The Truth About Leprechauns

Robert Curran, Dr. Robert Curran

• Publisher: The O'Brien Press
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781847179142
• eBook ISBN: 9781847179364
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Folklore & Mythology
• Index: Social Sciences

From the origins of this hero of Irish lore to his habits, occupations and characteristics. This book offers enlightenment on little-known aspects of the wider fairy world, as well as turning the spotlight on the real leprechaun.

Every country has its own myths about fairies and 'wee folk', but the Irish leprechaun is the undisputed king. To some, he is an impish figure full of harmless mischief, forever guarding his elusive crock of gold. To others, he is an evil gnome bent on disrupting the lives of mortals with his black magic and malevolent acts.

Historian and folklorist Bob Curran looks at the origins of this hero of Irish lore – fallen angel, diminished god or son of fairies – and at his habits, occupations and characteristics. He explores the superstitions surrounding the leprechaun and his enduring place in popular culture, and turns the spotlight on the 'real' leprechaun – mysterious, complex and contradictory.

Chapter One

Origins and General Appearance

Although the fairy kind in general are believed to be descended either from the Tuatha de Danann or from fallen angels, some of their number may have more specific origins. The leprechaun may be one of these distinct entities. So where did leprechauns come from?

Despite its now-widespread appeal – it is used to refer to almost any Irish fairy – the term ‘leprechaun’ was not really used until the late seventeenth or early eighteenth century. Even then, the word had many different, localised variations. In east Leinster, for example, the term was liomreachán, while in south Leinster it was lúracán; in Ulster it was luchramán, in Connacht lúracán. Even within provinces, the name varied. For instance, in parts of Munster, the sprite was called a luchargán, lurgadán or cluricán, while in other areas the description luchorpán prevailed.

Many of these descriptions were taken from the sprite’s alleged powers or characteristics. Within these terms, there are echoes of the ancient Irish words luch (mouse), lúth (agility), and lurga (ankle). The leprechaun was, therefore, believed to be about the size of a mouse, with speedy reflexes and large feet. The term ‘leprechaun’ is thought to have been used only in the north Leinster area until the middle or end of the last century. Nowadays, this form seems to be widely used all over Ireland.

The origin of the term ‘leprechaun’ is complex. It has been argued that it derives from leith bhrógán (half-shoe-maker – maker of half a pair of shoes), making the sprite a cobbler by profession, with a corpus of related folklore attached to him. However, it is more likely that the name comes from the ancient Irish luchorpán (little man) or luacharmán (pygmy), simply denoting a creature of very small stature. In texts dating from the eighth century, the term is used to denote members of a diminutive race. In the legend of Fearghus mac Léide, for example, reference is made to a community of diminutive people who possess magical powers and skills. Fearghus seizes three of them, and, in return for their release, they bestow the magical skills of swimming upon him. Later texts, dating from the tenth, eleventh and twelfth centuries, say that these beings may also bestow certain magical objects, such as silver shoes, which enable a person to walk on water without drowning.

Is the leprechaun, then, a member of such a community? If so, what were the origins of these tiny folk?

ORIGINS – GROGOCHS, PECHTS AND OTHER CREATURES

The Irish leprechaun may be part of a much wider lore concerning diminutive races. This lore includes brownies, gnomes, goblins, fées and pixies, all of whom feature prominently in Celtic vernacular mythology. It is quite possible that many of the tales concerning leprechauns were adapted by the Irish from other sources, perhaps from outside their own shores. Since there is no reference to the luchorpán in Ireland before the seventh or eighth century, there seems little doubt that he was imported from elsewhere and was integrated into native mythologies. But where could these tales have come from?

There is no way to determine an actual source, but it may be that they came from Europe, with waves of invaders who gradually settled in Ireland. Right across the Continent, we find tales of small, elusive aboriginal races dwelling in communities well away from their taller counterparts. Some of these little people were considered to have special powers; many are said to have lived underground, and many were believed to be ugly or slightly deformed (or different from humankind) in some way. Might these have been the prehistoric prototypes for the leprechaun?

A clue to the origins of the luchorpán comes from Ulster. Here, the leprechaun is known by two quite specific names – ‘grogoch’ and ‘pecht’. It is the latter epithet, ‘pecht’, which hints at the origin, for it is too close to the word ‘pict’ – a generic name in the area for aboriginal Scottish peoples – to be simply coincidence. Old local people, particularly in the North Antrim area, are quite sure of the area from which their diminutive neighbours came to Ireland.

‘The pechts and grogochs came from Scotland, surely,’ stated Robert McCormick, an old man from the town of Ballycastle on the northern coast. ‘They came here by way of a land-bridge which was between Kintyre and Antrim in the old days. When the Celtic people came to Scotland, they drove the pechts in front of them and they had to get out of the country. So they came to Ireland, where nobody was living at the time, and started to live here. The Celtic people followed them across the bridge and started to live here too. So the pechts had to hide away in secret places around the countryside, and that’s why you never see much of them. That bridge of land is long gone, but the pechts are still here. We call them “fairies” and “wee people”, and that’s how they came to North Antrim and to Ireland as well.’

Setting aside some of the more fanciful details, there may be some truth in this notion. Both Scottish and Hebridean folklore are filled with tales of communities of little folk living in remote places, some of whom may have migrated to Ireland in prehistoric times. Some of these may well have been aboriginal peoples who were displaced by incoming Celtic settlers. Indeed, the general descriptions of the grogochs or pechts seem to confirm this notion.

Although they are widely regarded as a type of leprechaun, the grogochs differ from the standard leprechaun in appearance and character. They are small and brutish-looking, with flat faces and large, languid eyes. They do not wear clothes; instead they grow long, reddish, matted fur which covers their entire bodies. They are untidy and dirty in their habits – their fur, for example, is tangled with twigs and straw which the grogochs inadvertently pick up on their travels.

‘When I was a wee child and staying with my granny in the Glens [of Antrim],’ recalled the famous Waterfoot historian and storyteller Mary Stone, ‘we would come in from the fields and my granny would say, “Ye look like an oul’ grogoch.” I never knew what that meant, but she always started to comb and untangle my hair. Later on, I found out that it meant “untidy”, because the grogoch is always very untidy and dirty in his habits. He always has bits and pieces of straw and chaff in his hair, and I suppose that after a day playing in the hay-fields, I was dirty and untidy too.’

Their dwellings were usually piles of tumbled rocks, sometimes no more than two great standing stones pushed over to provide a rude shelter from the elements. Several of these ‘grogoch’s houses’ still exist on Rathlin Island, off the Northern Irish coast.

‘The Groigock’s [sic] House is two big stones near Leg-an-thassnee,’ reported Rathlin man Frank Craig. ‘They said you would have been fit one time to see [one could see] the groigocks lying out on the grass and sunning themselves there. It’s up near the Knockans. There used to be plenty of them up there. Leg-a-goin, too: they’d be out sunning themselves, clear as day. When it rained, they took shelter in the House. Two stones leaning together. It’s there yet.’

Unlike the majority of the leprechaun species, the grogoch does not possess an overly surly nature. This makes him different even from those leprechaun-fairies whom he most closely resembles – the laughremen of the South Armagh region (small, hairy creatures who possess eminently unsociable dispositions and sometimes play tricks upon or show violence towards humankind) and an unspecified fur-covered entity who dwells in remote areas of County Sligo (who continually torments both animals and small children). In fact, the grogoch is usually helpful to the point of being a nuisance, and will sometimes attach himself to one particular individual or household for whom he has developed a special affection. In former times, grogochs would help both Rathlin and North Antrim farmers with the harvest. They were tireless workers; however, they could not tolerate laziness or idleness in others and frequently took steps to rouse a dozing farmhand or careless worker. Frank Craig relates a story from Rathlin which demonstrates this particular fairy trait:

There was a groigock in John Vawnilds’ place over in the Castle Quarter [also known as Bruce’s Castle]. He was a wee hairy man who would do turns about the place for John and his wife; he would wash spuds for them and take home the cows of an evening.

Now, at this time, John was an old man and liked his rest well enough, especially on a Sunday morning when he should have been at mass. He would take a bit of a lie-in after a week’s hard work. But the groigock wouldn’t have that at all. When old John was lying snoring in the bed, he would hoist himself up onto the covers and creep up. Then he would batter the old man about the face until he got up and did a bit of work before going to mass. They can’t stand anyone not working, do you see?

It was the same when the boys in the fields would sit down to have a rest or a can of tea as they did in the olden days. The groigocks would creep up behind them and torment them until they had to go back to the threshing or whatever they were doing. It got so that the groigocks were great pests and the farmers wouldn’t want them about, no matter how good workers they were. And poor John Vawnilds had reason to curse them as well.

That’s a true story, for I mind [remember] my grandfather telling that story often. Of course, you don’t see groigocks about any more, so I suppose them that sleep late in their beds or in the hay-fields are safe enough.

Unlike the standard leprechaun, the grogoch was widely thought to be extremely stupid – a kind of North Ulster ‘village idiot’. Always eager to please, grogochs would sometimes make a mess of the tasks they were given, if only through their enthusiasm. A story which was widely told in the Ballycastle area made this point:

A shepherd who worked on Knocklayd Mountain had to come into Ballycastle on business. It was the first time in over a year that he had been away from his herd, and, as he was going to be all day in the town, he had to find somebody to look after his flock. The sides of the mountain are very steep, and young lambs would be wandering all over the place and falling into ravines or sinking into bogs. Somebody had to be there to see that they came to no harm and to round them up if need be.

On the top of Knocklayd, there was an old grogoch living, and he was very friendly and helpful, so the shepherd went up and asked him if he would look after the sheep and lambs. The grogoch came to the mouth of his cave and told him that he’d be delighted to do so. The shepherd took him down the mountainside and showed him the sheep, grazing on the slopes, and the pen into which they would have to be put at night. The grogoch told him not to worry and that everything was safe in his hands.

The next morning, the shepherd took himself off to Ballycastle, leaving the grogoch in charge. Before he left, he told the fairy that he should gather all the sheep and lambs in that night, and he wasn’t to let any wander down onto the lower slopes. Again, the grogoch told him not to worry – he had been herding sheep off and on for hundreds of years – and so the shepherd eventually set off for the town.

He was far longer in Ballycastle than he’d planned to be. The business took up most of the day, and then he ran into some old friends who took him to the pub and bought him drink. The crack among them was good, and so it was late when the shepherd set out and nearly morning when he arrived back on Knocklayd Mountain.

To his surprise, all the sheep and their lambs were in the pen, with the grogoch looking after them. However, the little man seemed greatly out of breath and looked very tired. The shepherd naturally asked him if he’d had any trouble with the flock.

‘No real trouble,’ the grogoch answered him. ‘I got them all gathered in without too much trouble, although a wee brown lamb wouldn’t go into the pen and I had to chase it all over the mountain nearly all night. I caught it at last and put it in the pen with the others, but it took me some time to get it in, all right. It didn’t want to go.’

This puzzled the shepherd, for he knew that there was no brown lamb among his flock, and he told the grogoch so. The other, however, insisted that the brown lamb was there and brought the shepherd over to the pen to see it. Imagine his astonishment when he saw, lying in the shadow of the circling stone wall, nothing more than a small, out-of-breath hare! The stupid grogoch, unable to tell the difference between a lamb and a hare, had chased it all over Knocklayd for the whole night!

(A traditional North Antrim tale from the author’s own sources)

In spite of their stupidity, the grogochs were extremely good-hearted and eager to do good turns. Indeed, they were so eager to please that they invariably became pests about the house. They would run about (often invisibly) trying to do small chores for the woman of the house, and would usually end up creating more mess than they cleared. When a housewife unaccountably stumbled or tripped in the kitchen, she was sure that she had stepped on or bumped against an invisible grogoch. The great Rathlin Island storyteller Rose McCurdy mentioned such an encounter:

Did nobody tell you about the gruogock? That’s what they call them on this island, and on parts of the mainland as well. I had a man from the County Sligo come to see me, and he knew what it was. In Ireland, where I come from [the inhabitants of Rathlin Island always refer to the mainland as ‘Ireland’; Rose was born in Glenshesk, outside Ballycastle], they called him the grigock, but it’s this land [Rathlin] that I’m talking about now.

There was a grigock’s house up at Clegganleck on the upper end of the island. He was supposed to come down from it every day at one time – Alex Morrison or Owney Murphy will tell you the truth of it, for they seen him many a time. The woman of the house was polluted with the grigock coming down to her every day. When she got up from her chair, he would rise up with her and would be round her legs and feet. And he was always running round the fire and getting in her way. She was polluted.

One day, she was carrying a kettle of boiling water from the fire and the grigock was running around her feet, and what did she do but spill a drop on him. He let out a screech of a yell, they said, and shouted in the old Irish (which was all that he spoke), ‘Oh! Oh! My viggerald-vaggerald is all scalded!’ That’s what it sounded like. And he ran out of the house and all the way back to Clegganleck. But I’ll go bail that the grigock never came back to that house again, nor did he go near any of the houses after that.

Unlike other leprechauns, the grogoch was not interested in either money or reward for his labours. In fact, any sort of money or gift was anathema to him, and to offer him such a reward, even out of gratitude or sympathy, would invariably drive him away from a house. Frank Craig elaborated on this in a famous tale of the grogoch, widely repeated on Rathlin Island.

There was a grogoch worked over at Douglas Cecil’s place at times during the year. One time, there was a very harsh winter, with snow lying all over the island, but the grogoch came down from his house and worked away. Old Mrs ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Introduction: The Leprechaun in the Wider Fairy World
• 1: Origins and General Appearance
• 2: Habitat and Habits
• 3: Questions of Gender, Birth and Age
• 4: Leprechaun Professions
• 5: Leprechaun Society
• 6: Leprechauns and Religion
• 7: The Leprechaun’s Cousins: Cluricauns and Sheela-na-Gigs
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Other Books
• About the Author
• Copyright