ULSTER FOLKLORE
Ulster Folklore
ELIZABETH ANDREWS, F.R.A.I.
7, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.
1913
INTRODUCTION
In 1894 I was at the meeting of the BritishAssociation at Oxford, and had the goodfortune to hear Professor Julius Kollmann give hispaper on "Pygmies in Europe," in which hedescribed the skeletons which had then recentlybeen discovered near Schaffhausen. As I listenedto his account of these small people, whose averageheight was about four and a half feet, I recalled thedescription of Irish fairies given to me by an oldwoman from Galway, and it appeared to me thatour traditional "wee-folk" were about the size ofthese Swiss dwarfs. I determined to collect whatinformation I could, and the result is given in thefollowing pages. I found that the fairies are,indeed, regarded as small; but their height may bethat of a well-grown boy or girl, or they may notbe larger than a child beginning to walk. I onceasked a woman if they were as small as cocks andhens, but she laughed at the suggestion.
I had collected a number of stories, and hadbecome convinced that in these tales we had areminiscence of a dwarf race, when I read some ofMr. David MacRitchie's works, and was gratifiedto find that the traditions I had gathered were in[Pg vi]accordance with the conclusions he had drawnfrom his investigations in Scotland. A little laterI made his acquaintance, and owe him many thanksfor his great kindness and the encouragement hehas given me in my work.
As will be seen in the following pages, traditionrecords several small races in Ulster: the Grogachs,who are closely allied to the fairies, and also to theScotch and English Brownies; the short Danes,whom I am inclined to identify with the Tuathade Danann; the Pechts, or Picts; and also thesmall Finns. My belief is that all these, includingthe fairies, represent primitive races of mankind,and that in the stories of women, children, andmen