Selkie's Seal-Skin
The seal-skin of the selkie is the central object of the seal-people tales of Scotland, Ireland and the northern isles, a pelt that lets its wearer take human form on land. A selkie who wishes to return to the sea must put the skin back on, so a human who steals and hides the skin can hold a selkie bride or husband captive, and the marriage lasts only until the skin is found and returned. The motif drives the classic selkie-bride stories, from the Faroese tale of Kópakonan to the Hebridean, Orcadian and Icelandic variants collected by folklorists, in which the wife grieves by the shore until a