A mournful wail shatters the stillness, rising and falling like ocean waves, echoing through the dark, lonely hills. It is the cry of the Banshee, an omen that someone will die.
According to Irish folklore, the Banshee wails, or keens, for only the five major families of Ireland: the ONeils, the OBriens, the OConnors, the OGradys, and the Kavanaghs. Each Banshee attaches itself to a mortal family and follows that family wherever it travels, even across the ocean.
When someone in the family is about to die she stalks the hills around their home, her silver-grey hair streaming like a gossamer waterfall to the ground, her face pale and eyes red from weeping, her grey-white cloak as fine as cobwebs clinging to her tall slender frame. If you catch a Banshee, she must reveal the name of the person for whom she is keening.
The Banshee can take many forms. She may appear as a beautiful young woman, as a stately matron, as an old hag, or as an animal Irish folklore associates with witchcraft, such as a hooded crow, a hare, or a weasel. Some legends maintain that she is a ghost, often of a murdered woman or woman who died in childbirth.
In Ireland she is called Bean Sidhe (Sidhe pronounced shee), which literally means woman of the fairy mound. Her Scottish counterpart is Bean Nighe, or washer woman, which is another form she can take. The English word keen is derived from the Irish caoineadh, which means lament.
Traditionally, a woman would sing a lament, which was said to be an imitation of the Banshees cry, at peasant funerals.
According to legend, Banshees would appear before the death of a member of the five major families and sing their laments. If several banshees appeared, it foretold that someone great or holy would die.
The Banshee herself often attends funerals, her wails blending in with those of the mourners.
David Kubicek received a B.A. with distinction in English from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln in 1977. He has been a freelance writer ever since, with a brief stint in publishing. He has published several short stories and many articles, including nine years as a writer for the Midlands Business Journal. He has written a Cliffs Notes on Willa Cather's My Antonia. His short story "Ball of Fire" was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. As a publisher, he published five trade paperback books, including two he edited--October Dreams: A Harvest of Horror (with Jeff Mason) and The Pelican In The Desert: and Other Stories of the Family Farm both are out of print, but used copies often can be found on Amazon). In 2006 he took on a new challenge of Web development. Kubicek, his wife, Cheryl, and their son, Sean, live in Lincoln, Nebraska, with a black lab named Kabella, a cross between a lab and a hound dog named Scooter and a cat named Whiskers. Visit him at
http://www.davidkubicek.com.
