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Why Every Culture Invents Mischievous Spirits
- Cultures worldwide independently imagine small creatures that interfere with human life, suggesting a shared psychological need to explain misfortune.
- Ireland’s púca and Indonesia’s ebu gogo both steal food and children while rewarding people who avoid angering them.
How Goblins Became Folklore’s Universal Troublemakers
- Goblins evolved from older nature-spirit traditions and became a universal explanation for theft, breakage, and bad luck.
- Europeans carved goblin faces onto homes and medieval door knockers to ward off the creatures they feared.
The Pilot Who Blamed His Crash On Gremlins
- Early Royal Air Force accounts described gremlins as tiny sprites that sabotaged aircraft and caused inexplicable mishaps.
- In 1923, a surviving British pilot blamed his engine failure and crash into the sea on creatures tampering with the controls.