Where the Map Ends

Oct 2, 2026

The Last Lantern on the Street

A field note on the jack-o'-lantern, from Stingy Jack's doomed coal-lit turnip to the one carved light that always seems to burn longest on the street.

Sep 28, 2026

The Woman Who Turns Away

A journal account of the Huldra, the hidden forest woman of Norwegian and Swedish tradition, and the herders and hunters who claimed to have loved her.

Sep 14, 2026

The Threshold Must Be Guarded

A look at the old European practice of laying salt and iron at doorways to bar witches, spirits and the fae from crossing into the house.

Sep 2, 2026

A journal entry on the bunyip, the water-dwelling being of Aboriginal folklore from the Murray-Darling basin, and how a warning about dangerous water became, in colonial hands, both a cryptid and an insult.

Aug 31, 2026

Pukwudgie Country

An account of the pukwudgie, the small and sharp-tempered woodland spirits of Wampanoag and Algonquian tradition, and the wary respect they still command in the pine barrens of southeastern Massachusetts.

Aug 19, 2026

The Hare That Watches the Moon

A look at the moon-gazing hare of British and Celtic folklore, from Boudicca's battlefield augury to the shapeshifting hare-witches of the northern trials.

Aug 17, 2026

The Skin Left on the Rocks

A journal entry on the selkie of Scottish, Irish, and Faroese tradition — the seal that becomes human by shedding its skin, and what is owed, and lost, when that skin is taken.

Aug 15, 2026

The Bird That Watches the Fall

A journal entry on the raven as a death-omen in British and Celtic tradition, from the ravens kept at the Tower of London to the corpse-bird of the Welsh Marches and the war-goddesses who wore black feathers over the battlefield.

Aug 14, 2026

The Line Nothing Crosses

A short account of the salt circle, a protective boundary drawn against unwelcome spirits, and why so many unrelated traditions arrived at the same substance and the same shape.

Aug 13, 2026

The Giants Beneath the Turf

In the west of Ireland the Fir Bolg are remembered first as an ancient, defeated people, and only later as giants whose bodies became the hills they once held.