The Witch Files — The Midwife Myth: Curses, Infanticide, and Devilish Spells?

Master of the Life of the Virgin - The Birth of Mary https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15497939

In the great wealth of witch-related lore, the image of the persecuted local midwife is one of the most enduringly popular.

Orishas and the Balance Between Life and Death

orishas

Orishas are deities who mainly represent the powers of nature. They also have specific responsibilities and work to balance the universe and its energies. Orishas are predominantly praised among the Iorubá people in West Africa. However, when Africans were brought to Brazil and other countries in the Americas, they also brought their spirituality which flourished […]

Collectable Mermaids and the Myth of the Merrow

Feejee Mermaid, shown in P.T. Barnum's American Museum, 1842, as leased from Moses Kimball of the Boston Museum, papier-mache - Peabody Museum, Harvard University. By Daderot, Public Domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=69554826

The early sirens, the ones Odysseus encountered, were not fish at all but bird-women, but they had those great siren qualities – bewitching songs and the will to lure the unwitting to a bad end.

Nazis, Trolls and the Grateful Dead: Turmoil among Sweden’s Folklorists

Photo album presented to von Sydow by a group of his students in 1922, now in the possession of the archives of Lund University (collection: Etnologiska institutionen med Folklivsarkivet, vol. Ö1:1) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Sydow,_Carl_Wilhelm_von_i_Kivik_1922_beskuren.jpg

A story of love, betrayal and impending war became entwined with upheavals that affect the discipline of folklore to this day.

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