You shall not die until you have visited me in Avalon.” After many adventures serving King Charlemagne, Ogier is shipwrecked on a strange island that turns out to be Morgana’s realm. At his birth, Ogier is endowed with gifts and qualities by six fairy women the last of these, Morgana, declares “I claim you as my own.
The fourteenth century romance of Ogier the Dane mixes fairy material with the ‘Matter of Britain,’ the stories of King Arthur and the exploits of the knights of the Round Table. In the 13th century French romance, Huon of Bordeaux, too, there is a reference to a healing horn that’s presented to faery king Oberon by four faery ‘godmothers.’ Hearing a blast upon it will make the sickest man whole and sound instantly. According to the historian Layamon, for example, King Arthur was blessed by elves at his birth (this is, by far, our earliest faery godmother account, as the writer was born around 1200). One of the pastimes or habits of medieval faeries was to either bless or torment humans. In this posting I want to challenge that idea and to argue instead that it is one of the oldest recognised aspects of faery behaviour.
I recently read an academic article which suggested that the idea of the fairy godmother, so prevalent is our contemporary views of Faery, was a relatively recent introduction to existing tradition, something derived from the Brothers Grimm and from stories like Pinocchio and Cinderella, and since reinforced by popular films, rather than it being a long-standing element of folklore belief.
Estella Canziani, Fairies Bless the New Born Child
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