Central to the plot of a short story I’m working on is a four-leaf clover found by the main character after searching through a clover patch. I can remember sitting in the grass as a child, sifting through clover leaves and blossoms, hunting for a magical four-leaf clover with which I could make a wish. Yet, through my research for the story, I’ve learned that granting wishes was not the primary use of a four-leaf clover in faerie folklore.

The folklorist Katharine Briggs explains in her reference work, An Encyclopedia of Fairies, that the primary purpose of a four-leaf clover was to enable the person carrying it to see through glamour. (Glamour is a faerie enchantment that manipulates how things are seen or not seen in whatever manner the faerie desires.)

In this way, the four-leaf clover acted as a protection against faeries for mortals. But often this was only a perceived protection. Breaking a glamour spell cast by a faerie and revealing what the faerie was trying to hide could result in a consequence imposed by the faerie on the person who broke the spell.

Granting wishes was a secondary use of a four-leaf clover in faerie folklore. The mortal who found a four-leaf clover could use it to make a wish. Just as I had longed to do as a child!

Photo credit: photo by Dustin Humes via Unsplash, licensed under the Unsplash License