Hob-Goblins 7

Seán na gealaige (Jack o’Lanterns) Teine Sìth (Fire Faeries) Will o’ the Wisp, Willliam o’ the Wisps (William of the Sprites: Spirits) Púca, Pwca, Bwbach (Black Pig) Puck (Robin Goodfellow) Kitty Candlesticks, Ellyllon (Spirit Fires) Canwyll yr ysbryd (Spirit Candles) Feu d’ Hélène (Helen’s Fire) Feu Follets, Irrlicht (Mad Fires) Ignis Fatuus (Spirit Fire)

Compact of unctuous vapour, which the night
Condenses, and the cold environs round
Kindled through agitation to a flame,
Which oft, they say, some evil spirit attends,
Hovering and blazing with delusive light,
Misleads the amazed night-wanderer from his way,
To bogs and mires, and oft through pond or pool,
There swallowed up and lost, from succour far. .
– John Milton Paradise Lost

Yr ydoedd ym mhob gobant
Ellyllon mingeimion gant.
There was in every hollow
A hundred wrymouthed spirit fires.
– Davydd ab Gwilym, 1340

Suddenly it shot away from me, and in the distance joined a ring of its fellows, who went dancing slowly round and round in a goblin dance, which sent me off to sleep. – Iola the Bard, The Vale of Glamorgan © 1839

The Jack-O’lantern mushroom causes nausea and diarrhea if eaten. It tends to grow in clusters at the base of oak tree stumps. It has a bright orange cap & gills. The Jack-O’lantern got its name because the cap & gills glow in the dark – Biology Professor Sally E. Gochenaur, Ph.D

That frights the maidens of the villagery;
Skim milk; and sometimes labour in the quern;
And bootless make the breathless housewife churn;
And sometime make the drink to bear no barm;
Mislead night-wanderers, laughing at their harm?
Those that Hobgoblin call you, and sweet Puck,
You do their work, and they shall have good luck: Are not you he?

To which Puck replies: Thou speak’st aright;
I am that merry wanderer of the night.

– William Shakespeare, Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act II., Sc. I.

(pron. ethlerthlon, POO-kah) Tiny, pixie-like hob-goblins the size of rabbits with child-like faces carrying lanterns and lighted branches or dark little goblins dressed in black with grey beards holding burning lengths of straw. They emit a shrill high pitched sound that can drive men insane. Their food is bwyd ellyllon: toadstools and fairy butter, a fungoid substance found in the roots of trees and limestone. Their flowers are foxglove digitalis. They live in bogs and marshes and create a glowing yellow light to lure in travelers who become hopelessly lost. Can be strange lights in the sky hovering over rocky hills, dancing over wooded valleys, playing tag with each other, ghostly rays and beams. Wisps are forest sprites: Latin Spirit. [Oakie Dokie dressed in leaves with an acorn cap]. Cannwyll Corf: Corpse Candles appear halfway between a person and their grave. They were created by the Fays during the Second Age of the Sun. Their queen is Mab verch Mabon: Intoxicating One Her kingdom is Mabua Nant yr Ellyllon by the ruins of Dinas Bran: Raven Castle, Langollen: Hazel Place, Wales
Also known as Brenning-drake, Burning Candle, Dank Will, Death-fires, Dick-a-Tuesday, Elf-fire, The Fair Maid of Ireland, Friar’s Lantern, Gyl-Burnt-tail, Mad Crisp, Peg-a-lantern, Shot Stars, Spittle of the Stars, Star Jelly, Sylham Lamp, Walking Fire, Wandering Fires, Wandering Wild-fire, Sheerie. The Breton Sand Yan y Tad: St. John and the Father is a double ignis fatuus that carries at its finger-ends five lights that spin around like a wheel. When seen on the tips of the fingers, the hair of the head, mast-tops, and so on, the phenomenon is called Castor & Pollux (twin gods of the sea), Cuerpo Santo: Saint’s Body (Spain), Corpusants: Saints’ Body (France), Dipsas, St. Elmo’s Fire, St. Ermyn, Feu d’Hélène: Helen’s Fire (France), Fire-drakes, Looke Fuole, Haggs, Leda’s Twins (Castor & Pollux), St. Peter & St. Nicholas (Italy)
During The Age of Reason in 1730 Newton claimed ignited marsh gases could produce wispy flames and balls of fire. In 1980 Dr Alan Mills at Leicester University’s Department of of Geology consistently failed to reproduce a flame using methane, phosphene and other substances suspected as contributors to the chemical soup in marshland. He could not find any other natural spark which could ignite gasses produced from rotting vegetable matter and he also ruled out natural electrical phenomena..
Jack the Lad made a pact with the devil who went up the oak tree and was stuck when Jack carved a celtic cross into the tree. (In another version due to Jack’s superb fiddle playing). Jack wanders the earth with a turnip lantern not accepted in Heaven or Hell. ‘In Celtic mythology, there is a dark Holly King, disguised as a wren, and his twin, the light Oak King, disguised as a robin. At the summer solstice the Holly King kills his twin and begins a half-year reign. At the winter solstice, the robin slays the wren and he reigns for the next six months. There is an eternal duel of light and darkness.’ Winter Light.Robin Goodfellow or the Pooka can shapeshift to a black: horse, mule, goat, bull, pig, or large dog with glowing red eyes. Appears to lone travelers, farmers, and milkmaids at twilight. Likes to warm himself by the sides of fires, play tricks and smash blackberry patches flat on Halloween night. He is said to eat and spit fruit on Halloween and children are warned not to eat wild fruit afterward. Wales: Mynyddyslwyn, Ireland: Carraig phooka: Pooka’s Rock at Doneraile and Macroom. Wicklow: Poul-a-phooka: Pooka’s cavern. Laois: Cloch a phúka: Stone of the pooka, Inishmore: Clochán a Phúca. Cairn and natural cave. (6, 13, 20, 30.33, 53, 96, 97, 130)