#I like celtic folklore a lot

[pigeonstab]

welp, that's not how I thought this design would go lol

here are the other ways I wanted it to go:

so y'know normal Victorian British thing? but then I decided I wanted him to be celtic.

SO! Nightmare is actually 2500~ish years old, he was in Britain before the Roman invasion and is a celtic pagan! (I did my best to do reasearch but if anybody can correct me on anything pls tell me, I neither want to be inaccurate or worse offensive.) I took a lot of inspo (like a lot a lot ;TvT) from the design of Viviana from Rebis:

[reejindeed]

Trying to keep things a little looser

[consumeroflemoans]

Which myths would you be particulary excited about working into the superfox verse

Greek myths are always a classic. I’ve already mentioned things like centaurs, harpies, sirens, and dryads. But tbh them in a modern setting has already been thoroughly explored by stories like Percy Jackson so they’re not the most exciting to explore.

I think what I’m most anticipating is Celtic folklore. It’s always been one of my favorite mythos. I kind of want to include Kelpies somehow because I love those murder horses but I’m not sure how. I just love how many of their creatures are just slightly inhuman like with the fae, leprechauns, werewolves, bodach, the dullahan, vampires, and a bunch of unique ghosts like the banshee. It would be fun to find ways to integrate them into modern society.

I think I just have a weakness for myths about tricksters

[bellepochalypse]

What’s so great about Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries, which I finished in a day and a half, is that it doesn’t forget that faerie fantasy has to have a healthy dose of horror in it

[tommyssupercoolblog]

The next time I see someone making fun of an Irish accent or the language I am legally allowed to hunt that person for sport /hj

[debleb]

americans try not to immediately turn anything irish into magical mystical uwu pagan faeries challenge (100% IMPOSSIBLE)

[llamagoddessofficial]

I've never heard of Cornish before where is it from?

The language I had him speak is Cornish, or Kernowek, the critically endangered native language of my homeland Cornwall. We have about 500 fluent speakers. Cornwall is an ancient Celtic kingdom, like Ireland, Wales and Scotland. Up until the 1500s we were (just like the other nations) considered a separate country/ethnicity to the English, but over time the English pushed further and further into Cornwall and actively quashed the language by associating it with low intelligence and treason.

Most people, even in England, have no idea Cornwall has its own language and culture, or that it used to be its own country. Calling a Cornishman 'English' will get about the same furious reaction as if you called a Scot or Irishman 'English'.

It felt right to have him speaking Cornish, considering how connected the landscape is to fae. A lot of fae folklore is Cornish - Spriggans are originally from Cornwall.

If you're at all interested, I'd really recommend watching Cornwall: A Celtic Nation Trapped in England.

[breelandwalker]

Wolf Moon - January 24-25, 2024

Shake off the cold and sing to the sky, witches - it's time for the Wolf Moon!

Wolf Moon

The Wolf Moon is the name given to the full moon which occurs in the month of January. The name is said to be derived from the sound of wolves howling with hunger while prey is scarce in the midst of winter. Given that we now know that wolves howl mostly for communication, my personal opinion is that people huddled in their homes during a very dark and dangerous time of year probably noticed these sounds a lot more readily with little else to occupy their time as they waited out the winter, and thus were set to worrying about ravenous beasts invading their villages and farmsteads. (It's worth noting that wolves preying on livestock was a very real concern for most people outside major cities for many centuries, so this isn't entirely unfounded.)

The name also calls to mind the howling of the wind during winter storms, or whistling around the eaves during the long cold nights. And for those of us who might not have been careful with our spending over the holidays, I might cite a tongue-in-cheek reference to the wolves being at the door when those credit card bills come due.

[For those not familiar with the phrase, to have "a wolf at the door" is a saying that refers to some imminent hardship or disaster. In modern parlance, this is usually applied to poor finances or looming bankruptcy.]

This month, the moon peaks at 12:54pm EST on January 25th, so the moon will likely appear to be full on the nights of the 24th and 25th, depending on where you are in the world.

Some North American indigenous names for the month of January and its' moon are Cold Moon (Cree), Center Moon (Assiniboine), Severe Moon (Dakota), Ice Moon (Catawba), and Spirit Moon (Ojibwe). Other names include Mantis Moon (South African origins), Quiet Moon (Celtic), and Moon After Yule (Anglo-Saxon).

What Does It Mean For Witches?

As a new year dawns, it's time for rest and reflection before we set out on the next phase of our journey. While the cold weather lingers, take some time to sit by the fire, literally or metaphorically, and take stock of where you stand, what resources are available, and what you plan to do with them.

Check in with your near-and-dear following the mad rush of the holiday season as well. Make sure that friends, family, and community members around you are doing all right. Offer support and kindness where you can, but don't overextend yourself. It's your time to recuperate too, and it is good and healthy to set boundaries which allow time and space for yourself.

What Witchy Things Can We Do?

Winter is a prime time for storytelling. Back in the days before internet or television or radio, people would often read to each other or tell tales to pass the time. Consider re-reading a favorite book that inspires you or exploring some region of folklore or mythology you've been meaning to look into. If you have children who are of an age to enjoy stories, read them some of your favorites or introduce them to something new. Share stories and discussions with your witchy circle too!

While you're at it, take a moment to examine the role that folklore and stories play in your practice. If you subscribe to a particular mythos, be it through deities or just general belief, consider which parts of it resonate the most with you and why.

Consider also the lessons of the winter season - the necessity of rest between periods of growth and activity, and the role of death, cold, and darkness in the natural cycles of life. What do these things mean to you and your practice? Are they a source of fear or fascination? Do you come alive in the winter or bundle up and wait for spring? How can you best remind yourself to pause for breath as the year goes on?

And of course, the beginning of a new year is an excellent time for goal-setting and divination. You're making resolutions for your mundane life, so make a few for your craft while you're at it, and pull out your cards or runes or pendulum for a New Year forecast on how things might go.

Happy Wolf Moon, witches! 🐺🌕

SOURCES & FURTHER READING:

Bree's Lunar Calendar Series

Bree's Secular Celebrations Series

Wolf Moon: Full Moon in January, The Old Farmer's Almanac.

Full Moon January 2024: Discover the Wolf's Thrilling Spiritual Meaning, The Peculiar Brunette.

Moon Info - Full Moon Dates for 2024

Calendar-12 - 2024 Moon Phases

Image Source: What Is A Wolf Moon?, The Fact Site.

[rs-hawk]

Kinda gross you're sexualizing your culture. Literally playing into colonist fantasies about the "sexy savage Indian"

I have been trying to find a way to respond to this because I think this brings up the debate of cultural appreciation versus cultural appropriation. This is my personal take, and if any other Indigenous people disagree with me, that is their opinion, and they are right to have it.

Here's the thing, you're talking about my culture. My heritage. My ancestorial beliefs. I have talked a few times about how growing up I didn't have much positive representation for that part of myself, and how hard it was for me. That is a large part of why I write about Indigenous coded characters or about Indigenous creatures. Before I began writing my own stories, I had never read a single romance novel with any Indigenous main character (if you know any, definitely let me know!), aside from Cowboys and Indians novels, which for me is not included in "positive representation" (but if other Indigenous people want to, that is up to them).

If you were to bring this up about say the Straggele, I would understand more because just because I have studied folklore and culture from around the world, doesn't make it mine. If someone who was Swiss reached out to me and said something, I could understand where that came from. However, allowing parts of my history to influence my writing, getting to create characters that I see myself in, reading more into the history of my nations and our cousin and sister nations, amongst so many other things, is not sexualizing my culture. I am not appropriating myself or playing into stereotypes by writing what makes me happy.

I also want to add that the colonist fantasy includes a lot of racist stereotypes, which I don't put in my writing. There are no Indigenous women who use their body to get what they want or trick European men into helping them. There are no damsels in distress Indigenous women who just blink their big brown eyes and sling their braids over their shoulders as they ask for help. They're not naked and flaunting themselves or anything like that. Also, how are any of my characters "savages"? All of my stories are written in roughly this day and age aside from an ongoing commission.

It is not playing into colonist fantasies to write about Indigenous people. It is not playing into colonist fantasies for me to want to write about creatures from my own culture. Just like it would not be playing into colonist fantasies to sexualize a Kelpie as I'm also mixed with Celtic, or a Babau as I'm also mixed with Italian.

I am allowed to celebrate and use aspects of my culture and history, any and all of it from any part of my culture from any part of my family.

[laurasimonsdaughter]

If you were to make up fae courts besides the standard ones(Seelie/Unseelie and seasons for example), what would you choose? I was thinking of this cause A Court Of Fey and Flowers(the dimension 20 series) had a bunch of them(court of Craft, Wonder, Seafoam, Goblins, etc) and I thought it'd be a cool prompt.

What a fun question! I have so many complicated feelings about fairy courts and I honestly loved Dimension 20's approach! Because what by now is seen as "the standard courts" (Seelie/Unseelie, Summer/Winter, Light/Dark) are all quite modern inventions. So it really doesn't take anything away from the faerie of it all to change them.

I'd actually like to go one step further: if I was making fairy courts, I'd make them small, and local. Because I personally think that vibes better with the folktales that I know.

The concept of fairy courts is primarily based on Scottish folklore. But it was common practice there to call fairies "seelie" far before they were ever described as "unseelie". Which makes sense, because you wouldn't want to offend the fae. (Apparently in the Scots language "court" could also just mean "group" or "company", which would make "seelie court" not unlike "fair folk".)

On top of that - although there are definitely mentions of fairy queens and kings, especially in ballads - many Celtic folktales refer to a specific group of fairies living together in one mound as a "court" without implying that this is The Court that controls all other fairies. Their leader is sometimes called king or queen, but sometimes just lady or lord. And this concept shows up in Germanic folklore too, with elves and dwarves and witte wieven.

So if I was to make up fairy courts for a story they'd be very specific:

The Alder Court

The Wetland Court

The Court of Crown Hill

And those would probably just be the human names for them. The members of the court would be more likely to introduce themselves as "follower of my lady queen, ruler of all under the hill."

Alternatively, if I was going full secret urban fantasy world, I'd probably align the courts with the specific type of fae. (Which is an impossible task, but in urban fantasy you can pick and choose as you like.) So there'd be a Brownie Court, a Pixie Court, a Court of Wisps, etc. And all fae belong to that court, though spread far and wide, would answer to that ruler. I think that would be very fun, especially for the types of fae who deal a lot with humans.

[helsensm]

you said we could you know what this means...

-How'd you come up with the name Saoirse? -What are her thoughts on magic? -Who would she think is the most evil: Shang Tsung, Quan Chi, or Shao? -If she could have a pet, would she? And if so, what would it be of?

awww thank you for asking! 💗 here's a little Saoirse playing with her friends to draw attention afdfgHjJ

1. Back in my high school and uni years I was fascinated with Celtic folklore, Irish history and culture. The interest died down a bit with time, but I still love everything related to Ireland and dream about visiting it someday. 😩 So when I was thinking about Saoirse’s background (she’s a foreigner, raised in China), I decided... to make her Irish?? And since a lot of Irish names are hard to pronounce for English speaking people, I chose the one that might be more well-known because of Saoirse Ronan.

2. She actually grew up, seeing a few things (one of which is the reason of her abilities), so magic doesn’t shock or scare her. She’s not opposed to it too, she believes that if these forces even exist in the world[s], they are a natural part of it. The main problem is what kind of person is using magic and for what purposes.

3. Saoirse would not bother with the ratings. If you’re going against the natural order of things and infringe on the rights of others – you are a bad persons, and you need to be stopped. It’s that simple for her. 🤷 It goes both ways too – the person who donates millions to charity and the person who helped a kid learn a cool trick in the skatepark are equally good in her eyes.

4. Oh, that’s a good one, because I actually don’t know if you can have a pet in the Shaolin monastery, now I want to check this out. 🤔 Saoirse… I don’t think she would love the idea of being someone’s owner (✨childhood trauma✨). But she loves animals, so to have a self-sufficient animal with big personality roam around the monastery would be perfect, like a stray cat who comes and goes where it pleases but always comes back to eat and sleep with her. :3

[jewishvitya]

Rowling had nothing to do with Legacy and I think most people forget that. She wasn't even consulted. WB bought the license and the devs did whatever they wanted. "Sirona" is a beautiful, feminine Celtic name associated with healing, and "Ryan" is an extremely common Irish surname. I feel like people are looking for reasons to be offended, especially when it comes to trans characters and antisemitism. The goblins are not and have never been Jewish stereotypes. They're a fictional race. They're based on Tolkien's goblins and old English folklore dating back to the 1400's, where they have always been depicted and small, ugly, and greedy. Rowling herself was shocked by the antisemitism rumors and staunchly stated they weren't true. Just like the rumors saying lycanthopy is a metaphor for AIDS. Just... who thinks of this stuff?

What's really sad is people have argued that Sirona was never meant to be trans, but a male character that the devs rendered to look "more feminine" at the last minute. People have made fun of her voice and said it's "too masculine", so obviously WB just hired a man to voice her and changed her gender later. But that's not true! Her VA is actually a trans woman and the backlash against the character must be devastating to the VA.

Okay, so, I don't think you're here in good faith. You're here to be dismissive. But I'll reply anyway, just in case I'm wrong.

One thing at a time.

I'll start with the one point you made that I agree with: the VA. She doesn't deserve to have her voice scrutinized and criticized. That's horrible, no one deserves that. I did see - and share - the misinformation that Sirona Ryan was voiced by a man, and I regret that. I edited it out of my post as soon as I knew, but this is tumblr and unedited versions do go around. I hope more people will see that corrected, and leave the VA's voice alone.

Now for the mess you threw at me.

Hogwarts Legacy is related to Rowling by virtue of existing within the world she created. It's still her goblins, since she gave her permission to create this, and she let it be added to the canon.

Rowling's world is the context.

I don't care that she wasn't consulted about the details, that just means the other creators are bigots too. When you build within a world that has such large issues, where so much time and effort was devoted to highlighting and criticizing those issues, and you create a story that continues all the problems from the original canon and adds to them - that's a choice that I have a right to criticize. They had the benefit of being a google search away from knowing how to be respectful about all of this, and they did the opposite.

Sirona Ryan IS a beautiful real name, that's not the issue. I already wrote this post where I tried to explain the reaction, but I accept that maybe my feelings about this name come from cultural ignorance. If that's the case, I apologize, and I'd love to be corrected.

My real issue with the game is the antisemitism.

You say "folklore dating back to the 1400's" as if that's far too old to be influenced by antisemitism. Fun fact: antisemitism is older than goblins. Antisemitism is literally millennia old. At least as old as Christianity, which is the root of many antisemitic ideas. It's older than many European mythological creatures, and it infuses a lot of European folklore and mythology, down to the depictions of witches with their pointy hats. Stories about goblins being used as a way to dehumanize Jewish people is not new. And using a fictional race of non-humans as stand-ins for real groups of marginalized people - either intentionally or not - is a very common practice in storytelling. Most fantasy races have those roots to them. But even then, where, in the original lore of the goblins, did they control the banks?

It doesn't matter if Rowling was shocked by the claims of antisemitism and it doesn't matter if she denied them. The reality of her story is that she created an antisemitic depiction. I can believe that it wasn't her intention, but that doesn't mean it's not what she did.

You don't get to look at an antagonistic group that embodies EVERY SINGLE TRAIT THAT WAS ASSIGNED TO MY PEOPLE TO DEMONIZE US and tell me that's not antisemitic.

I already made this list, but let's do it again. All antisemitic traits that can be found in Rowling's goblins. I'll break it down to the original book canon, the movies, and the game.

Books - Rowling's actual canon:

Short, with clever swarthy faces, sallow skin and pointed beards

A guttural language

Ruthless and known for their greed

Pursue someone who owes them money with violent threats

Have cultural differences that make them impossible to trust

Harmed by dark wizard but still suspected to support them

Only worth associating with for their metalworking and control of the economy

She placed a goblin's rebellion in 1612 - the same year as the events that led to the Fettmilch uprising, which resulted in pogroms and Jewish deaths. Rowling stated that wars and political unrest parallel between the muggle world and the wizarding world as the two societies influence each other

The most prominent named goblin character, Griphook, betrays Harry. Harry is a Christ allegory - literally sacrifices himself to save everyone, and then comes back to life

Movies:

Hooked noses - the best known antisemitic feature

A six pointed star in the building they chose for the bank - I don't believe this was intentional, but it's an unfortunate choice and they could have covered it

Here end the parts I blame on Rowling directly. And the game was built on these foundations.

Game:

A historical time frame of pogroms, where our people were murdered in large massacres that often had support from authorities

Explicit ties between the goblins and the dark wizards

Aiming to undermine wizard society - the goal assigned to us in every antisemitic conspiracy theory

Kidnapping of children for their magic - literally just look up blood libel

A character says the goblins can't appreciate art. It’s absurd to say considering the quality and coveted status of goblin-made artifacts. In the real world, this is a claim that was made against Jews by the Nazis (and it targets other groups hated by white supremacists as well)

A ram’s horn artifact that strongly resembles a silver plated Shofar - a Jewish ritual item. Said horn is from 1612, from the same rebellion mentioned above. According to the item’s description, it was blown to rally the goblins and to annoy witches and wizards. It was stuffed with gorgonzola to mute it, a specifically non-kosher cheese (most kinds of cheese are kosher). It's so disrespectful I still don't have the words to fully convey it

Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, those traits became associated with Jewish people as a group through hateful propaganda. Putting all of them on a non-human race isn't better. It just adds to the dehumanization of it. It's not just Rowling's fault. That's shared by every single person who had a hand in the creation of this story. For the issues in the game, I blame the people named here more. I see no reason to extend grace to far-right bigots.

But to focus on Rowling. You brought up lycanthropy. You seem to think we made up the idea that it's a metaphor for HIV. We didn't. She said that. In the ebook Short Stories From Hogwarts of Heroism, Hardship, and Dangerous Hobbies - she said that. She said it before that, on Pottermore.

Lupin's condition of lycanthropy (being a werewolf) was a metaphor for those illnesses that carry a stigma, like HIV and AIDS. [...] The wizarding community is as prone to hysteria and prejudice as the Muggle one, and the character of Lupin gave me a chance to examine those attitudes.

This is a quote of her thoughts. It still exists on Lupin's page on her Wizarding World website.

And it's actually a pretty good example of how it's absolutely possible to be awful about depicting a stigmatized minority through a fantasy stand-in.

HIV+ people are stigmatized through no fault of their own. But in her books, it seems reasonable for the wizards to fear werewolves. And she did that, she made prejudice reasonable. We have: Remus Lupin, a named werewolf who is good and kind, and tries to avoid hurting people. Even then, he nearly does cause harm more than once. He turns in front of our heroes and spends a night loose in the forest. He tells the heroes that as a student, he almost bit people while out with his friends. So even while well-intentioned, he's a danger. That means we don't have a single safe HIV+ allegory in her work. The other named werewolf is Fenrir Greyback, who intentionally targets children to turn them young and raise them to hate the society they came from - which is fucking homophobic, whatever she intended, because of the way HIV gets associated with homosexuality. And the rest? A whole community of werewolves who side with the Death Eaters.

Did she mean to make a whole community of marginalized people into wizard Nazis? I DON'T CARE. SHE DID THAT.

I don't care to argue about her intentions while writing the text. I can't read minds. I can read the text she wrote. I can see what was put into the game that was added into her world. I can read about the history of my people and their persecution. I can see how disturbingly similar this game's story is to the propaganda that led to my grandparents suffering through the holocaust and losing their families to it.

If she cared about the antisemitism in her works, she wouldn't just act horrified and say "No, of course I wasn't being hateful to Jews!" - she'd look at whatever she lets people put into her IP, to prevent further harm. I do blame the other writers of the game more than I blame her for that plot, but it's not better that she gave her approval without being consulted. It's her IP, it carries her name, she gets royalties, it's her responsibility.

And at the very least, she doesn't care about antisemitism enough to worry about minimizing harm. I know that, because I know her friends. I know TERFs and Gender Criticals. Rowling saw an anti-trans event with white supremacist speakers, and she chose to criticize the counter-protesters. She went out to eat with Maya Forstater and Helen Joyce, who participated and spoke in events organized by Posie Parker - who explicitly includes far right groups in her events, and shares platforms with white supremacists. Rowling bought merch from Posie Parker. She wrote about Magdalen Berns as a "brave young feminist" - as if she didn't push the antisemitic George Soros conspiracy theory and share Breitbart articles. She praised MATT WALSH. The people she associates with now, read from Mein Kampf in their rallies.

She didn't put the antisemitism in the game, but she's very comfortable with antisemitism. Don't tell me she was horrified by the idea that her goblins could be called antisemitic. She just didn't want the label applied to her. If you willingly associate with Nazis, you're a Nazi. And enough of her friends don't seem to mind that.

I stand by what I said: playing this game, even pirated, is like printing out an antisemitic caricature and hanging it on your wall, saying “well, I didn’t pay the artist, I just like this art.”

[llyfrenfys]

Some really good notes from my post courtesy of @margridarnauds about that person accidentally using a white nationalist slogan to support the Welsh language:

I know someone who is doing a PhD on the Far Right and the co-option of cultural movements and these tags are bang on. Its the difference between a healthy nationalism and an unhealthy nationalism. A lot of this goes for Irish nationalism as well as it does for Welsh nationalism.

There's nothing wrong with (and arguably a lot right with) minority language preservation. It can be used for great good (strengthens community ties, preserves culture) but if co-option is not guarded against readily, it can also be used for great evil (see: using minority language struggles as an argument against immigration, for example).

The Far Right sees the cultural preservation of anything (white) and it's like a bat signal. These things are magnets for white supremacists and assorted fascists of all kinds. Which is why it is so goddamn important to be vigilant against people like that hijacking your movement.

I see a worrying amount of Welsh nationalists use (accidentally or not) the language of the far right to argue for Welsh language preservation. It can be as innocuous as advocating for a Welsh Academie Francaise to as obvious as insinuating that Wales must be kept "ethnically" Welsh in order to keep out foreign influence on the language. I see this go unchecked all the time in various Facebook groups for Welsh independence (most of which I've left since admins of these pages either don't know or don't care that people use their groups to share these sentiments).

Nationalism ≠ Fascism - but if you don't keep an eye on the company you're keeping, any well-meaning nationalist/independence or language preservation movement can be hijacked to promote hate. I only know a scant amount because I was only vaguely considering joining Yes Cymru a few years before they all went sideways (but I remember Owen Exie Hurcum talking about this on Twitter at the time) but the leadership of Yes Cymru began to squeeze out minorities from the group- nonwhite folks, gay people, trans people etc. Whole thing put me off from joining. I don't remember the full details but from the testimonies of others, the group was hijacked and steered into a reactionary way of being. Considering a large amount of Welsh nationalists also idolise groups like the FWA (Free Wales Army - a Welsh nationalist group formed in 1963 which tried to emulate the IRA in Ireland, with little success- mostly just playing paramilitary dress up) - whose symbol is this flag:

Even if the flag itself is based on Welsh folklore and is supposedly an entirely innocent, non fash design- it still is like a beacon to the Far Right who will take any amount of symbolic validation as a cue to join your movement and derail it for their own ends.

Which is why Celtic scholars, people with casual interest in Celtic languages and/or their respective cultures and civic nationalists alike need to be vigilant against those who would co-opt the field for their own twisted hate campaign.

So, one final thought,

Returning to my original post responding to that American chiming into Welsh politics from overseas. Please PLEASE be careful when wading into politics that isn't yours. Where the Far Right are involved, it doesn't take much to cause a dumpster fire - if you aren't 'on the ground' with these issues so to speak, you aren't in the firing line if your comments go sideways and enable/provoke the Far Right in this country.

If you have an interest in Celtic languages, countries and politics- you have a duty to be responsible with what you do and say. This isn't to say that you cannot engage with these topics- but that you should exercise caution lest you accidentally worsen an already delicate situation.

This has been your regularly scheduled Celtic anti-fascist tedtalk. Please reblog to make sure more people become aware of how delicate things can be and how to prevent fascists from getting a foothold in this field. Thank you.

[gamerbearmira]

Cryptid madrigals au-

I forgot to add, whether you get a gift or not, you're going to have some kind of ability no matter what, thanks to Alma's genetics.

So, what I've heard about the moth man, he can swipe people off their feet as he flies into the darkness.

Therefore, Mirabel is strong enough to lift people up without an issue while flying. She's not as strong as Luisa, but she can lift people up if need be. Only two at a time of course, maybe three if she's pushing it.

She's also really fast when it comes to flying. So, there's no point in running if you piss her off.

Mothman is described as being a human-bird hybrid larger than a normal man. So, Mirabel is taller than people her age without the amulet.

Canon Mirabel is 5'2, so in this au, without the amulet she's probably reaches her abuela's shoulders or a few inches above them.

Proximity to the Mothman causes confusion, extreme fear, and psychological distress that can last months and lead to death or insanity.

Mirabel can do that too but only with intent and so far, she hasn't been given a reason to kill anyone. She only needs to cause confusion, extreme fear, and phycological distress to villagers who need a humbling lesson. (I'm sure she probably gets this trait from Alma tho)

There's a movie called "Bodysnatchers" and basically these aliens take over people's bodies, and if these aliens know you aren't one of them, they'll point at you and scream.

Seeing as Dolores is a banshee, I can imagine her doing that. And from what I've read,

"Banshee, (“woman of the fairies”) supernatural being in Irish and other Celtic folklore who's mournful “keening,” or wailing screaming or lamentation, at night was believed to foretell the death of a member of the family of the person who heard the spirit."

So, give her a reason to scream if you want to, YOU are someone you care about is going to meet the maker in the clouds.

But let's be clear, no madrigal is a killer, if you don't prove as an actual physical threat to them, you'll just get "visits" at night to scare you into being a little nicer.

MORE STUFF YIPEEE❗❗

I'm not surprised that they get abilities. I mean Alma has some, so it's exoected that even without a gift, they have some kind of ability tied to whatever kind of cryptid they are. Her powers are pretty rad though, and you can obviously see where she gets her height from 💀💀

Dolores screaming is so real. I imagined she probably burst a couple ear drums, especially in her younger years when random grown people would just sneak into the house. Homegirl is trying to get sime water and some random dude is in Casita being tortured by Pedro 😭

Night visits, so real <\\33 ALSO. Is Mariano is in this au?? Or like the Guzmán's in general??? And are the cryptids too. Like. I need a reason 🙏🙏 silly idea where there are, albeit very, very few, cryptic families in the Encanto. Again, not many, and they aren't big families either. But they're at the very least known to the Madrigals. Idk, I'm spitballing again 🦀🦀

Dolores and then random drawings. Mirabel can't wear shoes, just ribbons, and Antonio acts a lot like an animal given he's a chimera. I also read that most chimera's breath fire so. Do with that what you will 💀💀 and then Félix, cause why not 🧯

You'll have to pry this damn family tree out of my cold dead hands because I genuinely love editing it to fit other aus. Like any given chance I WILL do it, even if its low effort 🙏

[synfl0w3r]

I think accidentally maybe made a truesona!!! They're based off of puca from celtic folklore :3

Tried to make them look a lot like me irl but with slightly longer hair because my last haircut was too short and I miss ponytail!!

[connorsnothereeither]

I dont know if youve talked about this before, but if not, how did you come up with some of your characters' names?

I’ve talked about it before for Ulysses here in this post but not some of the others!! But I would love to I shake their names about!!

Virgil Coronis (Sky Bound SMP)

So Virgil went through a lot of potential names. He was built up vibes-first in development, so I had my gothic, conspiracy librarian, and no names. I wanted something that sounded more sharp, and angular. Crow-like.

I went for some classic gothic literature names to start. Jonathan (for Jonathan Harker from Dracula), Percival/Percy (for Percy Shelly), and Auguste (from Poe’s The Murders in the Rue Morgue), along with some others were all potential candidates. By then, however, @jamphibiann had already chosen Pietro, and so I looked for some other Italian names to match since we were playing brothers. Romeo, and Salvatore were somewhat higher contenders then!

Landing on Virgil was actually sort of stolen from @venear-tmblr . When throwing around potential names, one of the ones that didn’t make the cut for him was Dante. And while Dante didn’t quite fit the character I had in my mind, Virgil definitely did! It had Latin/Italian roots, and felt angular and distinctly raven-like to me! :D

“Coronis” as a last name is actually an ancient Greek word, which is both referring to the curved flourish in old handwriting, and is same root word (corone) for the Greek for crows or ravens, referring the curvature of their beaks! So it felt very fitting too.

Leopold Haust (Terramortis)

Leopold was honestly… kind of a silly one. He never had any alternate names. I knew he was going to be from the 1920s, so I wanted a vaguely old-timey name, which fit the vibe, but could still be shortened into something more modern and easy to quickly say. And, at the time, I was reading Ulysses by James Joyce as a joke… and “Leopold” is the name of the Odysseus/Ulysses counterpart in that novel. So it just sort of… ticked all the boxes lol. It wasn’t supposed to be connected to Ulysses at all, but it jumped out at me as a perfect name for the character I had created. Haust was just a made up name that sounded like it matched well when spoken allowed!

D’Hakth’rkael “Daniel Thorns” Thoricht (Cantripped)

So Dan was… interesting name wise. I had the “bit” in mind long before I came up with the name. I was somewhat inspired by a lot of people I know or grew up knowing, who would have long, intricate names, and would shorten it to just like,,, “Mike”. But mostly I was inspired from the “folk hero” angle of how through Christianisation and colonisation, Celtic mythology names were super worn down into common, short Anglican names. Things like “Cú Cuhlainn”/“Conochubar” or “Fionn mac Cumhail” being worn down to names like Connor or Finn. I also just love when folklore figures have what feel like really mundane names, with a descriptor or trait. “Robin Hood”, “Jack Frost”, etc. it’s very English folktale to me.

For a while I wanted to play with “Tom” of “Jack” but for whatever reason “Dan” just stood out to me as a very mundane feeling name (and to be fair, Dan does go by Jack sometimes… in some places… just nowhere we’ve been yet…). So Dan Thorns came first, and I worked backwards from there.

From “Daniel Thorns” it was basically just a process of mashing fantasy sounds together until they sounded like a name. Thoricht felt like a believable evolution of “Thorns”, and could still pass as a human name. “D’Hakth” came next; I liked the juxtaposition of sounds, and the ways you could linguistically interpret it, taking it in a D, H, Y, or even J direction. The final part, “rkael” was mostly just for flavour. I started looking into vengeance Paladin, “avenging angel” imagery for Dan for a while, felt biblical, and I really liked the vaguely biblical feel it brought to the name, while adding another layer of “oh that’s why he just goes by Dan” akgakag