Hungry grass

In Irish mythology, hungry grass (Irish: "féar gortach"; also known as fairy grass) is a patch of cursed grass. Anyone walking on the hungry grass was doomed to perpetual and insatiable hunger.

Harvey suggests that the hungry grass is cursed by the proximity of an unshriven corpse (the fear gorta).Harvey, Steenie. [http://www.trueteacher.com/cm/apurl=rc1_EAIM_0_A21200647&dyn=8!xrn_1_0_A21200647.htm Twilight places: Ireland's enduring fairy lore] . "World and I", March 1998, v13 n3.] William Carleton's stories suggest that faeries plant the hungry grass. [Carleton, William. " [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/16019/16019.txt Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories] "] According to Harvey this myth may relate to beliefs formed in the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s. In Margaret McDougall's letters the phrase "hungry grass" is - by analogy to the myth - used to describe hunger pains. [McDougall, Margaret. " [http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/6599 The Letters of "Norah" on Her Tour Through Ireland] "]

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