Talking of phantom music, there is a widespread belief among Celtic races that whenever it is heard proceeding…
- Date of account
- Published 1920
- Source
- The Banshee
- Reference
- The Banshee · selected passage 56
- Rights
- public_domain
- Language
- English
- Record updated
- 2026-08-24
Record summary
Talking of phantom music, there is a widespread belief among Celtic races that whenever it is heard proceeding from the sea, either a death or some other great calamity is prognosticated
Published source text
Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.
Source passage
Source text · mention onlyTalking of phantom music, there is a widespread belief among Celtic races that whenever it is heard proceeding from the sea, either a death or some other great calamity is prognosticated. Such a belief is very prevalent along the coasts of Scotland, Wales, and Cornwall, and Mr Dyer, in his "Ghost World," p. 413, refers to it in Ireland. "Sometimes," he says, "music is heard at sea, and it is believed in Ireland that, when a friend or relative dies, a warning voice is discernible." To what extent this music is connected with Banshee hauntings it is, of course, impossible to say; but I have known cases in which it has owed its origin to the Banshee and to the Banshee only.
Historical context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyThis material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.
Modern context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyLattice compares motifs and reported features without assuming that a traditional being is a biological species or that similar stories document one external cause.
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