Leprechaun: From Gold-Loving Cobbler to Cultural Icon | Monstrum

One St Patrick's Day back in elementary school my teacher had us make Leprechaun traps. The next day the entire room was a mess with little green footprints everywhere. At some point the teacher pulled a prank on us she showed us a bottle with a green drink inside and said that it was left behind by the Leprechauns. She ofcourse drank it she then took off her shoes to reveal that her feet were green. I can't remember how I reacted but my sister got super freaked out and ran out of the room thinking the teacher was going to turn into a leprechaun.

So you're telling me everything I've learned about leprechauns from children's cereal commercials wasn't true...

Liked for your adorable mom making sure people know you're proudly representing leprechauns... Wait no... 😅

Ahh, nothing like a new monstrum episode

She needs to cover the menehune which are tiny people who are superb craftsmen of Hawaiian legend. Often referred to as "Hawaiian leprechauns".

Oh, damn! Just yesterday I was thinking about whether or not I had seen a Monstrum episode about Leprechauns in the past. This is a creepy but fortunate coincidence.

My grandma would tell me “beware leprechauns for their mischief is to be wary of.”

As an Irishman that started taking a deeper interest in Irish folklore over lockdown, this episode could not have come out at a better time for me. I was ecstatic to see you bringing up the Tuatha Dé! More people need to know about the Irish pantheon because there are so many good stories to be told with those characters.

I'm hooked on this channel... A pot of literal gold I found with it, thank you Doctor.

I really liked the 'American Gods' take on Leprechauns.

I remember reading an old Irish story, "A Brewery of Eggshells". A woman's baby was stolen by the fairies, and instead saw an awful looking changeling in the cradle. She was told to cook eggshells by a neighbor, and she did. This piqued the changeling's curiousity and it spoke to her, asking why she was cooking eggshells. That's when she knew it wasn't her baby in the cradle but a changeling. I forget the details of the rest of the story, but in short, she got the changeling out of the house and her baby was returned to her safe and sound.

I teach a Myths and Legends remote class to middle schoolers, and every week I show them one of these videos, you guys are the best!

Three cheers for Dr. Z and her impeccable pronunciation of Tuatha De Danann...no mean feat, even for a lot of Irish people. Mo cheoil thu...

A magical drinking buddy? Yes please! Lol

"The stories began to grow darker.....until we finally reached Leprechaun In The Hood."

Loved this one as a Monstrum fan and as an Irish-American! My mother's family is largely Irish, and when my brother and I were kids she'd throw gold and green glitter around in the backyard while we were at school and leave us chocolate coins and a Sacagawea dollar each. One year at school, while we were at gym, we got back to the classroom only to find the door was locked, and when we got in the desks were upside down, chairs were on top of tables, markers and erasers had been tossed all over, there was a whole platter of goldfish crackers set up for us. There was a note on the whiteboard saying the leprechauns had been there. Always wondered what amazing transportation all the holiday icons had to be everywhere in such little time :)

My favorite is the one where the leprechaun agrees to give him the gold and ties his handkerchief around a daisy (or some other flower) where the gold is buried. The man goes to grab a shovel, and when he comes back there's a handkerchief on every daisy in the field

SO excited to see this discussion of faerie lore! Faeries are some of my favourite sources of monster myths. I literally jumped up and down a little and clapped in my seat when I saw this had uploaded.

Dont need to "imagine a small tipsy man in green." Theres a small normally tipsy man who always wears a green had just down the road.🤣

Wow, so the NYC St. Patrick's day parade pre-dates the U.S. You learn something new every day.