Weardale Fairies
Weardale, Stanhope
“Despite being told by her parents to stay close to their farm near Stanhope in the Durham Dales, the young girl slipped away unnoticed to play along the riverbank…”This is Durham
We’re heading over to the North East with this tale. Fairies can often to attributed to bringing wealth and good luck, if you treat them right, but this tale has a more threatening vibe to it. I certainly wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of these fairies!
A wayward young girl, too curious for her own good, was warned by her parents to not stray too far from their farm. She found herself along the river bank, innocently collecting flowers and blissfully unaware of the dangers of this part of land. The hills above the river were full of hollows and caves, not very safe for a small girl to be playing around.
It wasn’t long before the girl heard eerie music playing on a pipe, a fiddle and a drum. Laughter followed, and the hauntingly beautiful music only drew the girl closer to the cave it seemed to swell from. She found herself face-to-face with a huge boulder jutting from the hillside and running down its centre was a very inviting fissure. As she peeked through the gap, she saw a group of little fairies dancing in a circle and laughing with glee!
But something inside the girl knew this wasn’t right, she shouldn’t be looking and so with worry in her heart she ran back to the farm to tell her parents. Her mother and father feared the worst, as they had heard that you should never spy on fairies, they do not like to be watched. No one had ever watched the fairies without them coming for revenge. Her mother suggested the farmer go to the village to consult with the ‘wise woman’ about what to do, they couldn’t risk losing their child to the fairies.
“Keep the house absolutely silent this evening. The fairies will come for your child at midnight. But if you keep quiet, they won’t be able to touch her”, the wise woman advised. And so the family took heed, ensuring everything that usually made a noise was thrown away, tidied up, locked where it cannot be heard. The log fire was dampened to smoke, the clocks were stopped so as not to chime, and the little girl was told to not move from her bedroom all night.
As the fairies approached the house, all was still and silent… until the farm dog noticed them, and began barking up a storm. As soon as the mother and father realised their mistake, they rushed to their daughter’s bedroom… and she was gone. The fairies had seized their chance to take the girl. Wrought with fear, the farmer rushed back to the village to tell the wise woman what had happened.
Probably with a sigh, the wise woman then explained a way of getting their daughter back from the fairies. “Take three gifts to pacify the fairies - something which gave light without burning, a piece of an animal’s body taken without the shedding of blood, and a chicken which had no bone in its body”, very tired, and overcome with fear, the farmer reluctantly agreed, despite having no clue as to how to answer this riddle.
Dejected by the riddle, the farmer slowly walked back home. How would he manage to find something that gave light without burning?! That was impossible, wasn’t it? Until he spotted something in the grass… something illuminating a green light… a glow worm! He had his first gift.
Okay, he was onto something here, he just needed to think! Think! A piece of an animal’s body without spilling any blood… there must be a way… He sat down after pocketing his glow worm and stared up at the sky, hoping the answer would fall into his lap. And just like that, something fell into his lap.
A kestrel from above had dropped the skin of a lizard, after realising the lizard was no longer in its skin, and had shed it. Huzzah! The farmer now had lizard skin, acquired without any blood shed. His hopes were peaking, he only had one more riddle to solve! His daughter would be safely returned just as soon as he could figure out how to get a chicken with no bones…
He returned to his farm, with glow worm and lizard skin in his possession. He heard his chickens clucking as he paced down the path and remembered the old wife’s tale that a newly laid chick, inside it’s egg, didn’t form bones for a while. Rejoice! He went to grab an egg laid that day and pocketed it. He did it! With joy in his step, and pride in his heart, he marched over to the fissure in the rock where his daughter had spied the fairies and one by one popped the gifts through the hole.
He heard the muffled laughter of the fairies, not daring to look through the crack but nothing seemed to happen. Until, as he turned to walk back home, his daughter was stood facing him. He’d managed to please the fairies and get his child back, a task that many before him had failed.
I suppose the only lesson we can really take from this tale is listen to your parents when they tell you to not go further than your farmland. Or just listen to your parents, anyway, they probably know what they’re talking about.
