Fairy rings are naturally occurring circles of mushrooms that pop up in forests and lawns, but European mystics were absolutely convinced they were portals to dangerous magical realms.

A closer look

Fairy rings are naturally occurring circles of mushrooms that pop up in forests and lawns, but European mystics were absolutely convinced they were portals to dangerous magical realms. Folklore warned that if you stepped inside one of these mystical circles, you would be forced to dance with fairies until you died of exhaustion, or you would be transported to a dimension where time moved differently. In reality, the rings are just the result of a single fungus growing outward in a circle, searching for nutrients in the soil while depleting the center. It is always funny when totally mundane agricultural phenomena get blamed on malicious woodland spirits, proving that ancient people would literally invent interdimensional kidnapping plots rather than learn how fungus works