Buckwheat and the fae

Another tale of [[ fae gifts ]]. There seem to be multiple stories of the fae and [[ buckwheat ]].

See also: fae asks for oatmeal pancake from a flying saucer

from Passport to Magonia by Jacques Vallee:

Now that we have refreshed the reader’s memory regarding the Gentry, perhaps we shall be forgiven for driving the parallel between fairy-faith and ufology a good deal further. The Eagle River incident, again, will be the occasion for our reflections.

The cakes given to Joe Simonton were composed of, among other things, buckwheat hulls. And buckwheat is closely associated with legends of Brittany, one of the most conservative Celtic areas. In that area of France, belief in fairies (fees) is still widespread, although Wentz and Paul Sebillot’ had great difficulty, about 1900, finding Bretons who said that they themselves had seen fees. One of the peculiarities of Breton traditional legends is the association of the fees or korrigans with a Tacc of beings named /ions. In our chapter on the Secret Commonwealth we shall study the fions more closely; here I want only to call the reader’s attention to one particularly pretty legend about fions and magic buckwheat cakes.

It seems that once upon a time a black cow belonging to little cave-dwelling fions ruined the buckwheat field of a poor woman, who bitterly complained about the damage. The fions made a deal with her: they would see to it that she should never run out of buckwheat cakes, provided she kept her mouth shut. And indeed she and her family discovered that their supply of cakes was inexhaustible. Alas! One day the woman gave some of the cake to a man who should not have been entrusted with the secret of its magical origin, and the family had to go back to the ordinary way of making buckwheat cakes.

I hardly need remind the reader that the Bible, too, gives a few examples of magical food supplies, similarly inexhaustible. Moreover, stories narrated by actual people provide close parallels to this theme. Witness the following account, given by Hartland:

A man who lived at Ystradfynlais, in Brecknockshire, going out one day to look after his cattle and sheep on the mountain, disappeared. In about three weeks, after search had been made in vain for him and his wife had given him up for dead, he came home. His wife asked him where he had been for the last three weeks. “Three weeks? Is it three weeks you call three hours?” said he. Pressed to say where he had been, he told her he had been playing his flute (which he usually took with him on the mountain) at the Llorfa, a spot near the Van Pool, when he was surrounded at a distance by little beings like men, who closed nearer and nearer to him until they became a very small circle. They sang and danced, and so affected him that he quite lost himself. They offered him some small cakes to eat, of which he partook; and he had never enjoyed himself so well in his life.3

[[ fae gifting ]] - [[ alien gifting ]] pancake from a flying saucer [[ paranormal food ]]