So I was reading DM of the Rings (thanks to the link in the Hilarity! thread), and had an interesting thought about enchanted forests.
What in the world does it mean to have a forest enchanted? I always thought that should entail a spell effect or some other magical aura that pervaded the whole woods at all time. Do most people see it this way, or do they consider an "enchanted" forest just to be one where stange things happen (i.e., because of the things living there as opposed to any large-scale spell or effect). I just realized that I don't think I've ever described a forest as "enchanted" in my games*, because unless the thing had a special effect in place, I didn't consider just having magical creatures within its borders grounds for calling it "enchanted."
*I take that back. There was a forest one time where rubies would ocassionally grow out of the ground like plants and could simply be picked up. My players loved that place. Subsequently, it no longer exists. :)
"Enchanted" could go either way. I've always seen the term as rather generic. It's up you what you do with it. There's the places where enchanted creatures live (and the occasional odd incident), then there are the places where the trees themselves (or some nature spirit similar to it and/or indistinguishable from it) are responsible for all the wierd stuff. Places like the forest in Wizard of Oz, or the living spirit in L.E. Modesitt's Saga of Recluse are one obvious type of truly "Enchanted" forest. If it's not on that line then it's more likely supersition on the part of local peasants, or leftover fear from some previous unusual incident (old necromancer long since defeated, hideout for brigands long since disposed of, etc.).
You could have one and call it the other; you could have it be both at the same time. It doesn't matter. Pattern it after the Forestall's and stuff in the Covenant books if you want to. It's all up to you.
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Maybe a forest can be called "enchanted" for no other reason than that the nearby population believes it to be so. We're talking about labels here. A forest full of elves, treants, fey, and who knows what else is going to seem to the nearby villagers to be an "enchanted forest" even if it is not enchanted by any magic per se.
Yeah I always assumed enchanted meant that it had treants and dryads and stuff in it.
Maybe literary archetypes are one useful way to think about this. As a familiar example, we could look at Tolkien's enchanted forests:
There's the Old Forest next to the Shire, where the trees sometimes move around and even attack the hedge marking the boundary with "civilization," animated perhaps by the malevolent spirit of Old Man Willow, but also inhabited by the fey quasi-deity figure of Bombadil and his nymph-like wife.
There's Mirkwood, a place that is mostly just dark and creepy, with giant spiders and such, but it has the enchanted stream that makes Bombur fall asleep for weeks, and the wood elves whose summer bacchanalia are lit by fairy lights that can be extinguish with the snap of fingers, and the terrible tower of the Necromancer exudes a foul, evil influence on the southern part of the forest.
There's Lothlorien, with its Mallorn trees and their golden and silver leaves, the stronghold of an ancient elven sorceress, protected from assault in part by her epic magical power.
There's Fangorn, with its animated trees and the strange tree creatures called ents.
And going back to the Silmarillion, there's Doriath, the forest ruled by a venerable elf who saw the Light of Aman and returned, along with his demigoddess wife, who enchants the borders of the forest with something akin to a maze spell that keeps unwanted intruders from finding their way to the heart of the wood.
These are set off against woods that are mundane and pleasant (Frodo's sylvan haunts in the shire), or wild but wholesome and beautiful (Ithilien), or havens of the primitive (the Druadan).
Your own favorite fantasy authors each have different takes on the magical forest--whether it's an Ogier Stedding or the little Godwood where your family connects with its past, a strange wood that you reach through a wardrobe in your uncle's spare room, or a place where a hunted deer leads you to cross paths with a god who needs a favor from you, a place where the trees and creatures are afflicted with a strange hellish corruption or one where archaic behemoths shake the ground.
Being a person who likes the real woods, I sometimes find myself enchanted and transported on flights of imagination while hiking in a redwood grove filled with trees big enough for a gnome to build his house inside or a cool, shady wood of bay and madrone trees hidden in a fold of wild space just over the ridge from the nation's fourth largest city, a woodlot on a spooky October night with the wind swirling the fallen leaves, or a steamy river bottomland at dusk with the fireflies lighting and the cicadas chirping and the mosquitoes biting. I can imagine pixies and unicorns and living trees in these places, and strange ancient overgrown ruins of temples and castles, fearsome beasts and enchanted streams.
Forests might be perceived as "enchanted" for vague reasons by those who live outside them, but if they truly are enchanted, there should be a specific explanation that can vary from case to case. Perhaps the magic flows from the land itself, or from a particular wellspring of magic. Perhaps it stems from powerful enchantments laid down by current or former inhabitants, or perhaps it is polluted by their magical detritus. Perhaps a cataclysmic event--an apocalyptic magical battle or a star falling from the sky--caused the enchantment. Or perhaps the entire world once bore enchantments laid by the gods or the "elder race," but this global enchantment now lingers only in a few forgotten corners. Perhaps there is some connection to an otherworld or demiplane exists in the forest, or perhaps it is an otherworld. Perhaps the enchantment is tied to a particularly powerful being attached to the forest--a magical beast, or an anointed queen of the wood, a tutelary deity or a spirit of the land.
The possibilities are endless--read, and visit real forests, and you will be inspired.
Peruhain, I think you have hit the nail truly on the head. That's one of the best posts I've read in a long time. I don't think anyone could top your post even if they tried. Bravo!!!!
What Peruhain said. Where I live I'm blessed with an abundance of forests and every step through those towering trees and hear the wind through the pines, I think to myself "I need to add a forest in my next adventure."
I suddenly have an intense urge to visit my folks in the country.
I suddenly have an intense urge to visit my folks in the country.
Same, same, get the urge to visit family in Germany.
Too bad that our little country isn't large enough to house any decent size forests and those that we are you're likely to bump into someone very 100 meters or so. I need to plan trip to the US or the UK or something...
Thanks, Peruhain. I, too, live near a woods and love walking through it. When we were smaller, my friends and I had many fun times pretending to have adventures around old hermits houses and in the mossy dry creekbeds and along the flowing Buck Creek that cuts through it.
I suppose another aspect of my inquery wasn't really stated- in DM of the Rings, the characters pointed out that EVERY forest seems to be enchanted in fantasy games. I was just wondering if this holds true in most people's games, or if they use the "enchanted forest" sparingly.
My personal interpretation is that young forests, either ones that are being heavily encroached on by civilization and don't really have much old growth to them, wouldn't be enchanted. The trees are all small and scraggly (at least, compared to other woods), and it feels much more open than elder woods. The same holds true for woods that have sprung up from farmland that has simply been abandoned- too young, not deep or wild enough, to have any innate magic.
However, when one gets to the old forests, the ones that fey and magical beasts and elves have lived in for centuries upon centuries, there would often be a power and a mysticism there which would certainly qualify the forest as "enchanted."
Also, one of the creepiest possible settings in my mind is the "haunted forest," where, as mentioned above, an ancient battle took place or a necromancer resided. That could have been ages ago, but the thought of entering a land where the trees are all grayed out, moss hanging heavily from them and many stand dead, the normal sounds of birds all gone save the shrill caw of a crow or raven, and an ocassional slight wind that makes things shift out of the corner of your eyes, and reminds you of the tales of the walking dead that dwell here.
I'll stay home, thanks!
In my homebrew, both elves and gnomes bring enchantment to the woods in which they dwell, and since they live a long time, their dwellings tend to be in old growth forests and the like. Also, unicorns are often closely associated with particular woods, and the maiden Unicorn Riders who are chosen to bond with them also bond with their forest, gaining special powers within its confines and a divine charge from the spirits of the land to serve as its guardian.
I have never really thought about clearly distinguishing between magical and mundane forests before you posed this question because in my mind, every forest is potentially home for some sort of magical creature, fey or otherwise, or a magical site, and as long as there's a little blank space on the map, I'm liable to drop something like that in somewhere. Some forests are certainly more magical than others, though. The ones where powerful magic is active all the time should be rare (or maybe should be a small part in the heart of a larger forest). Degree of enchantment normally should correlate to (a) remoteness from civilization, (b) presence of magic-wielding beings, and (c) natural or constructed wellsprings of magical power. I think, though, that it gives the campaign world flavor if certain forests are viewed with foreboding and awe, whether that feeling is inspired by natural wildness, gothic horror, sf or lovecraftian twistedness, or faerie otherworldliness. But even ordinary forests ought to have sites or attributes of enchantment--not enough to be widely known, but enough to get dredged up in a gather info or knowledge local check.