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InScottish andNorthern English[1]folklore, ashellycoat is a type ofbogeyman that haunts rivers and streams.
The name comes from the coat ofshells these creatures are said to wear, which rattle upon movement.
Many places on the coast of Scotland have names that reference the shellycoat. Supposedly, shellycoats are particularly fond of the area around theRiver Hermitage.
Shellycoats are considered to be relatively harmless; they may mislead wanderers, particularly those they think are trespassing upon the creature's territory, but without malice.[2] A common tactic of a shellycoat would be to cry out as if drowning and then laugh at the distracted victim.
As described above, the shellycoat shares many of the traits of theBrag,Kelpie andNix.
Jacob Grimm stated in hisDeutsche Mythologie[3] that the Scottishgoblin Shellycoat is one and the same as the GermanSchellenrock, that is bell-coat:
A pück [home-sprite] served the monks of a Mecklenburg monastery for thirty years, in kitchen, stall and elsewhere; he was thoroughly good-natured, and only bargained for 'tunicam de diversis coloribus, et tintinnabulis plenam.' [a "parti-coloured coat with tinkling bells"][4] In Scotland there lived a goblin Shellycoat, and we saw (p. 465) that the dwarfs of the Mid. Ages also loved bells [schellen; and schellenkappe is Germ. for cap and bells]. The bells on the dress of a fool still attest his affinity to the shrewd and merry goblin (fol, follet); see Suppl.
Thomas Keightley quotes Grimm and classifies the shellycoat as a type ofbrownie:[5]
Another name by which the domestic spirit was known in some parts of Scotland was Shellycoat, of which the origin is uncertain.
The domestic nature of the shellycoat emphasized by Grimm and Keightley stands in contradistinction to the wild nature of the water sprites mentioned in other sources.
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