Korrigan

Region/Culture: Western Europe (Brittany, France)
Mythos: Celtic Mythology, French Mythology (Breton folklore)
Primary Type/Nature: Fairy Folk and Spirit Beings
Mythical Attributes: A shape-shifting water fairy who sings and combs her hair like a siren, foretells the future, moves at lightning speed, and lures men to love and then to death.
Role in Mythos: Korrigans haunt the springs, wells and standing stones of Brittany, dancing by night, stealing infants for changelings, and destroying the mortal men their beauty draws in.
Relation to Humans: They can make a man fall hopelessly in love and then kill the one who does, and they carry off human children, leaving withered substitutes in the cradle. They loathe priests, churches and the Virgin Mary, and are said to lurk near dolmens on the night of Samhain waiting for anyone foolish enough to pass.

Just after dark, at the mossed rim of a spring deep in the Breton woods, a woman sits combing out a length of golden hair. The water gives back a little moonlight, enough to catch the comb moving and the wet gleam where it passes. She is singing, low and sweet, and the sound carries much further than a voice that size should carry. Anyone on the path would slow, then stop, then step off the path toward her. That is the entire design of her.

She is a korrigan, and she is not two feet tall. The name comes from the Breton korr, dwarf, softened by a diminutive, so that it means something close to “little small one.” Storytellers have never quite agreed on what that makes her. Some use korrigan to mean a fairy, some a sprite, some a kind of dwarf, and the great collector of Breton song Théodore de la Villemarqué simply treated the word as another name for a fairy. What the tellings share is the size, the water, and the danger. She is small enough to sit on the lip of a well, golden-haired, laughing, with eyes that flash red in the dark. She is also, when the light or the mood changes, something else entirely. The beautiful woman at the fountain can turn in a breath into a wrinkled hag, her charm dropping off her like a wet cloak.

Where she came from depends on who is telling it. In one account the korrigans are the souls of the unhappy dead, mortals broken by some tragedy and kept from rest, wandering the earth in penance. In another they are older than that, the pagan princesses and druidesses of Brittany who stood against the Apostles when the new faith came to convert the land, and who were cursed for it to linger at the edges of the Christian world. Walter Evans-Wentz, who went through Brittany gathering these stories, found the people of Morbihan drawing little line between korrigans and plain demons: evil spirits condemned to serve out an indefinite sentence here on earth. It is why she hates the sight of a priest, why the church bell drives her off, and why she is said to reserve a particular malice for the Virgin Mary and for celibate men of the cloth.

Her haunts are old and wet and made of stone. Springs, wells, fountains and running rivers belong to her, and so do the dolmens and menhirs that stand grey in the fields, above all in the forest of Brocéliande. On clear nights the korrigans gather to dance in rings, and the grass keeps the mark of the circle afterward. A traveler who stumbles on the dance might be pulled into it, spun through the dark until dawn, and there are two ways that ends. On the night of Samhain, at the turn of October into November, they are said to wait by the dolmens, and what they are waiting for is a person.

The story the Bretons told most often is the one Villemarqué set down as the ballad of Lord Nann. A young nobleman, newly married and lately a father, rides into the wood to hunt something to strengthen his wife after the birth. He grows thirsty, finds a spring, and finds a korrigan beside it, combing out her hair. She wants him. He is a married man and he refuses her, and refusal is not something she forgives. She gives him a choice, framed as a mercy: die within three days, or lie sick in bed for seven years. He does the arithmetic of grief and picks the quick death, reasoning that his wife is young enough to marry again if he goes fast. He rides home and asks his mother to make up a bed he will not rise from, and to keep the reason from his wife for as long as she can. The refusal does not save him. There is no version where the man simply walks away.

Her gifts are the gifts of a spirit that stands half outside the world. She can read what is coming, change her shape at will, and cover ground faster than a running horse. Her voice does the work a siren’s does, drawing men off their road and into the water. She steals infants out of the cradle and leaves a changeling in their place, a shriveled, wrong-tempered thing that eats and never thrives. But a creature bound so tightly to the old ways has old limits. Holy ground, holy water and the ringing of a church bell turn her back. And she cannot count the whole week. The seven days, complete, carry a sacredness she cannot voice, so a suspected changeling can be caught out by the days it fails to name, or startled into betraying its true age when a household makes a show of brewing beer inside an eggshell. She rules the spring and the stone circle and the dancing ground, and almost nowhere else.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a Korrigan?

A Korrigan is a small shape-shifting fairy or spirit of Breton folklore, from Brittany in northwestern France. Usually described as under two feet tall with golden hair and red flashing eyes, a korrigan is beautiful at first sight but can turn into a wrinkled hag, and is known for luring men to their deaths. The name comes from the Breton word for dwarf.

Where do Korrigans live?

Korrigans haunt springs, wells, fountains, rivers and ancient stone monuments such as dolmens and menhirs throughout Brittany, especially in the forest of Brocéliande. They are most active at night, when they gather to dance in rings near water or standing stones. On the night of Samhain they are said to lurk beside dolmens waiting for passing victims.

What do Korrigans do to humans?

Korrigans use their beauty and their siren-like singing to make men fall in love with them, then kill the men who do. They also steal human infants from the cradle and leave sickly changelings in their place. Because of this they are treated as dangerous rather than merely mischievous, and travelers were warned away from their fountains and dances.

What is the story of Lord Nann and the Korrigan?

In the Breton ballad recorded by Villemarqué, the newly married Lord Nann meets a korrigan combing her hair at a woodland spring while hunting for his wife, who has just given birth. When he refuses the korrigan’s advances because he is married, she condemns him to either die within three days or lie sick for seven years. He chooses the quick death and goes home to prepare his deathbed, asking his mother to hide the truth from his young wife.

How can you protect against a Korrigan?

Korrigans are repelled by Christian holy ground, holy water and church bells, since they are said to hate priests, churches and the Virgin Mary. A suspected changeling left by a korrigan could be exposed because korrigans cannot recite the complete seven days of the week, which carry a sacredness they cannot voice. Tricks such as pretending to brew beer inside an eggshell were also used to startle a changeling into revealing itself.