Folklore category: 2054 books

A comprehensive dictionary of sacred and magical gem lore that draws on the rarest source texts of Antiquity and the Middle Ages • Reveals the healing and magical virtues of familiar gemstones, such as amethyst, emerald, and diamond, as well as the lore surrounding exotic stones such as astrios,...

Examines how the ancient customs of constructing and keeping a house formed a sacred bond between homes and their inhabitants • Shares many tales of house spirits, from cajoling the local land spirit into becoming one’s house spirit to the good and bad luck bestowed by mischievous house...

Around the world there are hundreds of nightly performances of Goethe’s Faust as well as actual attempts at soul-selling on eBay. Faustus has rightly been described as an icon of modern culture. But in 500 years no one has written his biography—until now. Faustus is the real story behind the legend....

Unearth a gold mine of spooky history and meet the spirits that haunt this South Dakota landmark—photos included. The Wild West may be tamed, but Deadwood's notorious past has not relinquished its hold on its corner of the Badlands or its place in popular imagination. And no wonder. If Wild...

New York�s Southern Tier and its many communities abound with legends about strange, intriguing events. Stories of ghosts and other supernatural phenomena create an aura of foreboding and mystery. Tortured souls try to escape from the Inebriate Asylum in Binghamton; Native American treasure lies buried...

Since William Penn presided over the state's only official witch trial in 1684, witchcraft and folk magic have been a part of the history of the Keystone State. English and German settlers brought their beliefs in magic with them from the Old World--sometimes with dangerous consequences. In 1802, an...

Despite their short stature, dwarves are among the fiercest and most feared fighters of all the races. From an initial examination of the fighting methods of the individual dwarf soldier, this volume expands its focus to look at how they do battle in small companies and vast armies. It covers all...

Cave paintings at Lascaux, France and Altamira, Spain, fraught with expression thousands of years later; point to an early human desire to form a cultural identity. In the Oxford Companion to World Mythology, David Leeming explores the role of mythology, or myth-logic, in history and determines that...

Stories and photos that reveal the unknown spirits lurking among the living in this Alabama city . . . Mobile native and local history expert Elizabeth Parker combines the spookiest stories in Mobile Ghosts: Alabama’s Haunted Port City and Mobile Ghosts II: The Waterline to create an updated...

The Krampus, a folkloric devil associated with St. Nicholas in Alpine Austria and Germany, has been embraced by the American counterculture and is lately skewing mainstream. The new Christmas he seems to embody is ironically closer to an ancient understanding of the holiday as a perilous, haunted season. In the Krampus' world, witches rule Christmas, and saints can sometimes kill.

On the East African island of Mayotte, Islam co-exists with two other systems of understanding and interpreting the world around its inhabitants: cosmology and spirit-mediumship. In a witty, evocative style accessible to both the specialist and non-specialist reader, Michael Lambek provides a significant...

This fascinating and informative compendium of Native American lore was assembled by one of twentieth-century America's premier ethnographer/anthropologists. Hartley Burr Alexander recounts the continent's myths chronologically and region-by-region, offering a remarkably wide range of nomadic sagas,...

Discover the ghostly presences that haunt this historic region of the South and its famed university—photos included!   The Auburn and Opelika region is home to one of the most historic universities in the South. It is a region with a history stretching back generations—and it is a history that...

In Snowy Tower, Dr. Martin Shaw continues his trilogy of works on the relationship between myth, wilderness, and a culture of wildness. In this second book, he gives a telling of the Grail epic Parzival. Claiming it as a great trickster story of medieval Europe, he offers a deft and erudite commentary,...