Abstract
MISS M. A. MURRAY contributes to Folk-Lore (vol. xxviii., No. 3) a paper on the “Organisations of Witches in Great Britain.” The author brings forward certain facts which appear to show a connection between witches and fairies-not the little beings which the fancies of poets have evolved; the fairies of the witch trials are the fairies of Scotch and Irish legend. The ritual of the witches is like the ritual of the fairies: both sacrificed children to their god, whom Christians stigmatised as the devil.; both stole up-baptised children for the sacrifice; both sacrificed their god or devil every year, apparently on May Day; both had ritual dances of the same type. “If, as many authorities contend, the fairies are really the aboriginal inhabitants of these islands, there is nothing surprising in their ritual and beliefs being adopted by the invading race. And in that case I am right in my conjecture that the o rites of the witches are the remains of the ancient and primitive cult of Great Britain.”
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Primitive Cults. Nature 100, 494 (1918). https://doi.org/10.1038/100494a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/100494a0