The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries

by Evans-Wentz, W. Y. (Walter Yeeling), 1878-1965

Read online at Archive.org and Sacred-Texts.com

From Sacred-Texts:

“This is one of the most in-depth and scholarly attempts to explain the phenomena of the Celtic belief in fairies. Based on Evans-Wentz’ Oxford doctoral thesis, it includes an extensive survey of the literature from many different perspectives, including folk-lore, history, anthropology and psychology. The heart of the book is the ethnographic fieldwork conducted by Evans-Wentz, an invaluable snapshot of the fairy belief system taken just on the cusp of modernity. There are regional surveys of the fairy-faith in Ireland, Wales, Scotland, Brittany and the Isle of Man. Evan-Wentz later went on to become one of the leading authorities on Buddhism, and published many of the key documents of Tibetan Buddhism including the Tibetan Book of the Dead.

Evans-Wentz examines each of the hypothetical explanations of the fairy phenomena. Among these are the theories that fairies were a reclusive race of dwarfs, that they are disembodied spirits, or that they are a figment of our imaginations. Evans-Wentz concludes that they may indeed be a manifestation of inhabitants of a higher reality that only some of us are able to view, let alone understand.

We come away from this study with a multi-dimensional view of the fairies, who, much like the grey aliens of UFO belief, inhabit a narrative which seems too consistent to be the product of insanity, yet too bizarre for conventional explanation.”

• Title Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Introduction

Section I: The Living Fairy-Faith

• Chapter I: Environment
• Chapter II. Taking of Evidence: I. General Introduction
• Chapter II. Taking of Evidence: II. In Ireland
• Chapter II. Taking of Evidence: III. In Scotland
• Chapter II. Taking of Evidence: IV. In the Isle of Man
• Chapter II. Taking of Evidence: V. In Wales
• Chapter II. Taking of Evidence: VI. In Cornwall
• Chapter II. Taking of Evidence: VII: In Brittany
• Chapter III. Anthropological Examination of the Evidence

The Recorded Fairy-Faith

• Chapter IV. People of the Goddess Dana
• Chapter V. Brythonic Divinities
• Chapter VI. Celtic Otherworld
• Chapter VII. The Celtic Doctrine of Rebirth

Section III. The Cult Of Gods, Spirits, Fairies, and the Dead

• Chapter VIII. The Testimony of Archaeology
• Chapter IX. The Testimony of Paganism
• Chapter X. The Testimony of Christianity

Section IV. Modern Science and the Fairy Faith; and Conclusions

• Chapter XI. Science and Fairies
• Chapter XII. The Celtic Doctrine of Re-Birth and Otherworld Scientifically Examined