Selkies the seal folk
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This is just a point to explain Selkies which are sometimes describes as mermaids but not.

Selkies are mythological creatures that can shapeshift between seal and human forms by removing or putting on their seal skin. They feature prominently in the oral traditions and mythology of various cultures, especially those of Celtic and Norse origin. The term "selkie" derives from the Scots word for "seal", and is also spelled as silkies, sylkies, or selchies. Selkies are sometimes referred to as selkie folk (Scots: selkie fowk), meaning "seal folk".^[a] Selkies are mainly associated with the Northern Isles of Scotland, where they are said to live as seals in the sea but shed their skin to become human on land.

Selkies have a dual nature: they can be friendly and helpful to humans, but they can also be dangerous and vengeful. Selkies are often depicted as attractive and seductive in human form, and many stories involve selkies having romantic or sexual relationships with humans, sometimes resulting in children. Selkies can also be coerced or tricked into marrying humans, usually by someone who steals and hides their seal skin, preventing them from returning to the sea. Such marriages are often unhappy, as the selkie always longs for the sea and may eventually escape if they find their skin.^[1]

Selkies have counterparts in other cultures. They are sometimes confused with other seal-like creatures, such as the mermaids or the finfolk. Selkies have inspired many works of art, literature, music, and film.

The Scots language word selkie is diminutive for selch which strictly speaking means 'grey seal' (Halichoerus grypus). Alternate spellings for the diminutive include: selky, seilkie, sejlki, silkie, silkey, saelkie, and sylkie.^[2]

The term selkie according to Alan Bruford should be treated as meaning any seal with or without the implication of transformation into human form.^[3]

W. Traill Dennison insisted selkie was the correct term to be applied to these shapeshifters, to be distinguished from the merfolk, and that Samuel Hibbert committed an error in referring to them as mermen and mermaids.^[4] However, when other Norse cultures are examined, Icelandic writers also refer to the seal-wives as merfolk (marmennlar).^[5]

There also seems to be some conflation between the selkie and finfolk. This confounding only existed in Shetland, claimed Dennison, and that in Orkney the selkie are distinguished from the finfolk, and the selkies' abode undersea is not "Finfolk-a-heem";^[6] this notion, although seconded by Ernest Marwick,^[7] has been challenged by Bruford.^[8]

There is further confusion with the Norse concept of the Finns as shapeshifters,^[8] Finns (synonymous with finfolk^[9]) being the Shetland dialect name for dwellers of the sea who could remove their seal-skin and transform into humans according to one native correspondent.^[b][11]

In Gaelic stories, specific terms for selkies are rarely used. They are seldom differentiated from mermaids. They are most commonly referred to as maighdeann-mhara in Scottish Gaelic, maighdean mhara in Irish, and moidyn varrey in Manx^[12] ('maiden of the sea' i.e. mermaids) and clearly have the seal-like attributes of selkies.^[13] The only term that specifically refers to a selkie but which is only rarely encountered is maighdeann-ròin, or 'seal maiden'.^[14]

Many of the folk-tales on selkie folk have been collected from the Northern Isles (Orkney and Shetland).^[15]

In Orkney lore, selkie is said to denote various seals of greater size than the grey seal; only these large seals are credited with the ability to shapeshift into humans, and are called "selkie folk". The type of large seals that might have been seen on the islands include the Greenland seal (also known as the Harp Seal) and the crested seal (also known as the hooded seal).^[16] Something similar is stated in Shetland tradition, that the mermen and mermaids prefer to assume the shape of larger seals, referred to as Haaf-fish.^[17]

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