#21 - The Banshee

• Also known as a brownie and a Glaistig (a woman demon).

• Glastaiges were originally mortal women who had been put under enchantment and given a fairy nature.

• Can be a warning or protective spirit associated with certain families.

• A fairy woman who is a spirit who heralds the death of a family member, usually by wailing, shrieking or keening.

• Her eyes are red from continual weeping.

• She may be dressed in white with red hair and a ghastly complexion.

• Sometimes the banshee assumes the form of some sweet singing virgin of the family who died young, and has been given the mission by the invisible powers to become the harbinger of coming doom to her mortal kindred. Or she may be seen at night as a shrouded woman, crouched beneath the trees, lamenting with veiled face, or flying past in the moonlight, crying bitterly.

• The cry of this spirit is mournful beyond all other sounds on earth, and betokens certain death to some member of the family whenever it is heard in the silence of the night.

• Though the Glaistaig is supernatural, she could die.

#20 - Witch Mythology in Scotland

• Often women, some men and also you could possibly teach yourself to become a witch too.

• Could fly very far distances

• They would party with all of the elves, fairies, mermaids, warlocks, brownies, pixies and even the phantom hunters.

• Were usually part of a group of witches.

• Under torture witches would admit they would meet with the devil.

• Witches are notorious for their bad timeheeping.

• Accused witches killed for their crime have spirits that still roam.

• Witchcraft can be inherited by children of witches.

• Witches’ spirits can haunt their old homes or where they were killed.

•Since, other reports include that the windows light up at night, strange music and laughter wafting into the street. Sometimes, the shapes of enormous women can be made out through the windows, and other times the mysterious black staff can be seen hovering its way down the street in search of its master.

#19 - Ghost Mythology in Scotland

• Deceased friends often revealed their ghosts to their living friends in order to confirm there was an afterlife.

• Back in the day people realized they shared their land with the ghosts of those who had gone before.

• Speaking of spirits with disrespect, implying they were not as powerful as people said or even denying their existence was always a dangerous thing to do.

• If a body part or a bone of a deceased person was left behind somewhere apart from where they were buried they were known to revisit the spot as a ghost.

• Ghosts are unsettled by their crimes.

• Making a ghost angry is bad juju.

• Denying ghosts exist will cause you great harm.

#18 - The Hag

A common feature in many many stories of an old woman who looks ugly and evil but isn’t necessarily evil

• Witches/Fairy Godmothers

• Use their powers for good to help the unselfish (like Cinderella)

• Sometimes are personified as a death omen or a crypt keeper

• Many stories about hags are meant to keep children from misbehaving.

•Hags are often seen as malevolent, but may also be one of the chosen forms of shapeshifting deities.

• Many tales about hags do not describe them well enough to distinguish between an old woman who knows magic, or a witch or supernatural being.

• In Scotland, a group of hags, known as The Cailleachan (The Storm Hags) are seen as personifications of the elemental powers of nature, especially in a destructive aspect. They are said to be particularly active in raising the windstorms of spring, during the period known as A Chailleach.

• The most common pattern is that the hag represents the barren land, who the hero of the tale must approach without fear, and come to love on her own terms. When the hero displays this courage, love, and acceptance of her hideous side, the sovereignty hag then reveals that she is also a young and beautiful goddess.

#17 - Mythology Behind Halloween

• From the 18th century they Scottish diaspora has taken emigrants all over the world whose descendents still embrace a Scottish identity.

• Halloween is a combination of two Celtic pagan holidays known as Samhainn (November 1) and All Hallows Eve (October 31)

• Samhain is celebrated as soon as the sun goes down.

• Samhain marks the halfway point between summer and winter

• The early literature says Samhain was marked by great gatherings and feasts and was when the ancient burial mounds were open, which were seen as portals to the Otherworld. Some of the literature also associates Samhain with bonfires and sacrifices.

• The otherworldy court of the fairies known as “Seelie court” can cross into our world on Halloween.

• Carving pumpkins originated as turnips

• All Hallows Eve is a day of remembering the dead

#16 - Bodies of Water as a Theme

#15 - Cyclical Season Mythology

#14 - Fairies

#13 - Complete Summary of Research Themes

#12 - Celtic Gods Mind Map

#11 - Week Six

I was watching a detective movie today and I noticed that when the detective arranged all of his investigative information I liked the way it looked on the wall. I was inspired to create a mythology map for this research narratives project. I was hoping to collect images and graphics and text and cut up my books and present a room with four walls dedicated to tracing the mythologies. I especially thought this was a good idea because so many of these myths are similar to different regions of the world. I would love to show all of the connections between Scotland and the outside world using our shared mythology.

#10 - Week Six

Along with my mind-map of my geographic locations I began a large mind-map of the themes and ideas of all the myths and legends research I’ve been doing. I basically will read my books and then sit down and write out all of my newly acquired knowledge. It has helped me find themes and common ideas. I also want to begin connecting these ideas to mythology from other parts of the world if they do connect.

#9 - Week Six

This week I decided to organize my research by location. I did this in order to get a better idea of the most richly populated areas of Scotland that I should go visit. I narrowed it down to these seven locations. I included important dates and places and key figures as well as the type of myth and legend. I plan to add to this more as I go.

#8 - Week Five

The first thing I do when I embark on any sort of research project is to read up on the matter. So I purchased these books and have started to read them to acquaint myself with the subject. Some of the books are very simple almost for children, a few of the books are very difficult because the myths are verbatim as they were written a thousand years ago. My favorite so far has been the Lore of Scotland which is more like an encyclopedia of all types of events relating to folklore myths and legends.

#7 - Week Four

After my mid-semester review where I decided to focus on Scottish myths and legends I spent the next day diving into researching the topic. Below is some of the research I found. I did struggle a bit in that mythology is a lot different when it comes to research than history. There is no exact tracing or dating of anything and it felt a bit disorganized to me.

I was able to break the topics up into categories and found a cohesive narrative of the ideas. The first thing I did was go through and highlight all the locations related to the myths and legends to try to begin to decide where to travel to for this assignment.

#6 - Week Four

MID-SEMESTER REVIEW FEEDBACK

I found it important to include this blog post to keep these blog up to date with the evolution of my project. I presented my mid-semester review to my personal tutor, professor and director and we both realized that I had a hugely broad topic and foundation of research. I had too much.

So a suggestion that was made to me was that I focus on Scottish myths and legends. I was thrilled at this idea because while it was a topic I knew some about, it was still an area of knowledge I could develop. I also jumped at this idea because a lot of visuals came to mind when I thought about this topic. This was helpful because I was really struggling with visuals in my last idea.

Additionally, I knew a narrowing down of this topic to myths and legends was going to be much more effective when it came to researching by traveling through Scotland. Traveling is a huge element to my project and I originally had about 12 locations to visit but now with the narrowing down of the topic I have about 6 which is much more doable.

#5 - Week Three

This week I began to research visuals for this project. I have subscribed to a multitude of history magazines and was able to find images in there that gave me inspiration for this project.

I found this combination of medieval imagery and modern imagery a good representation of what I would like to display in my final result. I also love the element of collage.

This is an example of what I found to be a really successful map. I talked about my issues with maps found in history books because they often are very vague and not helpful when providing information. This is a specific map with loads of content and exact pin-pointing of what to know about a region.

I found this graphic based on imperial occupation of Barbados and I loved the aesthetic of it. I felt that the multi-media aesthetic is what I would like to go for. I also have a background in print making and would love to incorporate it into my research narratives final result.

This last image I found I really liked because it was a modern artistic rendition of historical portraiture. I think digital assets like this can prove to become invaluable in the future.

#4 - Week Two

BRAINSTORMING SESSION DAY 2

After having so much success on my mind-maps, the next day I revisited them and filled in the blank periods that were influential to Scottish culture. Listed are the time periods below. I did try to divide my idea bubbles up into green highlighted categories of “HISTORY” and purple highlighted categories of “CULTURE”.

I did this in order to solve my research question which I was brainstorming could be the concept of asking “DOES HISTORY DESIGN CULTURE OR DOES CULTURE DESIGN HISTORY”

STUART DYNASTY BEGINS TO FAIL and escalates into war

CELTS SETTLE SCOTLAND BETWEEN 1200 and 600 B.C.E

AFTER ROMANS LEAVE, A NATION EMERGES THROUGH PICTISH CULTURE between 200 and 1000 AD

UNION WITH ENGLAND IS FINALLY ACHIEVED, setting off domino effect of cultural development in Scotland

STABILITY OF UNION USHERS IN ENLIGHTENMENT TO SCOTLAND, developing Scottish culture to this day

#3 - Week Two

FIRST BRAINSTORMING SESSION

I sat down on one of my days off and started researching various Scottish topics and I kept getting overwhelmed about where to start and what to invest my effort and attention in. I realized the topic of all Scottish history and culture since the dawn of time until now was too much of a daunting task.

Instead of looking on the web and going down the rabbit hole I decided to mind-map. I had just about lost faith in mind-mapping for a history project when I got on a roll and quickly scrawled out 5 pages of 5 historical periods that I felt were essential to developing modern day Scottish culture.

ROMAN OCCUPATION between 79 AD and 124 AD

VIKING EXPLORATION AND INTEGRATION starting in 800 AD

ENGLISH SUCCESSION CRISIS OF 1066 AD is a domino effect of cultural influence into Scotland

SCOTTISH SUCCESSION CRISIS OF 1286 inspires domino effect of cultural influence

STABILITY OF STUART DYNASTY ushers in a Scottish Renaissance and Protestant Reformation

#2 - Week One

WHAT RESEARCH HAVE I ALREADY DONE?

For a few years I have spent every weekend reading Scottish culture and history books. I have compiled an image of all of the covers of the 29 books I’ve read up until this date. These books have formed my foundation of knowledge on the topic.