sea skin by sarcangel | G | 995 a boat, zouis, selkie!zayn
come down, i’d follow you by coffeewordangel | G | 1699 Prompted anonymously with, “mermaid zayn gets caught in liam’s fishermen’s net”. I took a slightly different angle with it.
Wish You Were Here by alittlewicked | G | 2492 From time to time, Louis got a peculiar feeling in his chest. Like something was literally tugging at his heartstrings. It was like the urgent need to be somewhere, like a niggling feeling at the back of his brain. That vague notion that something… or even someone was waiting out there for him to finally catch up to them, to come home. Or: The one were Louis is looking for home and finally finds it in Harry, the selkie.
Songs of the Sea by Anony_Moouse | T | 14626 “Hello.” The man says, his voice low and rumbling. Liam’s town is small. Even he, who speaks only to those he must, knows the faces of each person by sight, if not by name. This man is strange. “Are you lost?” Liam asks. The man’s smile remains but his forehead creases, eyebrows drawing together as he blinks at Liam. “I am not sure.” He says slowly, glancing over his shoulder towards the sea. Liam is a fisherman living on the Irish Coast. He lives a quiet life; happiness a luxury he hasn’t known for years. But a stranger knocks on his door with nowhere to go. An odd, happy man, Harry brings to Liam’s life a joy he hadn’t known possible. But his presence couldn’t have anything to do with the seal pelt, tucked away in the far corner of Liam’s home…
Leave Your Damage Behind and Gone by QuickedWeen | T | 15673 It’s the spring of 1882 and Sir Louis Tomlinson is a simple man with simple needs. Money. Running an old estate and dairy farm costs money, and he would much rather focus on his science experiments than take a trip to the Exposició Universal de Barcelona to beg for funding especially when everyone there is English anyway. He’s taking a walk one night to clear his head when he comes upon something mysterious on the beach that may or may not change his life forever.
love him (if he wounds you, if he tears your heart to pieces) by sailorharry | M | 17910 Niall has a secret – he’s not exactly normal. He loves the ocean a bit too much, loves the taste of salt in the air and the cold wind whipping at his face. Zayn loves Niall – more than he should, more than he has ever loved anybody – and he loves Niall’s secret just as much, even if it threatens to tear their band apart.
Water shows the hidden heart by noellehenry | M | 30995 The wind turns slowly into a storm, tugging at the roof and the door. Howling and moaning around the house. The dripping has become a stream of water, pouring through the roof. Louis checks on the bucket, he might need his fish bucket too tonight. He sits down again in his armchair near the hearth when there is a desperate knock on his door. Louis quickly gets up. The screens block the windows, so he can’t see who is brave enough to go out in this terrible weather. He unlocks the door and quickly asks: “Who is it ?” No answer, but another insistent knock. He opens the door carefully and nearly faints. In front of him stands a tall, lean, wet and naked young man, shivering in the ice cold wind. Louis steps aside and motions for the stranger to come in. A selkie AU set in Ireland in the 1930’s.
Cover art for that Space Selke mechs fan song I just made! (I’m posting it separately bcs the actual image thru Spotify is sad and links murder tungle.hell posts anyway)
Excited to share this new privately commissioned painting!
Folktales have always fascinated me, and Selkies in particular for their quintessential fairy allure and moral ambiguity…the sea calls us back with promises of creation, power, and destruction in equal measure.
Thank you to the inimitable @pippylongbaby for taking on the guise of this mythic being and modeling for this piece!
Text: I spend hours cataloguing the museum’s dusty back room. A capricorn skeleton, disassembled. A seer’s orb that only shows sinking ships. A trunk of seal skins, faded with age.
I did not choose to work at the Museum, not freely. But I had no family, and no home, and there were no better choices, so I took my place here.
Some people like it here. They wander the beautiful rooms, gaze upon priceless artifacts, or paintings, or elegant reminders of past times in the forms of furniture or clothing or decorative trifles of great expense. It is beautiful, I suppose.
The rooms where the staff live are small and drab. We are required to remain in the Museum, you see. We cannot leave for the duration of our contracts, neither by night nor by day, by the light of sun or moon. We belong to the Museum. Some have been here for decades… or centuries, perhaps. Time passes differently here.
As the newest member of staff, I was sent to do the ‘dull’ work of cataloguing the old exhibits. It had not been done for a long time – the last new member died in the doing, and the one before him got promoted before finishing. It can be dangerous, but I found that I liked the work, and chose to continue it even when another worker came. It is not right, that what we have here is not all treated with the same respect.
Some of the artifacts are dangerous, and kept locked up. I found three which no longer moved on their own, their curses faded or their clockwork run down, and moved them into Inert Storage.
Some of the paintings required tending. Some only need restorations or repairs, and for those I have the tools. Others require company, or… alteration.
“I know what a selkie is! What I’m having trouble with is my best friend of twenty years suddenly dropping by to be like ‘Hey, by the way, I’m a mythical water beast!’”
So I made my kitsune guide and now I’m finally remaking one of my original posts on my old blog: my selkie guide. Whether you’re a sea witch or a practicing fae worker or even a casual folklorist, you’ve likely heard of selkies.
My hopes with this post is to give those interested in selkies a place to start their research on folklore and someone else’s UPG. So I’ll provide a mixture of the history surrounding selkies and then dive (pun intended) into my own personal experience working with selkies. As always, however, just use this post as a way to get your foot in the door, not the full extent of your research.
This is not an all-knowing expert article on selkies nor is my UPG the end all be all of knowledge on selkies, just my personal experiences.
what is a selkie?
By definition selkies (also called silkies, sylkies, selchies, or seal folk) are “ are mythological beings capable of changing from seal to human form by shedding their skin.” Their mythology itself originates from the Northern Isles of Scotland but there are equivalents in Faroese and Icelandic folklore as well.
selkies in folklore
Selkies probably have a really well-known folklore to anyone interested in ocean-based folktales and their stories tend to follow a specific plotline.
One day, a seal comes to comes to land and sheds it’s skin much to the surprise of a fisherman hiding near by. But the surprise to behold is the fact that the seal is a beautiful woman. Enraptured by the beauty of the seal woman, he steals her coat forcing her to stay on land, marry him, and bear his children. Years later usually because of the children or because the husband was caught slipping, the selkie gets her coat back and immediately books it to the sea and returns to her watery home.
There are several stories you can find that detail these forced spousal situations. Make no mistake, these are not consent-based relationships no matter how ‘good’ the human treats the selkie while they are together. In these stories, there are even cases where the selkie already has a selkie husband and children in the sea. She might resurface as a seal from a distance to see her human children from afar, but she never returns to the life she was forced to lead. (As a side note: half selkie children were said to have webbed hands according to the stories.)
As far as selkie men, their legends differ slightly. Their stories don’t usually include coat theft. Selkie men and stories involving them describe them as more seductive, whisking away women on land to have their children. Stories would even say that if a woman cried and seven of her tears landed in the sea, a selkie man would appear to ease her grief for seven years before returning back to the sea himself. But even stories with selkie men can end in tragedy, such as a story where a woman’s human husband killed her selkie lover and selkie child while they were in their seal forms.
However, not all stories involving selkies are cruel. There are some stories, no matter how few they are, that detail positive exchanges between selkies. One Spared to the Sea is a story about a boy who spared the life of a seal pup not knowing it was a selkie. Years later, that same pup’s mother saved his life. You can read a modern wlw retelling of said story [here].
selkies in media
In stark contrast to how many folktales one may find about selkies, I haven’t found nearly as many in pop culture.
Song of the Sea
Ondine
A Stranger Came Ashore by Mollie Hunter
Selkie (made for tv Australian movie)
UPG
If you’re new to fae work and faerie witchcraft as a whole, I find that selkies can be great for beginners. They tend to be easier to get along with and most I’ve encountered are of the ‘wild fae’ category, meaning they tend to not be involved in Court politics. (Fae Work Tip: please don’t involve yourself in the politics of faeries.)
Like in the folklore, selkies are beings that are able to transform into seals with the help of their coats. As such, the variety of seal forms a selkie can take are varied. Leopard seal selkies, spotted seal selkies, harbor seal selkies, monk seal selkies, elephant seals, and so on and so forth.
I usually find that the type of seal they are influences what region they hail from, the culture and cuisine of a pod. This is a generalization, of course. Not every pod of, say, harbor seal selkies are 100% alike or unified in thought. One pod of harbor seal selkies can have their own traditions that another pod of harbor seal selkies have never even heard of. Personally, I work mostly with harbor seal selkies, they tend to be the most populous. The passing of leadership depends on the pod.
As to how much time they spend in their seal forms, that’s really up to the individual. Some selkies may prefer their fae form and indulging in the coat-based fashion trends of their pod (a more recently developed trend among selkies to better make their their coats look less like selkie coats). I know a selkie who spends most of their time in their seal form during the warm seasons. And there are instances of selkies who spend years in their seal form before slipping off their coat. Usually in those circumstances, they may struggle with talking and walking for a bit from what I’ve been told. Some selkies might not even live with their pod and are solo travelers or living on land.
Like the mythos, selkies are connected to their coat. Every selkie is born with their coat and from that moment, they’re lives are intertwined with it. As they grow from pup to fully grown selkie, their coats grow and change with them. What happens to the selkie, happens to the coat. You could see a selkie coat with scratches on it from fights they got in their seal form plenty of times. As such, if their coat is stolen by someone they have no choice but to go with whoever took it. They can’t just go ‘oh that sucks, I guess I’ll find a new one’. They can only transform and return to the sea with their own coat.
As to what their coats look like, I find that selkie coats I’ve seen look mostly similar to the coats in these illustrations:
(And no, they aren’t all pure white as they are in Song of the Sea. Unless they’re a harp seal selkie pup but as they get older, the white pup fur will fade and it will look like the typical coat of a harp seal.)
So understandably, selkies can be very suspicious of new people they meet who aren’t selkies. Hearing a story about a selkie coat being sold in the black market is not a rare one and you will have to prove that you’re trustworthy. Best way to do that is slowly overtime of course. I would recommend talking to whoever is in charge of the pod and asking for a chance to prove your loyalty and wishes for friendship. Respect whatever decision and conditions they give.
Brief Run Through on Pod dynamics (remember each one is different):
Leader: some pod has one specific leader and how leadership is passed down depends on the pod. Some pods do it by challenging the current leader and the winner is the one who will lead (or continue leading) the pod. Some pods pass it down between family members and other pods will vote on who they believe will be most capable to lead them. May rely on the elders of the pod for advice but if there is no specific leader of a pod, they might just have a bunch of elders running the show.
Elders: some pods don’t have a specific leader and instead have a group of the pod’s eldest members who decide their actions. But even in the case where there are elders
Scouts: the ones who patrol around their home and the waters surrounding it for prospective enemies and threats.
Hunters: kinda self explanatory. Selkies do their best not to heavily impact their ecosystems and avoid taking too much. This is especially true if they are not the only entities calling the place home, for instance if there are merfolk or sea elves and such living close by they have to make sure those around them can still eat as well.
As for children, while they are ultimately brought up by their own parents selkies tend to look after the youngest members of their pod as a community. As you might expect, they’re job is to be cute and learn from the older selkies how to swim and fend for themselves as they get older. They’re the next generation so they’re important to every pod.
But hunter and scout is just a broad overview of two common roles you’ll find in pods, there are of course selkies who do other things in their pods. Healers (I knew of a selkie interested in starting her own apothecary a long while back), sea silk weavers, teachers, pearl cultivators or even jewelers.
Befriending an entire pod can seem daunting, but take everything one day at a time and remember each pod is full of individuals. Each individual is different and so are their friendliness, so there are bound to friendlier selkies in a pod. Once you’ve befriended a selkie, or even an entire pod, then just know you’re with them for life. Selkies tend to be very family-oriented and once you’re in, you’re in.
Disclaimer: thinking of selkies as kind and fun-loving folk who will never do you any harm is a fine way to get yourself clapped. There are selkies who don’t like humans and some of them will let that dislike be known through aggression. Every selkie is different the way every human is different and they shouldn’t all be lumped together. Some selkies and pods are really open and welcoming, others like to keep to themselves. Each decision is valid, especially when selkies themselves have suffered the short end of the stick.
suitable offerings
The disclaimer here is that these are general offerings that most selkies should like. Should you ever find yourself working frequently with a selkie or find yourself the companion of one, there could be other things that they specifically like or dislike. But you usually can’t go wrong with:
Seashells or Coral (ethnically sourced of course)
Sea Glass
Ocean-related candles and incense
how to gain the attention of a selkie
1) old fashioned offerings
2) astral travel
3) spirit attraction spell
I’m not a promoter of conjuring or otherwise, forcefully bringing a spirit to your vicinity. Think about it like this: you’re at a wedding. You’re best friend in the entire world is getting hitched to the love of their life, and you’re among the audience. You’re welling up with emotion and pride for your friend to have made such an important milestone in their life when… Suddenly, you’re not at their wedding anymore.
No, instead you’re looking at some random stranger who summoned you to their home who say it’s because they’re interested in working with those of your kind. You wouldn’t be too happy about this, would you?
Not only is conjuring or summoning bad for the entity, it can be bad for you if this entity isn’t easily forgiving of being torn away from their personal life to your home and you can end up paying the consequences for it. Instead, I recommend a spell that attracts entities to your home or if you’re sufficiently prepared, astral travel it up.
Even if you’re already someone with an appreciation for the ocean or some sort of waterphiliac, working with selkies will still change your views on the large mass of water that covers our planet. Selkies are seafaring fae and as one might expect of the folk who turn into seals, it plays a big part of their life. Saying that the sea is the mother of all life isn’t an understatement. The sea is the lifeblood, especially for selkies who live half of their lives in their seal forms.
The sea shapes their culture, philosophies and supplies their food. At least for the selkies living in the traditional way at sea or on islands.
Any ocean-loving individual knows what it’s like after swimming in it. You feel cleansed and like you’ve been born again. After working with a pod of selkies so closely for several years, I can definitely say my yearning for it has increased.
So has my adaptability. I’ve always been pretty good at change, have been since I was younger but that doesn’t mean I don’t get frustrated when unwanted changes constantly occur in my life. But just as selkies easily slip back and forth between their forms, I just roll with it time and time again. Sometimes putting up a fight and struggle only makes things worse and you just have to roll out with the tide and see where you end up afterwards.
I got myself new watercolours for Christmas (well, early Christmas dsjkavn) and oh boy are they good!! So I decided to draw original character Molag (Pebble) and her seal friend. She’s a selkie and I drew her several times in the post (more recently in one of my inktober drawings). I kind of have. a very vague story for her so I’ll probably draw many more pictures of her in the future :3
this was supposed to be a galaxy originally but it turned out to be something completely else dfkljs I started working on it and like. halfway through I realised that my brain got strongly unconsciously influenced by the Song of the Sea, but I think it turned out rather cute anyway, maybe it’s Saoirse if she didn’t give up her coat or her mum or someone completely different :3
Selkies are mythological beings capable of therianthropy, changing from sealtohuman form by shedding their skin. They mainly exist in the folklore tales of Ireland, Scotland, Iceland and the Faroe Islands. Many tales tell of them coming in groups to the beaches at night and dancing by the light of the moon. It was also believed that if a person could sneak to the shore and steal the their seal skin, the Selkie was then forced to remain with them, unable to return to the sea unless they could get their skin back. Selkies were said to make good wives, but they always carried with them a deep and melancholy longing for the sea.
date a selkie, but don’t hide her cloak. let her go home and visit her family now and then, knowing that she’ll come back and hang her seal cloak in the closet like she always does. trust is important.
The first time she lets the redhead take her home, she’s diligent about hiding her cloak. She folds it carefully against tears and rips and abrasions, and hides it in a sea cave whose entrance is concealed by the tide.
She does the same, the second and third and fourth times, careful, wary, mindful of her mother’s lessons. Remembers the way her mother’s hands had chafed on her soft cheeks, rough with cooking and cleaning for her fisherman husband, the way her mother’s peat-dark eyes had been tense and harsh with the lesson.
“Mind me, Niahm. Never let them find your cloak.”
The way her mother’s mouth had curved, a sickle of dissatisfaction and relief and envy, as she had escaped into the waves.
So she minds her mother’s lesson, and she takes care with her cloak.
Would that she had taken as much care with her heart.
The fifth time, she wears the cloak to the girl’s door, clutched about her throat, dripping along the darkened lanes.
She enters the home, welcomed with soft kisses and gentle touches and kindling passion. She drapes the cloak, artful in her carelessness, across an old wooden chair, the one that creaks and tilts slightly if you don’t sit just right.
When she wakes, in the wee hours of the morning, even before her lover, the cloak still rests, supple and dappled by the sea, on the back of the chair.
She frowns into the softening dawn, dons the cloak, and returns to the sea.
And again, the sixth time. And the seventh.
The eighth time, she finally breaks, prickling and hurt with longing, gripping a handful of russet hair in her hand, firm with emphasis.
“Surely you know what I am,” she says to her lover, the cool froth of sea foam and the call of gulls curling around her voice.
“Of course,” her lover responds, soft and tender in the dawnlight, throat arched willingly, pale as the inner whorls of a shell. “You taste of the sea,” the girl whispers, reverently.
She shakes her lover’s head gently, fingers tangled still in russet locks. “Why?” she demands. “Why won’t you keep me?”
A long silence that waits and fills, like a tidepool, stretches between them. Cool as a current. Deep as the Channel.
Her lover’s eyes are dark and tender. “Must I trap you to keep you, my heart? Is that the shape of love that you desire?”
She sinks into the thought, struck and stymied, remembering her mother’s harsh hands, her cold eyes. Her hand eases into russet waves, caresses where her grip had punished. Her lips press cool and damp as the sea against the arching curve of her lover’s shoulder. “What shape of love will you give to me?”
The answer is easy, quick, certain. “Myself. Only myself, whenever you should wish it. Your cloak by the door, your body in my bed, and the freedom to go, whenever you must. As long as you wish.”
It’s not an answer a fisherman could ever give, nor would think to.
The ninth time, she hangs her cloak by the door, draped in careful dappled folds next to a drying oilskin jacket.
Amorous, affectionate and affable, Selkies are the hidden gems of sea mythology. Gentle souls who prefer dancing in the moonlight over luring sailors to their death, Selkies are often overlooked by mythological enthusiasts for the more enthralling forms of mermaids or sirens. Yet Selkies play a prominent role in the mythology of Scandinavia, Scotland and Ireland. Their myths are romantic tragedies, a common theme for land/sea romances, however it is the Selkies who suffer rather than their human lovers and spouses. While the tales of Selkies always begin with a warm and peaceful “once upon a time”, there are no true happy ending for the tales of Selkies—someone always gets his/her heart broken.
The mythology of selkies is similar to that of the Japanese swan maidens, though historically it appears that the tales of the swan maidens predate the western tradition. Selkies can be either men or women, but are seals while in the water. What differentiates them from mermaids (aside from the choice of animal) is that they undergo a full body transformation upon coming to shore: they do not merely transform seal tails into human legs, but rather completely shapeshift from the sea animals into a human. This is accomplished by shedding their seal-skin when they come to land. Selkies are predominately mythological creatures from Irish, Scottish (particularly in Orkney and the Shetland Islands) and Faroese folklore, however there is a similar tradition in Iceland as well.
Their name descends from the Scottish selich, and there does not appear to be a Gaelic term for these creatures. This is likely indicative of their prominence in early modern Scottish culture. It is believed that the Selkies arose in legends when early Scottish settlers and shipwrecked Spaniards married dark-haired, fur-wearing Finnish and Saami native women.
Described as incredibly handsome and beautiful, Selkies take the role of both predator and prey. Those who willingly come to land often seek those who are already dissatisfied in their daily lives such as the wives of fisherman. It appears more common in myths that the “predator” Selkies are usually the males, as tales indicate the men more often seek out lonely humans; however, there are also variations in which human women choose to summon male Selkies to the shore by sending seven tears to the sea. Selkies can only remain in the presence of humans for a short period of time, and then must commonly wait seven years to return the shore. That rule is broken, however, when a Selkie is forced to remain a human without his/her consent. The other way in which Selkies become part of human life is when their seal skin is stolen. These tales most often occur to female Selkies, creating the role of “prey” as mentioned above. It is not uncommon in myths for Selkies to come ashore and transform into humans for pleasure, and it is often during this time (when the skin is left unattended) that human men steal the female’s skin.
Once a Selkie is no longer in possession of his/her skin, the Selkie is under the hold of the human—most often depicted as a forced marriage. Interestingly, Selkie women are very good wives, but regardless of how happy a Selkie is on land, or how many children he/she beget during their time on the surface, once a Selkie recovers his/her lost skin, the Selkie immediately returns to the sea without looking back. Ironically, various tales also depict the half human children accidentally finding their parent’s lost skin and returning it without being aware of the repercussions.
One rather uncommon tale of Selkies reveals what happens if a Selkie chooses to return to the sea. It appears, according to one tale from the Faroe Islands, that upon making this choice, the Selkie is not able to return to his/her former life even if the Selkie wanted to. An abridged version of this tale describes a human husband sailing into a treacherous storm, saved only when his Selkie wife retrieves her skin and rescues him as a seal from certain death. Though this tale indicates a real love between the Selkie wife and her human husband, her donning of her seal skin will prevent her from ever taking part in the human world again. This is only one variation, of course, and thus is contradicted by other mythologies, however it is pertinent to the tale of Selkies because it reveals that all human/Selkie marriages are not hollow.
Selkies are far tamer and much more gentile than their mermaid and siren counterparts, and it is likely this is because those cultures who believed in Selkies lived very close to the sea and, in a way, the edges of the world. To these cultures, the sea was both wild and bountiful at the same time. It is not unreasonable to assume that the nature of the Selkies has remained tame throughout their legends because the sea was a source of survival for the Scandinavians and Scotsmen who believed in them. While Selkies are less prominent in cultural traditions today, they should be valued for their preference to love rather than harm humans. It is more pleasant to image a Selkie mother watching over her human children from the sea, than a seductive mermaid planning her next underwater vanquish. ｓｏｕｒｃｅ
