Tarbh Uisge

Also called Tarbh-uisge, Tairbh Uisge, Tairbh-Uisge, Water Bull.

The tarbh uisge is the Scottish water bull — black, earless, and velvet-coated, a nocturnal loch-dweller whose short-eared calves among mortal herds were killed for the luck of it.

Tradition: Scottish folklore
Region: Scottish Highlands (place of origin)
Trait family: The Water-Beckoners
Symbols: Bull

Near this figure

Brag Disguised as harmless livestock
Dunnie Disguised as harmless livestock
Excalibur Bound to specific body of water
Lik Bound to specific body of water
Nymphs Bound to specific body of water
O Goncho Bound to specific body of water

Symbols

Judged against the description by a model. Meanings are our own paraphrase.

Bull is image-domain The bull denotes fecundating potency and pent strength, sacred to storm and sky gods, and harnessed as the ox to the plough that founded settlement.
why
The tarbh uisge is the Scottish water bull — black, earless, and velvet-coated, a nocturnal loch-dweller whose short-eared calves among mortal herds were killed for the luck of it.

Traits

Read from the figure's description, which a model wrote. Open "why" for the sentence a trait came from.

Form

Disguised as harmless livestock
why
The water bull leaves the loch by night to run with grazing herds, and calves born with short or half ears were held to be its offspring — and were often killed at once, to forestall the bad luck such uncanny stock could bring, a custom the compendia record alongside the belief itself.

Behaviour

Bound to specific body of water
why
The descriptions are consistent and strange: all black, without ears, with a coat of soft, velvety appearance; it is nocturnal, haunting lochans such as those under the Tarmachan mountains, and its call is likened not to a bull's bellow but to the crowing of a rooster.

Roles

Judged from the works' own entries, not from the description. Carries: the figure holds the role. Meets: the role is in its stories, held by something it meets.