A Magickal Journey
Scotlands Green Lady
The Green Lady of Scotland is either beautiful and protective, or a blood-sucking demon. It all depends upon where you hear the story, and who is telling it. In the Highlands, as with many faerie and ghost stories, the macabre is ever-present. Many Highland tales speak of a dangerous Green Lady.
However, I believe that the Green Lady is benevolent, and the darker imagery comes from a look-alike, or the storyteller’s exaggerations.
The Green Lady is similar to the Irish Banshee, because she is neither human nor ghost. Most describe the Green Lady as a mortal woman who is under an enchantment, or has already entered the faerie world.
Whatever her nature, her appearance is lovely. She is a slender and lovely young woman, with long golden hair. She wears a green gown that reaches the ground. She is usually associated with water, and there are stories of a beautiful woman arriving at a cottage, dripping wet. She asks if she can enter the home to warm herself and dry her clothing. If welcomed, she stays for awhile, and then she becomes the home’s own Green Lady.
Each Green Lady protects a particular house, and the family in it. If the family moves, the Green Lady remains in the house and protects the next family to move in. In this way, the Green Lady is very different from the Banshee, which follows and protects a particular family.
The Green Lady is especially helpful with farm animals. There are many stories of a Green Lady taking care of a farm’s cattle, herding them into the barn when a storm was coming, or when enemies were nearby.
There is a male counterpart to the Green Lady, but this is not the “Green Man” of Celtic forest legends. The male version of the Green Lady is a slender, handsome young man who wears red and green. He also protects the house, the family that lives there, and its cattle. However, this male counterpart is rarely mentioned. Nearly all of the stories describe a Green Lady.
Because she has long hair, the Green Lady is usually called a Gruagach. This is a category of brownie-type spirits of the Scottish Highlands. As soon as you read the word ‘brownie’, you know that these are generally good spirits, although they sometimes enjoy a practical joke. Any mischief they cause is minor compared with the good that they do.
In Skye, where Gruagachs are usually male, there is a tradition called a ‘gruagach stone’. This is a stone with a small hole or depression in it. Every night, the family sets out its gruagach stone and leaves a bit of milk in it. This is to thank the home’s own Gruagach for help. A small amount of milk, fresh cream, cake, or bread is acceptable. Anything larger will insult the Gruagach.
But this connection with Gruagachs is merely guessed. The Green Lady is a unique spirit, and not someone lightly categorized with all brownies or Gruagachs.
Every woman who appears as the Green Lady wears a rich green gown that reaches the ground. In some darker legends, this is because she is actually a demon and the gown covers her hairy, goat-like body. In other stories, the Green Lady is cursed with hooves for feet, and the gown hides them.
The goat’s body tradition relates to another category of Highland spirits: the Glaistig. In fact, the Green Lady can be called a Ghlaistig uaine, ‘the Green Glaistig’. Glaistigs are spirits who were once women of title, or at least the mistress of a house. For some reason, each of them has been put under an enchantment. They dislike dogs, prefer to be alone, protect houses, and favor fools and people ‘of weak intellect’. The Green Glaistigs are rarely seen, but there are stories of the Glaistigs of Ardnacaillich (home of the Macquarries), Donolly Castle, Mernaigh, Dunstaffnage, and many other locations.
In other cases, she is simply called the Green Lady. One of the most famous is the Green Lady of Skipness Castle, by Loch Fyne. She has protected her home and the family in it for centuries. Several times, she created a supernatural confusion among enemies whod planned to attack the castle. After they left Skipness, their wits returned, but as they marched back towards the Castle, they became confused again.
One Green Lady appears today at Crathes Castle, about 15 miles southwest of Aberdeen City in Scotland. This Green Lady is usually called a “ghost,” and she appears by the fireplace to pick up a ghostly infant. Then they vanish together. Her bones, and those of the baby, were found buried beneath this spot in the castle, when the castle was renovated centuries ago.
Another reliable place to see a Green Lady, is at the ruins of the castle at Caerphilly, just north of Cardiff in Wales. Like the Green Man of the forest, she hides herself as ivy around this castle. However, if you watch very closely, she will reveal her presence by moving slightly. Once she knows she has been seen, she will emerge as the gracious and lovely woman that she is, extend a hand in welcome if she likes you, and then she vanishes.
There are no reports of a Green Lady outside of the British Isles, but there are some similar tales. For example, there is Ocean-Born Mary, who remains to protect her home in Henniker, New Hampshire. I’ll post something about her soon
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