packshaud
Devoted Cultist
- Joined
- Nov 13, 2018
- Messages
- 200
- Location
- Brazil
Selkies are a kind of shapeshifter that are seals, and become human-like when removing their skins. They can be bound to a person if this skin is hidden.
A typical story is of a man that finds a female selkie on a beach, and hides her skin to capture her as his wife. Eventually, the selkie finds her skin and goes back to the sea, to never be seen again, leaving her "husband" and children behind.
Like I said, children often result from this union. These may have webbed hands, a medical condition known as syndactyly.
With this small introduction, now the point I want to make. There is a strong opinion nowadays that changeling stories became popular as justifications for infanticide of children with birth defects. I am thinking of selkies as something like that, but for wives with defective children--or not. "She was a selkie and ran away back to the sea, and now she is sleeping with the fishes."
A typical story is of a man that finds a female selkie on a beach, and hides her skin to capture her as his wife. Eventually, the selkie finds her skin and goes back to the sea, to never be seen again, leaving her "husband" and children behind.
Like I said, children often result from this union. These may have webbed hands, a medical condition known as syndactyly.
With this small introduction, now the point I want to make. There is a strong opinion nowadays that changeling stories became popular as justifications for infanticide of children with birth defects. I am thinking of selkies as something like that, but for wives with defective children--or not. "She was a selkie and ran away back to the sea, and now she is sleeping with the fishes."