The Selkie

I guess this is in late honor of St.Patrick's Day? Even though he was British...? The Selkie story is kind of a general fairytale in Ireland. The equivalent of Mermaids or Syrens. But more interesting. I watched "The Song of the Sea" last week, which is a really gorgeous animation of this legend. (Made by the same people who did The Secret of Kells...if you didn't see, it's on Netflix). Now, the story below is more like my own specific telling of a general legend, although I took most of the language and a lot of the specifics from the film "The Secret of Roan Inish" (Give credit where credit is due and all that). In this re-telling there are two names mentioned, and being Irish names, I'll help you out with pronunciation: 1. Diarmuid: "deer-mid" and 2. Niamh: "nee-iv". If you're really clever, you'll read this aloud in your best Irish accent. I tried to stick with the authentic language. Enjoy.

The Selkie

There was once a boy named Diarmuid who always preferred to be alone. He set his own traps, built his own boats, sat alone at all the family gatherings. One day, walking along the outer islands, he saw a thing his eyes could scarce believe. In them days, seals was hunted for their oil and hides, clubbed to death and made into coats and pouches. But Diarmuid never took part in it, for he believed, as many did then, that there was no worse luck than to harm a seal.

Diarmuid had seen a selkie; A creature that’s half human, and half beast. He had heard stories of such creatures, luring ships onto the rocks and pulling sailors down into the dark storm of the cold unknown. But all Diarmuid knew, was that he had never seen a woman so unearthly bewitching in all his life.

Now it was said that whoever could take the hide of the selkie could control it. Now the selkie had seen men before and had fled from them back to her own world underneath the seaweed and the rolling deep. But Diarmuid quietly stole the seal hide, and she went with him without a word, without a sound. All the islanders had seen Diarmuid row out to sea alone, and now all saw him return with a strange-looking girl. Island people are a wary lot. They are not likely to pass judgement on another person’s affairs, but there was something so utterly unearthly about her that kept them talking for a long time. And there was much shaking of heads when Diarmuid married her, for she barely spoke, and when she did her Irish was queer sounding: more ancient than their grandfather’s grandfather. And when they asked Diarmuid where he had found her, he would only say “Trabaeg”; but of course this was nonsense, for it was only a speck in the ocean that even the seals had to leave at high tide. And she would always be at the water looking out at the seals and the birds...

Despite her love for Diarmuid and her children, Niamh, for that was what she called herself, had something sad about her, and would always be at the sea, looking out to where she came from.

Now one day her eldest daughter came to her, and said the words that changed it all: “Why does father hide a leather coat in the roof?”

Later that evening, as Diarmuid was rowing home, he was followed by a solitary seal. It seemed joyous in its movements, but its eyes, as with all its kind, held a sadness deeper than the soul.

When the seal left him at last, Diarmuid felt a deep sadness inside, a mad fear, and he rowed home as quickly as he could.

When he got home, it was the looks on his children’s faces that told him that his fears were true. For once a selkie finds its skin again, neither chains of steel nor chains of love can keep her from the sea.

These images are all taken from the film "The Song of the Sea"