Irish mythology is famed for its richness of detail, its abundance of memorable characters and its meaningful fables. From the most well-known tales, including the Cattle Raid of Cooley and the Children of Lir, to lesser-known gems involving the warrior-queenCarmán or the fierce warrior Scáthach, Ireland can lay claim toan abundance of folkloric wonders.
In this article, we will explore the legend of the banshee spirit. The banshee ghost is often seen and portrayed as an evil entity due to her association with death, but in Irish mythology, this isn’t the case. The banshee doesn’t create or cause death, they simply mourn it and alert certain families of the death of a loved one.
This article is not discussing Martin McDonagh’s film, though don’t worry we do have a full guide to the Banshee’s of Inisherin, one of the best Irish movies to come out in recent times, starring Irish actors and filmed on Achill island off the coast of Mayo.
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The true legend of the banshee has been obscured and misunderstood. There is much more to this ghost story than meets the eye.
The Banshee fairy is a female spirit who lives by the river. They can have the appearance of an old hag or a young and beautiful woman. The Banshee was seen as the omen of death and only cried for certain ancient Irish families, (with names such as O’Neil, O’Connor, and O’Donnell) often staying near the home a particular lineage for generations. In Ireland and Scotland, it was once traditional for women to wail or
At funerals or Irish wakes, which was inspired by the keen of the Banshee. Hearing her cry signalled that death was nearby.
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Alleged newspaper reports of hearing Banshee ghosts are as old as 1893, but they existed in Celtic folklore long before this. According to legend, the six noteworthy families ofIreland—the O’Neills, O’Donnells, O’Connors, O’Learys, O’Tools, and O’Connaghs—each had a female spiritwho would act as the harbinger of death for their family. Havingforesight, she would appear before the death occurred, weeping the loss in the family. It was believed that the banshee fairy sang such a sad song because she was a friend of the family, she was not anything evil, she was simply mourning an unavoidable and tragic death.
According to folklore, a Banshee ghost would sometimes perch on a windowsill in the form of a bird, where she’d remain for several hours or even days until death comes to call. Often, as the Banshee escapes into the darkness, witnesses have described a bird-like fluttering sound. Thus, some believe that banshees are birdlike creatures.
The Banshee spirit also wails in other areas such as woods, rivers, and rock formations. In Waterford, Monaghan, and Carlow, there are wedge-shaped rocks which are referred to as “Banshee’s Chairs.”
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The word Banshee derives from the Irish language known as Gaelic. She is also called Banshie, Bean Si, Bean Sidhe, and Ban Side, among other name variations. Banshee is comprised of two words in Irish, ‘bean’ and ‘sídhe’ which literally means ‘female fairy’ or ‘woman of the otherworld’.
Some of the surviving tales and lore of the Banshee comes from outside of Ireland, however. In Scotland, the Banshee may be referred to as Ban Sith or Bean Shith.
Irish folklore was passed down from word of mouth from generation to generation. It wasn’t until centuries later that Irish myths were transcribed by Christian monks who altered and left out details to make them suitable for Celtic Christianity. As a result many parts of Irish folklore are murky and mysterious in comparison to other mythologies, which some people may find annoying. However, this ambiguity allows people to draw their own conclusions about how the myths came to be and create connections to other parts of the folklore.
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Essentially every community and family in Ireland had their own version of popular tales that had evolved naturally over time. There is no one correct or truly complete version of Celtic mythology in Ireland and this leads to many interesting variations of common tales.
Since the Otherworld of Irish mythology can be interchangeable in certain texts as either the realm of the fairy folk, the land of youth (known as Tír na nÓg) or the afterlife (land of the dead), the origin of the Banshees are hard to determine. However, the belief that they were women who died prematurely, tragically or unjustly is a widely agreed upon, possibly to create an atmosphere of sorrow and grief around the spirits and to make their wailing even more devastating.
In mythology, the Banshee spirit was linked to the fairies and was a part of the mystical race, the Tuatha De Dannan. The Tuatha de Danann were the Celtic Gods and Goddesses of Ireland. They were driven underground by the Milesians and over time they descended into all the fairies in Irish myth.
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It just shows us that even though the Banshee is a commonly known figure, the familiar spectre remains shrouded in mystery, and there are many theories to account for Banshee’s sightings.
The Banshee is still one of a handful ofmythical creaturesthat, although widely known over a diverse geographical area, is not commonly seen outside offolklore. Gaelic oral traditions passed down for centuries, and written down only in the last five hundred years, are the most common place to find the banshee. She appears in the fourteenth-century text
Such traditions changed over time to includepoems, limericks, nursery rhymes, andsuperstitionsthat carried on to the twentieth century, although even actual belief in such creatures was scarce at best.
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Irish history is full of legends of leprechauns and fearsome warrior kings. These days the Irish are more well-known by shamrocks, St. Patrick’s Day and our love of brewing Guinness, but that is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to our Irish traditions and culture.
While it isn’t known for certain, there is evidence that the origin of the Banshee fairy can be placed sometime in the early 8th century. An Irish tradition of the time saw women lament the passing of a warrior or soldier with a mournful song. These women were reputedly offered alcohol as a method of payment. At this time, the Irish Church considered this bartering system contradictory in God’s eyes, and these women were punished for their activities by forever becoming Banshees.
Sightings of a Banshee ghost have been reported infrequently throughout history. Part of the legend of the Banshee does claim that if one is seen, or thinks it has been seen, it will vanish inside a cloud of smoke or mist and the only evidence that it was ever there is the flapping of wings. As scary as the cry of the Banshee is said to be, the Irish do not believe that a Banshee is ever actually responsible for a death that could follow shortly afterwards.
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It was believed that the Banshee would protect individuals that were pure or noble if death were to claim them. In contrast pop culture and horror movies usually portray them as nothing more a scary ghosts, creating a new type of modern myth in and of itself.
Technically the Banshee spirit is considered to be part of theFae (or fairies)family, though banshees are not actually considered fairies by modern standards, in Irish myth, the term fairy is used to describe any supernatural, yet human-like figure. By modern definitions, the Banshee is its own creature with some ties to the fairy world.
As we discuss in more detail in our fairy tree article linked in the section below, fairies fell into two classifications, the first being the Aos Sí (people of the mounds) who were descendants of the almighty Celtic deities or the Tuatha de Danann. They were defeated by the Milesians and subsequently drove underground. They were were more similar to humans than traditional fairies such as the Banshee. The second type of fae were known as solitary fairies which were comprised of a number of sub categories of creatures including, leprechauns and other smaller more mischievous beings.
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A fairy (fey or fae; collectively known as the wee folk, good folk and people of peace among other names) is a spirit or supernatural being, based on the fae of medieval Western European folklore and romance. Even in folklore that uses the term “fairy, ” there are many definitions of what constitutes a fairy.
Sometimes the term is used to describe any mystical creature of humanoid appearance, including the Banshee, and at other times only to describe a specific type of more ethereal creature. Many folktales mention fairies, and they appear as characters in stories from medieval tales of chivalry to Victorian fairy tales, and up to the present day in modern literature.
Some scholars contributed fairies to a folkloric belief concerning the dead. This is noted in Celtic folklore by many common descriptions of fairies and the dead, such as the same legends being told of ghosts and fairies, the Sidhe mounds actually being burial mounds, the danger of eating food in both Fairyland and Hades, and both the dead and fairies living underground.
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