What follows is the archival record of six Instagram posts made for a takeover in April 2020 on @multi_species_.
Y TYLWTH TEG
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There's an interesting tension as the theme for these takeovers is home//garden. I have chosen to share some images of fantastic creatures, most commonly found at the far edges of maps and who are often the antithesis of domesticated spaces.
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Nevertheless, I begin with the frightening and transgressive Tylwth Teg, Welsh fey folk who may steal into homes and exchange one of their own for a golden headed baby.
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Tylwth Teg is an exceptionally beautiful name for fairy kin, it was coined by my favourite Welsh poet, the irreverent 14th century Dafydd ap Gwilym.
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It is however an inauspicious choice of name for the final image, a holiday villa in Portugal.
DOMOVOY
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Slavic male house spirit
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A man may wake up to find that his beard has been plaited. This is regarded to be a sign of good fortune and of the Domovoi’s love for its family.
KOBOLDS
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Germanic house spirits, once adopted, loyal unless slighted.
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The kobold enters the household at night, strewing wood chips about the house and putting dirt or cow manure in the milk cans. If the household responds wisely, the kobold will serve the family for many years.
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However, one story, as written by folklorist Thomas Keightley, describes a kobold insulted by a kitchen boy. The head cook refused to punish the boy. In the dead of the night, the kobold beat the boy and tore him limb from limb, adding him to the pot of food cooking in the hearth.
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The last images show kobolds adapted as part of the Dungeons and Dragons pantheon.
BOGGARTS
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A scary one this time. Associated with the North West of England, boggarts can be domestic or otherwise.
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Linking in to the horses theme of the multispecies meeting on Friday: "to take boggart" is an expression that means a horse shies away from something unexpectedly 🐎
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Often, for example by J. K. Rowling, a boggart gets conflated with a boogie man: "So the boggart sitting in the darkness within has not yet assumed a form. He does not yet know what will frighten the person on the other side of the door. Nobody knows what a boggart looks like when he is alone, but when I let him out, he will immediately become whatever each of us most fears".
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Boggarts have also become an important part of the Magic the Gathering pantheon as the lowest type of goblin.
BAKU
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Japanese nightmare devourers.
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According to legend, they were created by the spare pieces that were left over when the gods finished creating all other animals.
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My favourite so far. .
I'm happy to include a chimeric entity as I thought that would be difficult when restricting myself only to fantastical creatures known to enter the home or garden.
PLANTS EATING PEOPLE
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Last post for my takeover. Moving from the home into the garden...
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Firstly a child being passed through a tree to cure disease.
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The famous man eating tree of Madagascar.
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& Plants hating on people in films.
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