them. Building on a fairy fort was said to bring bad luck to those who interfered with the Sí.

Main Piece:

A: So tell me about the fairy fort at the house.

J.O.: Well there was a fairy fort around the back of the house, at the cow sheds.

A: And did the folk interact with you at all?

J.O.: Actually, and I’m not sure whether or not to believe in this, the fairies would interfere with the cows. I remember Dad coming in some evenings and saying that a cow had died, despite the fact there was no reason for them too. After they had all died we bought new cows, but they wouldn’t produce any milk. You’d try day after day and there would be absolutely nothing. After a while, Dad called in the vet, who couldn’t find a thing wrong with them, and asked about the others’ deaths, and the vet couldn’t explain it. So then Dad called in the priest, who went looking around the land, and sure enough at the back of the shed there was a small mound, maybe a foot high and a sort of round thing, and he said it was a fairy fort. He went on saying that building things on the forts angered the fair folk and that it was best to move the shed, lest they start bothering the house. I always thought it odd that the priest would tell us that, but Dad said that’s what you did when the Sí were acting up. That summer Dad knocked the shed and built it again at the end of the field. After that, the cows were grand. There was no problem with them, and the shed is still there today as far as I know.

A: And do you believe that it was the fairy folk that were messing with the cows?

J.O.: I don’t know what to believe to be honest. I mean, I can’t explain that the cows were fine once the shed was moved, but at the same time, it seems madness to actually attribute it to the fairy folk. Especially seeing as the priest and the vet couldn’t offer any better explanation. I’d be hesitant to believe it fully, but I would also have my land checked before building anything just to avoid any hassle, you know?

 

Performance Context: This folk belief was related to me over the phone, after I asked my aunt about the fairy forts, which were mentioned in class around this time. She then related to me this story about the fairy forts in her life.

 

My thoughts:

This is a classic story of suspended belief in legend. It utilizes a contrasting claim to land by both the fairy folk and the modern owners and the power of the fairy folk to influence the living. What is perhaps most striking, however, is the mention that it was the priest that noted the presence of the fairy folk. Ireland is an unusual case, as prehistoric beliefs in such peoples still persevere despite a heavy Catholic influence. This feels like a kind of cognitive dissonance, in which it is incredibly strange to align these two beliefs with such vastly different outlooks. Like many legends, such as Valk’s account of ghosts in Estonian property issues, the outside characters of the priest and the vet, a religious man and a scientist, serve to bolster the story and affirm the happenings on both counts. Again, it is worth noting that belief in the Sí is not entirely disregarded as part of the part, and is a living part of Irish history.