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The Green Mist
The story of a young woman who grows thin and pale. She wants the green mist that signals spring to rise over the fields, believing it will restore her, but it doesn’t come. She expresses a desire to live like the cowslips that grow by the gate every year, and to die with the first…
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The Dragonby Dragon
The Dragonby ‘Dragon’ is a natural limestone formation, about ten metres long, with a discernible ‘head’ and ‘tail’. According to legend, it is the body of a dragon, turned to stone by a wizard…
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The Pilford Bridge Spirit
It was believed the ghost of a witch lurked beneath this bridge (or its precursor) over the River Ancholme, and would come out to push people into the water.
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Old Mother Nightshade
Old Mother Nightshade was a witch, feared by all apart from the young and foolish John Culpepper, who sought her counsel after being rejected by a potential lover. She gives him a box of sweetmeats to present to the girl, and tells him to return in three days’ time…
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The Strangers’ Share
This tale has something in common with ‘Tiddy mun’, which is also discussed on this map. It concerns the strangers, or ‘tiddy people’ – baby-sized beings with long arms, legs, and tongues, who wore green clothes and yellow bonnets…
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The Lad who Went Looking for Fools
This story tells of a young man called Jack, due to marry a young woman called Polly. One day, he finds mother, father and daughter in tears: there is a well in the garden, and the three are terrified that, should Jack and Polly have a child, it will fall in and drown…
Lincolnshire Folk Tales Project 