The Sluagh and the Wild Hunt

Disclaimer

This is NOT a page about Wiccans or neo-pagans, and I do not advocate the belief that Wiccans are Satan-worshippers and/or baby-killers. I am well aware that they are not. This is a starting point for historical research into the great witch craze of 1100-1700 AD. And please, don't ask me for spells.

The Sluagh and the Wild Hunt

Also known as The Host, the Sluagh (sloo-ah) are the Host of the Unforgiven Dead, and the most formidable of the Highland faerie people. They were believe to travel above inhabited places around midnight. In some accounts, the Sluagh are fallen angels rather than the dead, but on the average, the accounts are very similar to the following:

Sluagh, 'the host', the spirit-world. The 'hosts' are the spirits of mortals who have died. The people have many curious stories on this subject. According to one informant, the spirits fly about in great clouds, up and down the face of the world like the starlings, and come back to the scenes of their earthly transgressions. No soul of them is without the clouds of earth, dimming the brightness of the works of God, nor can any win heaven till satisfaction is made for the sins of earth. In bad nights, the hosts shelter themselves behind little russet docken stems and little yellow ragwort stalks. They fight battles in the air as men do on the earth. They may be heard and seen on clear frosty nights, advancing and retreating, retreating and advancing, against one another. After a battle, as I was told in Barra, their crimson blood may be seen staining rocks and stones. ('Fuil nan slugagh,' the blood of the hosts, is the beautiful red 'crotal' of the rocks melted by the frost.) These spirits used to kill cats and dogs, sheep and cattle, with their unerring venomous darts. They commanded men to follow them, and men obeyed, having no alternative.

It was these men of earth who slew and maimed at the bidding of their spirit-masters, who in return ill-treated them in a most pitiless manner. They would be rolling and dragging and trouncing them in mud and mire and pools (K. Briggs 373, 374).

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The Sluagh and the Wild Hunt is copyright 1998 to Shantell Powell.