LV426
09-07-2003, 03:15 AM
(more taken from my site)
Were-Seals/Selkies
Seals may seem unusual animals for shapeshifting candidates, but Celtic legend is full of tales of the Selkies, men and women who take on seal shape in the water and must preserve the seal skin on land in order to return to the sea (as in the film The Secret Of Roan Innish. The Shetland Isles tell stories of the Finn Folk, gardeners of the sea bottom, who make use of fairy medicine and take the form of seals. Traditional Scottish legends say that a weeping woman can lure a male Selkie onto land with her tears, and if they marry, their children will be born with webbed fingers and toes. The appeal of the selkie lies in its mastery of both land and sea, two very different worlds.
As with selkies, the appeal of the bird shifter is its mastery of two worlds: earth and sky. The dream of flight has been with mankind for centuries. Birds also have the power to commune with the spirits as no other creature can do, and in many traditional societies the bird is associated with the soul. One of the most familiar bird-shifter stories is that of Swan Lake, in which a princess is forced to take the form of a swan through the enchantment of an evil sorcerer. A more modern interpretation can be found in the movie Ladyhawke, in which a woman must where the form of a hawk by day and ride on her lover's arm. (He, in turn, becomes a wolf by night). Raven, a trickster archetype among many Pacific Northwest cultures, also transforms himself into a man when involving himself in the affairs of humans.
Were-Seals/Selkies
Seals may seem unusual animals for shapeshifting candidates, but Celtic legend is full of tales of the Selkies, men and women who take on seal shape in the water and must preserve the seal skin on land in order to return to the sea (as in the film The Secret Of Roan Innish. The Shetland Isles tell stories of the Finn Folk, gardeners of the sea bottom, who make use of fairy medicine and take the form of seals. Traditional Scottish legends say that a weeping woman can lure a male Selkie onto land with her tears, and if they marry, their children will be born with webbed fingers and toes. The appeal of the selkie lies in its mastery of both land and sea, two very different worlds.
As with selkies, the appeal of the bird shifter is its mastery of two worlds: earth and sky. The dream of flight has been with mankind for centuries. Birds also have the power to commune with the spirits as no other creature can do, and in many traditional societies the bird is associated with the soul. One of the most familiar bird-shifter stories is that of Swan Lake, in which a princess is forced to take the form of a swan through the enchantment of an evil sorcerer. A more modern interpretation can be found in the movie Ladyhawke, in which a woman must where the form of a hawk by day and ride on her lover's arm. (He, in turn, becomes a wolf by night). Raven, a trickster archetype among many Pacific Northwest cultures, also transforms himself into a man when involving himself in the affairs of humans.