Olivia
oliviaarmstrong.bsky.social
Olivia
@oliviaarmstrong.bsky.social
Professional Storyteller. Folklore Lover. Believer in magic.
Irish wake games were intended to remind the deceased they were a treasured part of society, to send them away happy, and hopefully prevent them from returning... #FolkloreThursday

🎨Nathanial Grogan
November 13, 2025 at 7:21 PM
Take a pack of cards, cut them, choose a card - make your wish. Now shuffle the cards into three piles. If your card is in the first pile, the wish will come true. If in the second, the wish will take time. In the third? It will not come true at all... #FolkloreThursday
November 13, 2025 at 6:32 PM
In Polynesian tradition, kites originated in the spirit world, a way of connecting heaven with earth and sending messages to the gods... #FolkloreThursday
November 13, 2025 at 1:23 PM
My wee brother is no good.
Chop him up for firewood.
When he's dead,
Cut off his head,
Make it into gingerbread.

Belfast Skipping Rhyme.
📷Shirley Baker &📷Getty Images & 📷 Harry Benson
#FolkloreThursday
November 13, 2025 at 10:55 AM
The origins of the roulette wheel and the concept of Lady Luck can be traced back to the goddess Fortuna, randomly turning her Wheel of Fortune and changing the fates of those upon it... #FolkloreThursday
November 13, 2025 at 8:43 AM
Asmodeus took to his toy enthusiastically. In another week he permitted me to stroke him, producing a raucous purr, but, in order to save his face, pretending to be asleep.
― Geoffrey Household, Rogue Male
#BookWormSat
October 4, 2025 at 2:55 PM
Beware! Even if a vampire has been felled by a silver bullet, if it is left in the moonlight, it could still rejuvenate, especially if it is the light of a full moon... #FolkloreThursday
🎨Edward Gorey
September 4, 2025 at 6:28 PM
The Yuracaré people interpreted the Moon's spots as a four-eyed jaguar that escaped to the skies... #FolkloreThursday
🎨Janelle Penner
September 4, 2025 at 5:51 PM
In Paraguayan lore the Moon's spots are actually his intestines, disembowelled, when ducks that he was trying to catch, tore him to pieces... #FolkloreThursday
🎨Olav Stromme
September 4, 2025 at 5:31 PM
Across Europe, folk once said sleeping in the moonlight resulted in insanity, lunacy, literally one would become moon-mad... #FolkloreThursday 🎨Gerard Dillon
September 4, 2025 at 3:16 PM
I stood on the library steps holding my books and looking for a minute at the soft hinted green in the branches against the sky and wishing, as I always did that I could walk home across the sky instead of through the village

Shirley Jackson - We have always lived in the Castle
#BookologyThursday
September 4, 2025 at 12:54 PM
The Milky Way has long been associated with the idea of a road. The Welsh knew it as Hynt St Ialm (St James's Way) & Heol y gwynt, the way of the wind. To Italians it was 'the holy street to Loretto' & to Anglo-Saxons the stars were "Watling Street" as in the earthly road... #FolkloreThursday 🎨Doig
September 4, 2025 at 11:18 AM
In Lithuanian and Latvian folk tales, the Pleiades are often depicted as a sieve which gets stolen by the devil from the thunder god... #FolkloreThursday

📷Haocheng Li and Runwei Xu
September 4, 2025 at 9:42 AM
In Hungarian legend, the Milky Way is called Hadak Útja - The Road of the Warriors. The stars are sparks from the horseshoes of the horses of heavenly Prince Csaba & his warriors... #FolkloreThursday
September 4, 2025 at 9:15 AM
In Finnish mythology, migrating birds travelled along the Milky Way to the edges of the Earth and "Lintukoto" where they lived during winter. They were guided by the goddess Lindu, queen of the birds and daughter of the sky... #FolkloreThursday 🎨Jan Brueghel the Elder
September 4, 2025 at 8:26 AM
In Northern England the dogs of the Wild Hunt are known as the Gabriel Hounds. They make an eerie whistling or crying in the night sky. It may be the angel Gabriel hunting souls and the noise the lash of his whip as he urges them on... #MythologyMonday 🎨Malmström
August 25, 2025 at 6:42 AM
I think we were all a little bit in love with Terence Stamp, weren't we?

#RIPTerenceStamp
August 17, 2025 at 4:07 PM
Goodbye #RayBrooks - Mr. Benn. The shopkeeper has appeared, as if by magic, to take you on to your next adventure. You will be very much missed...
August 10, 2025 at 2:28 PM
Fairy Robin Goodfellow (Puck) hid on lonely roads to misguide way-farers. He could take the form of a will o' wisp or talk in what would sound like a familiar voice. Once he had abandoned folk on a far-off hillside or stuck in a marsh, his laughter would echo... #FolkloreThursday 🎨George Romney
July 3, 2025 at 6:07 PM
Celtic goddess Epona was able to unlock the gateway to the Otherworld. All riders, warriors and heroines on quests, as well as ordinary travellers, worshipped her. Her patronage of journeys linked spiritually with the journey of the soul from life to beyond life... #FolkloreThursday 🎨Rachel Arbuckle
July 3, 2025 at 5:50 PM
A tattoo of a swallow indicated a sailor had travelled more than 5,000 nautical miles. And if the sailor drowned, the swallow would carry their soul to heaven...⚓️ #FolkloreThursday 📷Todd Walker
July 3, 2025 at 5:39 PM
Both Zephyrus, god of the West Wind, and Apollo loved Hyacinthus. He chose Apollo. And so when a jealous Zephyrus caused the death of Hyacinthus, a mourning Apollo took his lover's ebbing blood and transformed it into a blue flower, the hyacinth, so that he would live on forever...
#MythologyMonday
June 30, 2025 at 11:57 AM
In Bulgarian lore, folk could change gender by walking underneath a rainbow or drinking water from either end of the rainbow...🌈🏳️‍🌈

I wonder where the belief originated? I find it very gentle and inclusive. #MythologyMonday
June 30, 2025 at 10:28 AM
Midsummer is when selkies shake off their bewitchment and become human again, dancing until dawn on the shore, before returning to their seal skins and swimming away... #FolkyFriday 🎨John Duncan
June 27, 2025 at 12:13 PM
One Chinese summer event is Yue Lan or the Hungry Ghost Festival during Hungry Ghost Month (August/September). The gates of hell are most open on this summery night when hungry and wayward ghosts are released to roam the world and visit the living... #FolkyFriday #PhantomFriday
🎨Luo Ping
June 27, 2025 at 11:32 AM