created 2025-03-25, & modified, =this.modified
The word Fylgja means “to accompany” and is in North mythology a “supernatural being or spirit which accompanies a person in connection to their fate or fortune.” They can appear in sleep as a dream-woman or be present in life as a disembodied form of an enemy.
The term fylgja also has the meaning of afterbirth, caul.
The fylgja is a ghost who associates with (or, for a lack of better word, stalks or Survey of Shadows) a particular individual
The Icelandic word fylgja can also mean “placenta” or “afterbirth of a child” and the folkloric supernatural connection made between child and afterbirth may be the origins of the fylgja as a concept. According to some, the fylgja takes on the form of whatever animal that first showed itself and consumed the newborn baby’s afterbirths, hence, such creatures take on the forms of such carnivores, as mice, sheep, dogs, foxes, cats, and raptors, birds of prey, or carrion eaters