Handcrafted, relief carved Celtic mermaid ceramic tile

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8x8 relief carved Celtic mermaid ceramic tile done here in an art glaze we call emerald shadow.

The Merrow

The Merrow, or in the Irish, Moruadh or Murruadh, from muir, sea, and oigh, a maid, is not uncomon they say, on the wilder coasts. The fishermen do not like to see them, for it always means coming gales. The male Merrows ( if you can use such a phrase...I have never heard the masculine of Merrow) have green teeth, green hair, pig's eyes, and red noses; but their women are beautiful, for all their fish tails and the little duck like scale between their fingers. Sometimes they prefer, small blame to them, good looking fishermen to their sea lovers. Near Bantry in the last century, there is said to have been a woman covered all over with scales like a fish, who was decended from such a marriage. Sometimes they come out of the sea, and wander about the shore in the shape of little hornless cows. They have, when in their own shape, a red cap, called a cohullen druith, usually covered in feathers. If this is stolen, they can not again go down under the waves. Red is the color of magic in every country, and has been from the very earliest times. The caps of fairies and magicians are well-nigh always red.

~ From the Book of Fairy & Folk Tales of Ireland, compiled by W.B. Yeats, 1892.~