ABSTRACT
Listed under Captives and Fugitives, motifs of kidnapping or abduction by supernatural creatures are numerous. Abduction of a maiden by a monster or an ogre is an important motif in several tale types. Abduction by all manner of animals occurs with great frequency in the world's folklore. Mozart's opera The Abduction from the Seraglio features a hero abducting a princess from a Turkish harem, after she had been abducted by pirates and sold to a pasha. One of the most widespread categories of abduction is by fairies. Sometimes the abduction is intercepted, sometimes the victim is successfully restored, but often the attempt at rescue fails. Multiple abduction cases and research about them really blossomed in the late 1950s and 1960s. Abduction accounts continue to stream in—supplemented by new alien phenomena such as "circles" and "signs." As traditional belief dwindled or was rationalized, kidnapping fairies from the otherworld became aliens from outer space who had much the same function and nature.
