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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐

@pjrobichaud.bsky.social
5.8K followers 4.3K following 2.8K posts

Literature, myth, folklore • Stories of the Stones: Imagining Prehistory in Britain, Ireland, & Brittany • Pan: the Great God’s Modern Return • Hellebore contributor • poems in NewPoetry.ca, Ekphrastic Review, South Shore Review • 🇨🇦 in Connecticut • /|\

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Reposted by Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐
hookland.bsky.social @hookland.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
To stand inside a stone circle is to be enfolded by the Long Neolithic. To stand inside a stone circle is also to be enfolded by folklore and a sense of awe. Archaeology is a telling of stories, we do not pretend that our stories are the only ones that matter. – Dr. K. Brophy #StandingStoneSunday
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
As it’s the first #StandingStoneSunday of October, here’s a suitably witchy reminder of my latest book…
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
Melville nails it once again.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
More like #StandingSheepSunday if I’m perfectly honest.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
Sheep with standing stones at the Kerlescan alignments at Carnac in Brittany, June 2023. #StandingStoneSunday
Tree, sheep, and stones.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
You can read my piece on riddles and enigmas in the new issue of Hellebore!
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
‘Both iron road and level highway are shunned by the rural Pan, who chooses rather to foot it along the sheep-track on the limitless downs … not without pleasant fellowship with feather and fur.’ — Kenneth Grahame, ‘Pagan Papers’ (1894) #BookWormSat 🎨 Norman Price 🇨🇦
Pan laughing by the riverbank
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
A tragedy.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
Friday night listening: Fairport Convention, ‘Liege and Lief’ (1969). Sandy Denny’s voice is pure magic.
Album sleeve above spinning record.
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Reposted by Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐
Tobias Wilson-Bates @phdhurtbrain.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Every old book is written by a ghost if you think about it.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Thanks!
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Currently watching. 📺 ‘Quatermass and the Pit’ (1958)
Hobbs Lane SW1
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Reposted by Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐
hookland.bsky.social @hookland.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
For I am a salt-hag. I know gull gossip. I know the calling and quelling of storms. My hair is wind-braided. My lips wear rough salt kisses. I stand on the cliffs and read omens pulled by the tide. Be well and avoid my anger. – #EmilyCBanting, 1982 #FolkWitchFriday #WitchSky
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
I've backed this exciting project on Kickstarter, organized by @oldweirdalbion.bsky.social
kickstarter.com
The Lost Occult Books of Victor Neuburg
Publishing never-before-seen books of poetry by legendary British occultist Victor Neuburg.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
My college announced this week that effective immediately they are eliminating contributions to our retirement plans for at least this year. For someone who's worked there as long as I have, it amounts to a 10% pay cut. Very glad to have taken a retirement planning class this month.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Very sorry for your loss.
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Reposted by Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐
Dr Francis Young @drfrancisyoung.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
I reviewed the exhibition on fairy painter Richard Dadd at @royalacademyarts.bsky.social: drfrancisyoung.com/2026/10/01/e... 🧚‍♀️
drfrancisyoung.com
Exhibition review: Richard Dadd Beyond Bedlam
The Royal Academy’s exhibition on the painter Richard Dadd (1817–1886) runs until 25 October, so there is still time to see it. Dadd is most famous as a fairy painter, as well as for being confined…
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Arrived safely across the Atlantic today!
The journal ‘Folklore’ with a cover image of the Bromley stag dance
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Amazing image!
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Hellebore @helleborezine.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
⚡️IT’S HERE!⚡️ Ruined temples, living myths, riddles and enigmas, Medieval mystics, a gas-lit world of secret societies and energy grids, psychedelic revivals, and sonic experiments at the City of the Dead. 👉🏼 Gaze into the eyes of the sphinx and pre-order The Mystery Issue on helleborezine.com
A woman standing by a sphinx, the wind beating her cape
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Dirk Puehl @wunderkammertales.eurosky.social · 29/09/2026
"Faerie Folk" 🎨 Arthur Rackham, frontispiece for Julia Ellsworth Ford's "Imagina" (1914)
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Becido Ethaniel - )O( 🇧🇪 @becido.eurosky.social · 29/09/2026
"Les "flèches du Diable", le plus haut alignement de mégalithes de Grande-Bretagne, faisaient partie d’un vaste paysage cérémoniel" Poke @pjrobichaud.bsky.social
sciencesetavenir.fr
Les "flèches du Diable", le plus haut alignement de mégalithes de Grande-Bretagne, faisaient partie d’un vaste paysage cérémoniel
Pour construire l’alignement des « flèches du Diable » (Devil’s Arrows), les hommes du Néolithique ont transporté ces trois monolithes de plus de 25 tonnes sur près de 20 kilomètres depuis le site féé...
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Fantastique!
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Even better!
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Nearly signed off an email with ‘Beset’ instead of ‘Best’ this morning. Maybe a better option?
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The Ghost Monk @theghostmonk.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
'Goblin Market' by Frank Craig. #FairyTaleTuesday #fairy #fairies #faerie #poetry
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Sardonicus @sardonicus.eu · 28/09/2026
“Le Morte d'Arthur” Vol. IV by Sir Thomas Malory William Russell Flint, 1921 archive.org/details/lemo...
The scene depicts the returning of the magical sword Excalibur to the Lady of the Lake.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
I feel like one should not have to chase down an exceedingly small payment from a publisher for a peer review.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
🎨 Robert Lawson, ‘Young Pan Piping’
Pan plays his pipes while an elf listens from behind a stone.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Now listening: ‘The Violet Hour’ by @theclientele.bsky.social
Album sleeve above spinning record
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Looking forward to giving an online talk for The Last Tuesday Society on 'Fairies, Witchcraft, and Magic at Prehistoric Sites' on 4 February 2027, from 8:00 pm - 9:30 pm BST. You can order tickets through the link below. #StandingStoneSunday #folklore
thelasttuesdaysociety.org
Fairies, Witchcraft, and Magic at Prehistoric Sites - Paul Robichaud - Zoom - The Last Tuesday Society
Fairies, Witchcraft, and Magic at Prehistoric Sites The folklore surrounding barrows, stone circles and other prehistoric sites in Britain, Ireland, and Brittany suggests that local inhabitants experi...
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hookland.bsky.social @hookland.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
We archaeologists tell the stories of the stones not to erase their mystery, not to undo their role as anchoring post for folklore, but to transmit the Long Neolithic. We give context for ghosts, provide new reasons for lithic pilgrimage. – Dr. K. Brophy #StandingStoneSunday
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Fiona Robertson @stonelands.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
The Duddo Stones: five strange megaliths on a hilltop in Northumberland. Sometimes they even sing. #StandingStoneSunday
Deep folds of stonesViews far and wide
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
My great-great-grandfather Lessey Pedley Browne, who was a grocer in Coventry. He was born in Nantwich, Cheshire, son of a Welshman who had opened his own grocer’s shop in Crewe. His mother’s family, the Pedleys, were Cheshire yeomanry and the name was preserved for a couple of generations.
Historic photo of a man with a moustache.
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Reposted by Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐
Thomas Waters @drthomaswaters.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
In case you missed it, here’s my article about historic magical (and religious) house protection. Fire-starting demons; hag stones; evil-repelling plants; mystical markings; witch chimneys; Bibles under pillows & more! Republished by the Smithsonian Magazine. www.smithsonianmag.com/history/six-...
smithsonianmag.com
Six Ways That People of the Past Used Magic to Protect Their Homes, From Witch Bottles to Mystical Symbols
Throughout history, humans around the world have employed protective talismans such as special stones, herbs and plants, and decorative demon tiles
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Lots of interesting cases.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
A rainbow in the east and deep red skies in the west ahead of tomorrow’s nor’easter storm here in southern New England.
Rainbow!Apocalyptically red skies!
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
My current non-fiction reading is this excellent account of popular witchcraft belief in 19th and 20th century Britain by @drthomaswaters.bsky.social
Cursed Britain: A History of Witchcraft and Black Magic in Modern Times
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Io Pan!
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Rosie has let me know that we aren’t going anywhere until she decides it is safe to do so.
Dog with pink leash.
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Reposted by Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐
Dr Victoria Xiaoxiao Ma @victoriaxiaoxiaoma.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Friday #morningread Gerard Manley Hopkins’s ‘Hurrahing in the Harvest’
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Welsh Myth and Legend and Magic @mythwelsh.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Nice to see a discussion of my book Pages From a Welsh Cunning Man's Book on Simon Young's Substack. britishmythology.substack.com/p/a-welsh-so...
britishmythology.substack.com
A Welsh Sorceror’s Magical Diary from 1832?
Who wrote the mysterious diary entry from 1832 about unwitching a farm in Wales. Was it a cunning man or a curious antiquarian?
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I just read it this month — a fascinating book!
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Association for Scottish Literature @asls.org.uk · 24/09/2026
“In Gaelic tradition, the last sheaf or sguab mu dheireadh…was crafted into a superstitious charm, which could take the form of a simple plait of straws tied up with ribbon, or may be crafted into a corn dolly and even clothed.” #FolkloreThursday www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/blog/a-rich-...
Corn dollies collected by anthropologist Robert Craig Maclagan (1839 – 1919). Left Cailleach from Islay; right Maighdean Bhuana from Argyllshire

The dollies are a little bit flattened, and shown side by side within a brown frame. They are made of snips of cloth – some quite fine – and ribbon, placed like skirts around a small bundle of oats or barley with the seeds still on. The dolly on the left has two little tufts poking out of the bottom of its skirt, presumably representing feet.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Attending the first of two retirement planning seminars this evening. Just about have my own plan worked out but want to make sure I understand the US tax implications.
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Belbury Poly, ‘The Belbury Tales’ (2012; Bandcamp cover). The cover image alludes to the track ‘Goat Foot.’
Album cover showing goat’s foot and revellers
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
I would say he does wherever possible — he also seems to have looked at every possible archival source.
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The Ghost Monk @theghostmonk.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
'Autumn' by Hugo Simberg, 1895. #WyrdWednesday #weirdart #art
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
An unexpected late September bloom on our Princess Alexandra of Kent rose. #roses
Vibrant pink rose
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Paul Robichaud 🪨🐐 @pjrobichaud.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
I picked this up at the Salem Witchcraft Museum last month. In great detail, Gaskill compellingly tells the story of the witch scare in 17th century Springfield, Massachussetts. The Puritan combination of religiosity, acquisitiveness, and paranoia seem all too familiar in the US of 2026.
Macolm Gaskill, 'The Ruin of All Witches: Life and Death in the New World'
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