Tanuki: Mischief, Magic and Change in the Japanese Countryside

by Anne Louise Avery
The Lucky Tea Kettle of Morin Temple, from the series New Forms of the Thirty-six Ghosts, a series of 36 prints published by Sasaki Toyokichi in 1889-92. By Yoshitoshi https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5496954

The Japanese raccoon dog or tanuki, a shape-shifting, hedonistic and jovial trickster, has always lived in the borderlands between human settlement and the wilderness

The Fortunes of Mother Shipton

by Richard Jenkins
The entrance to Mother Shipton's Cave as it is today. © Richard Jenkins

The story of Mother Shipton, as well being a window on the past, is a mirror in which modern capitalism is reflected. It looks like one of the more solid of English legends: she has approximate dates; she is claimed by a definite place, Knaresborough; and she even has her own tourist attraction, in Mother Shipton’s Cave.

The Six Creepiest Creatures from Scottish Folklore

by Anna Mazzola
Kelpie statue by Jamie McInall https://www.pexels.com/photo/grayscale-photography-of-horse-head-and-clouds-906793/

Scottish lore contains some of the darkest and strangest figures in folkloric history: shape-shifters, blood-suckers, monsters without skin.

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