The Wee Folk Vs. Big Business

This is from an article from the UK newspaper "The Times" with the headline "FAIRIES STOP DEVELOPERS' BULLDOZERS IN THEIR TRACKS":

"VILLAGERS who protested that a new housing estate would “harm the fairies” living in their midst have forced a property company to scrap its building plans and start again.
Marcus Salter, head of Genesis Properties, estimates that the small colony of fairies believed to live beneath a rock in St Fillans, Perthshire, has cost him £15,000. His first notice of the residential sensibilities of the netherworld came as his diggers moved on to a site on the outskirts of the village, which crowns the easterly shore of Loch Earn.

He said: “A neighbour came over shouting, ‘Don’t move that rock. You’ll kill the fairies’.” The rock protruded from the centre of a gently shelving field, edged by the steep slopes of Dundurn mountain, where in the sixth century the Celtic missionary St Fillan set up camp and attempted to convert the Picts from the pagan darkness of superstition.

“Then we got a series of phone calls, saying we were disturbing the fairies. I thought they were joking. It didn’t go down very well,” Mr Salter said.

In fact, even as his firm attempted to work around the rock, they received complaints that the fairies would be “upset”. Mr Salter still believed he was dealing with a vocal minority, but the gears of Perthshire’s planning process were about to be clogged by something that looked suspiciously like fairy dust...."

Later in the article, a local chairman was quoted: "I do believe in fairies but I can't be sure that they live under that rock".

Apparently the local Planning Protectorate has "no specific guidelines on fairies"...

Fairies Stop Bulldozers in Tracks

I just finished reading a book written by an Irish- American couple who recently returned to their homeland as adults and they mentioned a few items of this nature. One was a farmer's field that nobody would build on because it was the location of a fairy rath (or fort).

The other case was a home renovation nightmare. Apparently a house was built too wide and blocked some sort of ancient highway used by the little folk. As long as the home encroached, the household was plagued with ill luck. Ten feet was shaved off the side of the home and refinished before things were right again.

I wonder how common this belief is nowadays in the British Isles. I remember my Irish auntie telling me that just because you don't personally believe in fairies doesn't mean you should tick them off by forgetting to put milk out for them.

Good advice, I suppose. Cover your bases. Keep on the fairies' good side. Build somewhere else.