Hello everyone –
Today is May Day – that pivotal date in the traditional
agricultural calendar systems of NW Europe which marked the end of the “winter
half” of the year and the start of the “summer half” of the year. It was a time
for dancing around the Maypole, singing under the stars, and kindling bonfires
on hilltops to celebrate the planting season and welcome in the warm weather.
It was also one of those days on which the Fair Folk were actively celebrating
the changing of the seasons, too – with midnight revels that included moonlight
dances and Otherworldly music! In recognition of all these festive happenings,
here’s an article that I wrote about the Fair Folk many years ago for the ACES
James Scholars, along with an early poem by J. R. R. Tolkien about an Elvish
minstrel named Tinfang Warble.
“The Lost Road to Faerie: Where Science and Folklore
Meet”
By Rob Chappell, Editor
Excerpted from Cursus Honorum VII: 10 (May 2007)
From prehistoric times
until the rise of modern science, most human beings regarded the world as an
enchanted place. Fabulous beasties like dragons and unicorns roamed along the
edges of medieval maps; the stars were animated by “intelligences” that guided
them in their celestial circuits; and the “Fair Folk” resided in the depths of
caves or beneath hollow hills. With the advent of the scientific and industrial
revolutions, belief in such things waned throughout much of the Western world,
to be replaced by a reliance on science and reason. Traditional folk beliefs
have often been derided as superstitious nonsense, but every once in a while,
scientific research uncovers evidence that the folk beliefs of yesteryear might
once have had a basis in reality.
Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We dare not go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap,
And a white owl's feather.
-- “The Fairies” by William Allingham (1824-1889)
Such a discovery
occurred in 2003, when a team of Australian and Indonesian paleoanthropologists
unearthed the fossilized remains of eight prehistoric humans on the Indonesian
island of Flores. What is so remarkable about these people is that they stood only
three feet tall – yet they were fully-grown adults! They belonged to a newly
classified human species –
Homo Floresiensis – that lived alongside
modern humans (
Homo Sapiens) on Flores from 50,000 to perhaps 500 years
ago.
These recently
discovered people – hailed as “Hobbits” in the popular press – are apparently
an offshoot of previous human populations that had rafted over to the
Indonesian archipelago at an even earlier date. According to evidence collected
on Flores, these “Hobbits” (named after the halfling heroes in J. R. R.
Tolkien’s Middle-Earth legendarium) were fully human in their abilities and
behavior. They made sophisticated tools, used fire, hunted, fished, and (based
on their anatomy) possessed the power of articulate speech. According to the
Flores islanders’ folklore, these prehistoric people might have survived until
the arrival of Dutch explorers in the 16th century.
How do these recent
scientific discoveries intersect with ancient folk beliefs? People from all
over the world have been telling stories about the “Wee Folk” – faeries,
gnomes, leprechauns, etc. – since the beginning of recorded history. These
tales tell of small humanlike individuals who dwelt in caves or within hollow
hills. These “Fair Folk” or “Good People,” as they were euphemistically called,
lived in communities ruled by monarchs or chieftains, and they were adept at
many crafts (such as mining or shoemaking). Their alleged healing abilities,
musical artistry, and ability to “disappear” without fanfare when one of us
“Big People” came wandering along may have led our ancestors to regard them as
magical creatures instead of fellow human beings. These habits of the “Wee
Folk” may also have had the unfortunate effect of making our ancestors fear and
shun them.
The possible extinction
of
Homo Floresiensis in historical times might be reflected in a
recurrent folkloric motif about the disappearance of the “Wee Folk” from
everyday experience, as in the opening lines of Geoffrey Chaucer’s (1340-1400)
“Wife of Bath’s Tale”:
In the old time of King Arthur,
Of whom the Britons speak with great honor,
All this land was filled full of Faerie;
The Elf Queen, with her jolly company,
Danced full oft in many a green mead.
This was the old opinion, as I read;
I speak of many hundred years ago,
But now no one can see the elves, you know.
Of course, the
identification of the “Wee Folk” from faerie lore with
Homo Floresiensis
is somewhat speculative at this point. Nonetheless, we should bear in mind that
many legends have been found to have a basis in fact, and that some activities
and characteristics of our halfling human cousins might have found their way
into traditional faerie tales. Perhaps contemporary folklorists will want to
collaborate with paleoanthropologists and reexamine the faerie lore of long ago
and faraway to see what “data” might be gleaned from worldwide folklore about
our diminutive prehistoric kindred. To learn more about how
Homo
Floresiensis could have been (mis)perceived by our ancestors, you might
enjoy visiting the following resources:
Related Links of Interest
“Over Old Hills and Far Away” (1915)
By J. R. R. Tolkien (1892-1973)
It was early and still in the night of June,
And few were the stars, and far was the Moon,
The drowsy trees drooping, and silently creeping
Shadows woke under them while they were sleeping.
I stole to the window with stealthy tread
Leaving my white and unpressed bed;
And something alluring, aloof and queer,
Like perfume of flowers from the shores of the mere
That in Elvenhome lies, and in starlit rains
Twinkles and flashes, came up to the panes
Of my high lattice-window. Or was it a sound?
I listened and marveled with eyes on the ground.
For there came from afar a filtered note
Enchanting sweet, now clear, now remote,
As clear as a star in a pool by the reeds,
As faint as the glimmer of dew on the weeds.
Then I left the window and followed the call
Down the creaking stairs and across the hall
Out through a door that swung tall and grey,
And over the lawn, and away, away!
It was Tinfang Warble that was dancing there,
Fluting and tossing his old white hair,
Till it sparkled like frost in a winter moon;
And the stars were about him, and blinked to his tune
Shimmering blue like sparks in a haze,
As always they shimmer and shake when he plays.
My feet only made there the ghost of a sound
On the shining white pebbles that ringed him round,
Where his little feet flashed on a circle of sand,
And the fingers were white on his flickering hand.
In the wink of a star he had leapt in the air
With his fluttering cap and his glistening hair;
And had cast his long flute right over his back,
Where it hung by a ribbon of silver and black.
His slim little body went fine as a shade,
And he slipped through the reeds like mist in the glade;
And laughed like thin silver, and piped a thin note,
As he flapped in the shadows his shadowy coat.
O! the toes of his slippers were twisted and curled,
But he danced like a wind out into the world.
He is gone, and the valley is empty and bare
Where lonely I stand and lonely I stare.
Then suddenly out in the meadows beyond,
Then back in the reeds by the shimmering pond,
Then afar from a copse were the mosses are thick
A few little notes came a trillaping quick.
I leapt o’er the stream and I sped from the glade,
For Tinfang Warble it was that played;
I must follow the hoot of his twilight flute
Over reed, over rush, under branch, over root,
And over dim fields, and through rustling grasses
That murmur and nod as the old elf passes,
Over old hills and far away
Where the harps of the Elvenfolk softly play.
Wishing everyone a merry month of May –
Rob
J
