Selkie

Selkie
Species information
Eye colour	Varies
Skin colour	Varies
Hair colour	Varies
Related to	Merpeople Merrow
Native to	Scotland
Distinction	Less beautiful than sirens
Ministry of Magic Classification	XXXX
Status	Extant

"The oldest recorded merpeople were known as sirens (Greece) and it is in warmer waters that we find the beautiful mermaids more frequently depicted in Muggle literature and painting. The Selkies of Scotland and the Merrows of Ireland are less beautiful, but they share that love of music which is common to all merpeople."

— Newton Scamander, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them

Selkies were Scottish merpeople, generally considered less beautiful than their warmer-water counterparts, and comparable to the Merrows of Ireland. Notable Selkies included the Great Lake Selkie colony.

Behind the scenes

Concept art of the discarded Selkie mermen in the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

• Selkies are creatures appearing in Faroese, Icelandic, Scottish, and Irish myths. They live in the seas as seals, but shed their skin to come on land, often dancing and singing. The most common theme in myths with selkies is humans falling in love with them and stealing their seal skin in order to force the selkie to marry them. Such legends usually end with the selkie learning of where its skin is hidden, often inadvertently, and returning to the sea, regardless of their own feelings towards their human spouse and any children.
• For the film adaptation of the Selkies, the concept artists drew on the anatomy of the sturgeon for the animal side of the Selkies. Also, for the hair of the Selkies they were inspired by sea anemones. The Selkies from the films don't wear pebble necklaces like they do in the books. Their colour scheme also changes, in the books their appearance varied but most of the merpeople had grey skin and dark green hair, in the films they have grey pale skin and yellow-orange hair .
  • In the films we only see female Selkies, unlike in books where we also see males. Despite this, A concept art shows that initially there were supposed to be male Selkies, but then they were discarded for (probably) budget reasons.
• Harry and Ron were originally supposed to meet Selkie Mermaids in Black Lake in a discarded chapter for Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. One Mermaid in particular was described as a woman with a cloud of hair of the deepest black tangled like seaweed floating around her. Her tail was large, scaly gunmetal fishtail; around her neck she wore ropes of coils and pebbles; her skin was a pale silvery grey and her eyes blazed in the headlights, dark and menacing.

Appearances

• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (First appearance)
• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (film)
• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (video game)
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Mentioned only)
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (video game) (Mentioned only)
• Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (First identified as Selkie)
• Pottermore
• Harry Potter (website)
• Harry Potter: A Pop-Up Book
• LEGO Harry Potter: Building the Magical World
• LEGO Harry Potter: Characters of the Magical World
• LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4
• LEGO Harry Potter: Years 5-7 (Handheld versions only)
• LEGO Harry Potter
• Harry Potter: The Creature Vault (Mentioned only)
• Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery
• Hogwarts Legacy (Mentioned only)
• Harry Potter: Magic Awakened