Dartmoor National Park Authority

Dartmoor's Legends

Dartmoor is rich in legends and folklore; stories passed on by word of mouth from generation to generation.  They were used to explain familiar objects and events.  Almost all the locations can be visited and with a little imagination who knows what you might see or hear......

Here is the latest instalment of the Dartmoor Legends:

The Tulip Pixies

Not far from Tavistock on the edge of the moor was a cottage with a pretty garden full of flowers, At night the woman who lived there would wake to the sound of sweet music, and the tulips she had planted gave off a scent more lovely than that of honeysuckle or roses.

The ability to see pixies is given to few, but one evening at dusk as the woman looked -out of her window she saw pixies bringing their babies and laying them each in a tulip flower to sleep. The woman realized that it was the pixies’ breath that was scenting the flowers and the music was the lullabies they sang.

When the woman died the cottage was bought by a man who uprooted all the flowers so that he could plant vegetables. The pixies were heartbroken and left the garden, never to return. Soon it was a desolate waste as nothing would grow there any more.

With loving care the pixies tended the woman’s grave instead, making sure that the turf was always neat and green and that beautiful flowers grew there all year round.

No one ever saw them but sometimes at night people would hear sad singing and know that it was the pixies mourning their departed friend.

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