Selkies are legendary creatures from Irish, Scottish and Icelandic folklore. Generally they are imagined as seals that can transform into humans, usually beautiful women. It's thought that they transform by removing their seal skins and return to their seal form by putting the skin back on.

Selch means 'seal' in the dialect of Scotland's Orkney Islands.

The majority of tales about selkies are romantic tragedies about lonely fishermen stealing the seal skin of a selkie while they are in human form, forcing them to come home with them to become their wife. The couple then have children and in some versions these children have webbed hands or other abnormalities, all the while the selkie continues to search for her skin as she cannot return to the sea without it. Once found the woman will return to the sea leaving the man desolate. However in some cases the man is completely unaware of the woman's true nature, that they are selkie.

Another legend says that if a lonely fisherman's wife drops seven tears into the sea a male selkie will appear and make love to her.