Wheel of Topics #27

Let me tell you about another ancient fay creature: the Redcap.

If the Alp was only a nuisance, the Redcap was one of the worse creature you could ever encounter in your life(and probably the last one you will ever see). This kind of goblin from Ireland and Scotland was known for his cruelty, his sadism and his love to spill blood. They were described as small, old looking man with heavy iron boots(sometime with spiked sole), an iron pick or heavy cleaver and a blood red cotton cap. The main reason they are called Redcap is because of his cap(quite obvious) but the reason why his cap is red is a sinister one. Redcap like to capture human, torture and kill them, then mutilate their body to spill as much blood as possible. They will use the pool of blood to soak their cap, giving it its color.

Ancient stories says that if their cap become too dry, they will loose their power and could even die. Which mean that they need a steady supply of new prey to maintain their cap wet with human blood. They usually live in abandoned castle or tower far from most civilization, but they probably travel far for home often. Although they are small, old looking and wearing heavy boots, they are actually so fast that no human can ever outrun them, although they take pleasure in torturing others, so they could play with you for a long time before finishing you. As I told you earlier, they like to mutilate dead bodies, and one of the way they are known for is by dancing on the body with their heavy boots until the blood splashes around.

They show anomaly with most other fay creature, like having iron item with them when most fay are normally weakened by iron and stay away from it. The fact that they live far from most civilization when they are so dependent on us to survive, while the other creatures that need us(in one way or another) usually live close to us, is also strange. I must also deplore the fact that most of their stories have been changed after the arrival of christian belief in those countries, because I have seen many time that reciting verse of the bible can keep them away. They existed in Scottish folklore since before the bible was written, so it doesn't make any senses.

I hope liked this one, because I had to search through many pages to find those info, and I'm pretty sure I missed a few thing. Fun fact: when you Google Redcap, over half of the page relate to something else than the monster, like the redcap mushroom, a species of chicken, some species of fish(redcap oranda), the UK's military police and the original Grim's brothers story about the little red riding hood.

Grim the pirate (although I do have a brother, he's not a Grim)