The Horned Women
"The Horned Women" is a classic Irish fairy tale that tells the story of a woman who faces and outwits a group of supernatural beings known as the Horned Women.
In the tale, a wealthy but humble woman is awake alone in her house late at night. She is preparing wool while her family sleeps when there is a knock at her door. Upon opening the door, she is met by a woman with a single horn growing from her forehead. The horned woman forces her way into the house and begins working at the spinning wheel. More horned women follow, each with an increasing number of horns (two horns, three horns, and so on) until twelve of them are gathered in the woman’s home.
The horned women reveal themselves as witches, intent on overpowering and taking control of the household. They enchant the woman and command her to perform various tasks, hoping to break her will. However, she remains resolute and clever. At the direction of a mysterious voice from a well (often interpreted as a protective spirit or divine intervention), she follows specific instructions that disrupt the witches’ power. For example, she places water from a certain source on the door and uses a charm that forces the witches to flee to their Otherworld abode in Slievenamon and never return.
The story ends with the woman saving herself and her home from the witches’ curse. "The Horned Women" serves as a tale of courage, quick thinking, and the triumph of good over malevolent supernatural forces, reflecting themes of resilience and the power of protective charms in Irish folklore.
As with most fairy tales there are various versions of it. The one that I came across in the Irish Fairy Book attributed to Lady Wilde goes as follows:
The Horned Women by Lady Wilde
A rich woman sat up late one night carding and preparing wool while all the family and servants were asleep. Suddenly a knock was given at the door, and a voice called out, “Open! Open!”
“Who is there?” said the woman of the house.
“I am the Witch of the One Horn,” was answered.
The mistress, supposing that one of her neighbours had called and required assistance, opened the door, and a woman entered, having in her hand a pair of wool carders, and bearing a horn on her forehead, as if growing there. She sat down by the fire in silence, and began to card the wool with violent haste. Suddenly she paused, and said aloud, “Where are the women; they delay too long?”
Then a second knock came to the door, and a voice called as before, “Open! Open!” The mistress felt herself constrained to rise and open to the call, and immediately a second witch entered, having two horns on her forehead, and in her hand a wheel for spinning wool. “Give me place,” she said; “I am the Witch of the Two Horns”; and she began to spin as quick as lightning.
And so the knocks went on, and the call was heard and the witches entered, until at last twelve women sat round the fire—the first with one horn, the last with twelve horns. And they carded the thread and turned their spinning-wheels, and wound and wove.
All singing together an ancient rhyme, but no word did they speak to the mistress of the house. Strange to hear and frightful to look upon were these twelve women, with their horns and their wheels; and the mistress felt near to death, and she tried to rise that she might call for help, but she could not move, nor could she utter a word or a cry, for the spell of the witches was upon her.
Then one of them called to her in Irish, and said, “Rise, woman, and make us a cake.” Then the mistress searched for a vessel to bring water from the well that she might mix the meal and make the cake, but she could find none.
And they said to her, “Take a sieve, and bring water in it.” And she took the sieve, and went to the well; but the water poured from it, and she could fetch none for the cake, and she sat down by the well and wept. Then came a voice by her, and said, “Take yellow clay and moss and bind them together, and plaster the sieve so that it will hold.” This she did, and the sieve held the water for the cake; and the voice said again:
“Return, and when thou comest to the north angle of the house cry aloud three times, and say, ‘The mountain of the Fenian women and the sky over it is all on fire.’”
And she did so.
When the witches inside heard the call, a great and terrible cry broke from their lips, and they rushed forth with wild lamentations and shrieks, and fled away to Slievenamon, where was their chief abode. But the Spirit of the Well bade the mistress of the house to enter and prepare her home against the enchantments of the witches, if they returned again.
And first, to break their spells, she sprinkled the water in which she had washed her child’s feet (the feet-water) outside the door on the threshold; secondly, she took the cake which the witches had made in her absence, of meal mixed with the blood drawn from the sleeping family, and she broke the cake in bits, and placed a bit in the mouth of each sleeper, and they were restored; and she took the cloth they had woven, and placed it half in and half out of the chest with the padlock; and, lastly, she secured the door with a great crossbeam fastened in the jambs, so that they could not enter, and having done these things she waited.
Not long were the witches in coming, and they raged and called for vengeance.
“Open! Open!” they screamed. “Open, feet-water!”
“I cannot,” said the feet-water; “I am scattered on the ground, and my path is down to the Lough.”
“Open, open, wood and trees and beam!” they cried to the door.
“I cannot,” said the door, “for the beam is fixed in the jambs, and I have no power to move.”
“Open, open, cake that we have made and mingled with blood!” they cried again.
“I cannot,” said the cake, “for I am broken and bruised, and my blood is on the lips of the sleeping children.”
Then the witches rushed through the air with great cries, and fled back to Slievenamon, uttering strange curses on the Spirit of the Well, who had wished their ruin. But the woman and the house were left in peace, and a mantle dropped by one of the witches was kept hung up by the mistress as a sign of the night’s awful contest; and this mantle was in possession of the same family from generation to generation for five hundred years after.
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