Folklore

Withypool Stone Circle
Stone Circle

It’s definitely the domain of the pixies round here. According to Jack Hurley in his 1973 ‘Legends of Exmoor’ “it was to Withypool farms that pixies came to thresh the corn at night. At one farm, curious womenfolk peeped through a hole in the barn door and saw the pixies busy threshing... in their birthday suits. So to show gratitude for the services of the little folk, the women made clothes for them and left the gifts in the barn. The pixies took this as an insult, and they never came again.” Sounds very much like the attitude of the more northern hobgoblin. I don’t think pixies (or hobgoblins) are usually seen without their kit on. Perhaps they left because they were embarrassed.