Foxfire, Cakes and Witches' Butter: A Basket of Fungi Folklore

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Coming in a host of colors and strange shapes that pop from the forest floor or sprout from wood, fungi have also spread into folklore.  Let's take a look at...

  • Elf Cups, Fairy Baths and Elfin Saddles
  • The Mushroom Men of Tassili n'Ajjer
  • Foxfire and Faerie Fire
  • Mesoamerican Mushroom Gods
  • King Alfred's Cakes
  • Fungal Fairy Rings
  • Second-Hand Fly Agaric
  • Ergot, Witches and St. Anthony's Fire
  • Witches' Butter

Small group of scarlet, cup-like fungi on a branch
Elves were said to drink dew from these fungi... (Weevinz)

Elf Cups, Fairy Baths and Elfin Saddles

Folklore often has fairies using fungi as furniture, and one of the most direct examples has to be the scarlet elf cup.  The tops of these diminutive mushrooms (around 4cm across) curl upwards around the edges to create little bowls or cups with scarlet interiors, while their paler undersides form the outside of the "cup."  Their stems are short and connect to the leaf-litter or fallen wood on which they grew - the end result seems to be little colorful bowls sitting on the forest floor.

Depending on the story, the elves and fairies of the forest would drink or bathe in the dew-filled caps of the scarlet elf cups... though hopefully, not at the same time!

There's also the elfin saddles - mushrooms from the Helvella genus.  Some of these strange-looking fungi really do resemble approximations of the saddles used by human riders... though it must be said, they do not look comfortable.  There's also the dryad's saddle - a big bracket fungus that can reach 60cm across the cap.  The name references the Greek tree nymphs known as dryads, and suggests that the large, slightly saddle-shaped caps could serve them in that role!

Strange-shaped dark-brown and cream fungus that looks a bit like a horse saddle
An elfin saddle? It doesn't look comfortable... (Vladvictoria)

The Mushroom Men of Tassili n'Ajjer

Tucked away in the Tassili n'Ajjer cave complex of Algeria rests a set of petroglyphs and cave paintings that span millennia.  Of particular interest is an image thought to be around 9,000 years old, depicting a bee-faced shaman with an array of mushrooms sprouting from his body and hands.

The figure seems to stand in a strange posture that suggests they may be in some kind of trance or other state of altered consciousness.  Combine this with the presence of fungi, and you can see why some people believe the figure represents a shaman in a psychedelic trance having consumed mind-altering mushrooms.

It's not the only image from the complex with a certain "mushroominess" about it.  Other figures seem to be carrying fungi, or to have heads shaped like a mushroom's cap.  Whether the images actually show mushrooms is still a topic of some debate - alternative explanations have included claims that the "mushrooms" are really arrowheads, flowers, an unknown mystical symbol or even sheep.  To be perfectly frank, these explanations seem like a bit of a reach when looking at the carvings... but feel free to see what you think.

Foxfire and Faerie Fire

Glowing fungi may be a staple of fantasy novels and films, but some real-world mushrooms really are bioluminescent... and as you might imagine, this has inspired several pieces of folklore.

In the western world, glowing fungi were often considered to be the "lanterns" of fairies.  Sometimes the glow would be viewed as an attempt to lead lost travelers back to the path, whilst other stories claimed foxfires were used by either the fair folk or witches to mark their own routes... and any normal mortal picking the glowing mushrooms would find themselves cursed.

Finnish folklore had another explanation - it claimed that these lights (often blamed on honey fungus, but also a particularly reflective moss called Schistostega pennata or "goblin's gold") were the gleam of gold left in the forest by trolls.  This peikonkulta (peikon means troll and kulta means gold) would, when picked up by a hopeful wanderer, return to a handful of earth and mulch.

In Japan, bioluminescent fungi may have inspired legends of kitsune (supernatural fox-creatures) carrying amber or green lights as they traveled first to an ancient hackberry tree in Eastern Japan (where they dressed in human costumes) and then proceeded to the nearby Ōji Inari shrine.  The kitsune were said to set a number of small foxfires (kitsunebi) as they traveled, and farmers would treat the number of foxfires as predicting the yield of the upcoming rice harvest.  The Ōji district holds Kitsune no Gyoretsu (a fox-themed parade) each year to celebrate the legend.  It was also said that a marriage between kitsune could lead to foxfires, as the procession carried kitsunebi on their way to the couples new home!

Interestingly, some bioluminescent fungi in Africa are known as "chimpanzee fire" - a localized take on foxfire!

Patch of golden-brown mushrooms with small scales
Honey fungus can be bioluminescent... (cocoparisienne)

Mesoamerican Mushroom Gods

Xōchipilli was a Mesoamerican god whose name derives from the Nahuatl xōchitl (flower) and pilli (prince or child) to make "Flower Prince" (or somewhat entertainingly from a modern perspective, "Flower Child.")  A deity of pleasure, fertility, creativity and vegetation, one of his most famous statues depicts him sitting in a trance-like state, adorned with hallucinogenic plants and mushrooms!

Piltzintecuhtli also had links to mushrooms (along with other hallucinogenic plants.)  He appears in the Codex Vindobonensis Mexicanus I (page 25) clutching a pair of mushrooms in his hand!

King Alfred's Cakes

The resilient (albeit unappealing) fungi known as King Alfred's cakes take their name from a bit of English folklore.  

The story goes that, in the 9th century, King Alfred (later known as Alfred the Great) was on the run from Viking invaders.  A peasant woman offered him refuge in her home, but asked him to keep an eye on the cakes she had baking by the fire.  Unfortunately the king turned out to be a poor baker (he probably had no idea what he was doing, to be fair) and let the cakes get burned.  Embarrassed by his failure at this menial task, he threw the cakes into the wood to get rid of the evidence.

The round, brown-black fungi actually does look a bit like someone burned a cake, hence the name!

Ring of white fungi beneath a conifer tree
A fairy ring I personally encountered (but didn't step into...)

Fungal Fairy Rings

We can't really talk about fungi folklore without mentioning fairy rings.  A very common feature of folklore in the British Isles, it was often said that they marked where the fair folk had danced... and that to enter one was to risk putting yourself under their influence.

Those ensnared by a fairy ring might dance or play for days, years, decades or longer, as time ran differently in fairyland.  Occasionally tales have those so trapped being rescued, either physically (for example, one story has a farmer entering a ring to rescue his daughter, with a rope around his waist for his friends to pull him back out) or by invoking religion to break the spell.  In a cruel twist, this could sometimes lead to the death of the released person as the years caught up with them - some stories have them crumble to dust before their rescuer's eyes.

Of course, modern mycologists know that that the classic fairy ring is simply marks a patch of subterranean fungus spreading out from a central point... so step in, if you dare.

Red-capped mushroom studded with white scales , on top of a white stem
The classic fairytale mushroom, fly agaric... (Robert Anasch)

Second-Hand Fly Agaric

The fly agaric is that classic fairytale fungus, featuring a red cap with white spots.  It's also poisonous, and while there have been relatively few reports of deaths, it can cause gastrointestinal distress... and hallucinations.

At some point, people discovered a strange way of "processing" the fly agaric - passing it through the digestive system.  Urine from a human or reindeer that has consumed the dangerous mushroom can contain ibotenic acid and muscimol (the active ingredients behind the psychoactive effects of the mushroom) but seems less "toxic."


You might be wondering why reindeer keep coming up.  Well, it turns out that they love chowing down on fly agaric (and seem to experience similar mind-altering effects.)  Perhaps that's why folklorists have drawn links between ancient fly agaric consumption rituals and the flying reindeer of Christmas.  The suggestion is that reindeer herders, tripping on fly agaric or contaminated urine, hallucinated that they or their reindeer were flying.

You might also be wondering how the fly agaric got its name.  In the past, people would break up the cap and sprinkle it in a saucer of milk or water, where (in theory) the ibotenic acid would attract and kill flies ... hence "fly agaric."

Ear of rye with small, dark ergot growths replacing some of the kernels
Ergot could easily slip into a harvest, with potentially dangerous consequences... (jhenning)

Ergot, Witches and St. Anthony's Fire

Ergot is a strange fungus that replaces kernels of grain with hard and dark "ergots" that can easily slip into an otherwise healthy harvest.  This can be a problem - while ergot can be used medicinally, it can have psychoactive effects or even cause St. Anthony's Fire (a medieval name for ergot poisoning) leading to burning sensations in the limbs or even gangrene.

It's been suggested that ergot may have been behind the Salem Witch Trials, since the symptoms of ergotism (such as psychosis, hallucinations, dizziness, convulsions etc.) sound awfully like the reported maladies.  It's a controversial idea, as many researchers prefer the idea that social pressures of the time were to blame... but I don't see why it couldn't have been a combination of both factors, with ergotism supplying the symptoms and society providing an explanation.

It's also been suggested that the Scottish "witch" Isobel Gowdie may have been under the influence of ergot, and that her extensive confessions may have been a result of hallucinations brought on by the fungus!

Yellow jelly-like fungus with lots of curls and lobes
Evidence of witchcraft? (adege)

Witches' Butter

The jelly fungus known as witches' butter is a strange looking organism, with an even stranger belief behind it.  The fungus itself consists of a weird looking collection of gold-to-orange lobes that, when damp, become slimy to the touch.  It's not unlike curls of butter, or the surface of a brain - in fact, another name for it is the yellow brain fungus.

Folklore claimed that the presence of this fungus around a house meant that the occupant had been cursed by a witch.  Sticking pins into the fungus was said to help negate whatever malefic spell had been cast.

Scandinavian folklore has another, more colorful explanation for the fungus.  It was said that witches were gifted animals (a bird and a cat or "troll-cat") by the devil, and that these creatures could be sent on missions to pilfer butter, bacon, cheese, milk and more.  Sometimes the animals gobbled up more than they could keep down, and ended up vomiting a portion of their haul as they returned home... and these leavings were witches' butter.  The appearance of the delightfully-named dog vomit slime mold Fuligo septica was sometimes blamed on a similar situation!

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