Star Wars: Galactic Folklore and Mythology is a oneshot scenario by AlternateHistory.com user J-Roge-1 which, as its name implies, explores various imaginary myths, legends and fairy tales from various well-known (and some more obscure) species across the Star Wars universe, borrowing heavily from various real-world mythologies.
Can be read here
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This work contains examples of:
- Alien Sky: The Bith homeworld of Clak'dor VII has a series of thick rings, which feature prominently in local folklore.
- Barred from the Afterlife: In Gamorrean myth, a holy city was sacked and its royal family killed when a guard fell asleep at his post and let the invaders through. The gods, outraged at this breach of duty, barred the guard from ever resting in either sleep or the afterlife, and he now wanders endlessly across the world.
- Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti: Parodied. The shaggy, apelike Wookiees of the forests of Kashyyyk have legends of a small, hairless being that lives in the open plains, which they call Smallfoot.
- Bewitched Amphibians: In Bothan legend, one potential punishment for drinking from the Fountain of Youth without being pure of heart is to be turned into a toad-like amphibian, forced to eternally keep watch over the sacred waters and eat any bugs that stray too close.
- Breath Weapon:
- Frostbite, a beast created from ice and stones by the giant Big Bloqo, is said to have been able to freeze enemies solid with his icy breath.
- Much like dragons, the mythical rolyetra from Frozian mythology are capable of breathing fire. The stated reason for this is that one once heard the true name of the king of the gods, who caused the beast's breaths and cries to turn to flame so that it couldn't reveal this secret.
- Came Back Wrong: Twi'lek legend tells about a magical song that can restore life to the dead. However, if the singer should falter or miss a note, the deceased will come back as a Receased, a skinless zombie with eyes hanging from its sockets, which feasts on the lekku (head-tendrils) of the living and will go on a murderous rampage until it can catch and devour its resurrector.
- Changeling Tale: The egg-laying Rodians have a variant of this where unhatched eggs are said to have their hatchlings stolen by the diminutive thumbfolk, who take them to the Netherworld to raise as their own.
- Draw Sword, Draw Blood: Ancient Ryn myth told that the mythical King Ofar owned a magic sword called Clurabexi, which could inflict wounds that never healed and never missed its target; however, it couldn't be removed from its sheath without being used to kill someone. Ofar's queen, Durvica, was kidnapped by a wizard, but managed to poison him and escape, stealing his cloak to cover herself on the way home. When she returned, King Ofar mistook her for the wizard and drew his weapon to face him; on realizing who she was and knowing that someone had to die, he thrust Clurabexi into his own chest.
- Excalibur: A legendary Ryn king, said to have been the first ruler of their lost homeworld, owned a magic sword called Clurabexi — an anagram of Excalibur — that had been made by the gods, which was his greatest strength but eventually proved his doom.
- Elixir of Life: A great alchemist named Mixan is said to have created a potion that restored his youth and made him immune to sickness. However, it also restored his youthful arrogance, and didn't prevent him from suffering injury — a combination that shortly afterwards led him to dying in a fight with a stronger foe.
- Expy:
- Big Bloqo, a giant who created various landforms through odd accidents and daily habits and who created a huge version of his planet's ox-like beasts of burden to match his size, strongly resembles Paul Bunyan.
- A Brodo Asogian folktale claims that aurorabirds can take off their feathery cloaks to reveal their true shapes as beautiful maidens, and that hunters can contrive to claim them as brides if they somehow get the cloak out of the picture — very reminiscent of the tale of The Swan Maiden.
- Chaya, a kindly spirit who saved the early Toydarians from a divine cataclysms by giving them wings and who was harshly punished by the gods as a result, brings Prometheus to mind.
- Nana Jebhanye, a Rodian witch who flies around Rodia on a magical spoon stealing unhatched eggs to eat, is based on Baba Yaga.
- Fantastic Fruits and Vegetables: The fallfruits from Ewok myth are coconut-like fruits said to be sapient, and to deliberately drop on the heads of unsuspecting passers-by.
- Fountain of Youth: Bothan myths claim that a certain island holds a magical lake that will reflect even the oldest people as they were in the prime of their youth and, if drunk from, will grant eternal life — for the pure of heart. Depending on the version, undeserving people who drink from it will either die on the spot or turn into toad-like beasts cursed to stand eternal vigil at the lake.
- Flying Dutchman: The Frozians, a race famous for their heavy use of airships and zeppelins, have an aerial version of this in the form of the Black Rolyat, a ghostly dirigible that made a Deal with the Devil for safe passage through a storm in exchange for the soul of the first person to go down the ship's gangplank; the captain fulfilled this deal by throwing the ship's jonzi (a catlike animal) across the gangplank on arrival, and the furious Devil cursed the ship and its crew sail the skies for all eternity. Frozian sailors say that the ship can be seen flying during terrible storms, and that such a glimpse carries very bad luck.
- Griping About Gremlins: The Frozians, a race historically known for their airship technology, believed in gremlin-like creatures which stole food and cigarettes, tore holes in parachutes, and even sang hypnotic lullabies to make pilots fall asleep mid-flight.
- Groin Attack: The ancient Snivvians believed that creatures called hoppersnaps, resembling furry, hopping phalluses, would punish men who engaged in premarital sex by biting off their genitals.
- Island of Mystery: The island of Ezan-Throgg from Asogian myth (heavily based on the real-life legend of Hy-Brasil) is said to only appear during leap years — which on Brodo Asogi occur every five years. The rest of the time, it's surrounded by the vast cloak of King Fonhom, shielding it from any potential invaders.
- "Just So" Story:
- In Gamorrean myth, sleep paralysis is caused by Dormin, a ghost who was cursed by the gods to never sleep or enter the afterlife, sitting on mortals' chests to steal their sleep.
- On Orto, local myth credits the giant Big Bloqo with the creation of numerous landmarks. A river was created when he drooled in his sleep, while the moon's cratered surface comes from his habit of spitting fruit seeds at it.
- Some Sullustan tales state that echoes in caves are the voices of misbehaving children stolen and hidden by the Voice-Taker, a popular boogeyman figure.
- On Tatooine, earthquakes are said to be caused when the giant bantha who carries the planet on its back sneezes.
- In Toydarian myth, a kindly spirit saved the ancient Toydarians from a flood by giving them the wings of the predatory amsulcras, and was punished by the gods with being turned into a rodent-like animal and banished to the largest of the planet's moons. This is used to explain the moon's rodent-like markings, as well as why amsulcras are hostile to Toydarians and why they howl to the moons — they're cursing the being who robbed them of their flight.
- A Kitkoak legend states that death came into the world when a foolish and greedy man cut down the Tree of Life that had grown all living creatures on its branches.
- Karmic Transformation: An Arcona myth tells of a man who, during a famine, murdered and cannibalized his own son. When he woke up the next day, he found that he had been transformed into a figure of living sugary dough; after losing several body parts to starving neighbors and wild animals, the transformed cannibal ultimately devoured himself.
- Lilliputians:
- Rodian myth tells of fairy-like beings called thumbfolk, as they're said to be the size of a Rodian's thumb.
- There's an Ortolan folk figure named Tiny Tovya, who's described as only a few inches tall.
- Mechanical Lifeforms: The Snivvians of Cadomai Prime tell legends of oilcows, mechanical animals made out of metal and rubber, who suckle their young on oil, defecate coal, shoot bullets from their horns and unfold their tails into umbrellas to shield themselves from the rain.
- Monster Clown: The ancient Gungans worshiped a mad laughing god called Har Har, whose priests also served as court jesters and performed sacrifices "as hilarious as they were brutal".
- Moon Rabbit: In Toydarian myth, a kindly spirit who saved the early Toydarians from a divine cataclysm was punished by the gods by being turned into a smeerp, a creature resembling a cross between a rabbit and rat, and banished to Toydaria's largest moon. The myth uses this as an explanation for the dark, rodent-like markings on the lunar orb.
- Our Giants Are Different: The planet Orto has a legendary race of bloodthirsty giants who were banished to a distant mountain by an ancient hero. The smallest of these giants, who had developed amnesia after being throw off the mountain by his father, could blow away entire blizzards and storms with his breath, uses trees as toothpicks, and made the moon's craters by spitting fruit seeds at it. He later married the Lilliputian Tiny Tovya, who lives in her husband's navel and knits clothes from his lint.
- Shout-Out:
- The Besalisk artist Othobludge, who was forced to live in a cave after pissing off the local emperor, is named after a Stone Age sculptor who appears in Dr. Dolittle in the Moon.
- The Frozian equivilant to cats are called jonzies.
- When describing how most galactic cultures abhor cannibalism, the narration notes that there have been some exceptions to this trend, such as the Gugs of Tsalal Prime.
- The Sky Is an Ocean: The Frozians, a race noted for their skill at building airships and zeppelins, are described as having their own so-called "aerial mythology", which borrows numerous elements from real-world Nautical Folklore. Notable Frozian myths include that of Rainbow Cove (an afterlife for pilots who have served at least seven years, similar to Fiddler's Green), mischievous gremlins (which steal food and cigarettes, and damage parachutes), the sully-gullies (a race of suicidal birds which intentionally fly into propellors, causing aircraft to crash), and the Black Rolyat (a ghostly dirigible forced to sail the skies for all eternity).
- Things That Go "Bump" in the Night: The Voice-Taker is an undead creature from Sullust with an oversized mouth and a beard of flies and maggots, who steals away the voices of rude or noisy children.
- Tooth Fairy: There's a legendary being similar to the Tooth Fairy known as the Skin Sprite. Instead of taking teeth, it takes alien children's shed skins, which it brings back to its home, stuffs with straw, brings to life and raises as its own.
- Tower of Babel: There is a Gran legend similar to the story of the Tower of Babel. An ancient race attempted to construct a building so tall it would reach Vraxang (their homeworld's twin planet, where the Gran believed the gods to reside), which was turned to dust by the gods, and used to make the trail of the galaxy's spiral arm in the planet's sky as a permanent warning to mortals.
- Vanishing Village: Brodo Asogian myth describes Ezan-Throgg, a phantom island hidden by dense fog that only appears on leap days once every five local years. According to legend, its king hid it with a magic cloak to protect it from invaders, but the shroud is lifted every five years by his daughters to let the suns' light reach their home.
