Foremost in Scottish Hebridean tradition are the tales of the sea-folk - seals who could assume human form, but could not return to the sea without their sealskin belts. Against the background of such beliefs, the fact of strange people in kayaks being occasionally seen around the islands off the north and west of Scotland was probably not worth special mention, until travellers from the mainland heard of these sightings in the 17th and 18th centuries. This study draws together historical fact and maritime folklore to reveal some spellbinding mysteries of the ocean, involving seals and kayaks, Norse ancestry and "the children of the seal".
