British Goblins; Welsh Folk-Lore, Fairy Mythology, Legends, and Traditions by Wirt Sikes

Description

British Goblins; Welsh Folk-Lore, Fairy Mythology, Legends, and Traditions is a book by Wirt Sikes, first published in 1880. It is a Victorian-era compendium that collects tales, customs and beliefs from across Wales — from the realm of the fairies (the Tylwyth Teg) and local ghost stories to wells, stones, dragons and quaint rural customs. Sikes writes as both an outsider and a careful recorder, combining material drawn from earlier printed traditions with accounts gathered from oral testimony while he served in Wales, producing a full-bodied introduction to Welsh folklore and fairy mythology for an English-speaking audience. The work is notable for its breadth rather than for scholarly theory: it reads as a field-collected miscellany and a Victorian attempt to preserve local belief in a time of rapid social change. For modern readers interested in Celtic studies, Welsh legends, folktales, Tylwyth Teg, or historical folklore collections, the book remains a useful window into 19th-century attitudes toward myth and tradition — and a handy source of the stories and place-legends that inspired later folklorists and popular retellings.

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