2017
The beginnings
Llegendàrium began its journey on Midsummer’s Eve 2017, with the launch of a blog devoted to recovering, studying and sharing folklore and the traditional imagination.
During this first stage, the site brought together interviews, literary pieces, explorations of historical places, book and music reviews and, above all, short essays on oral narrative folklore: folktales, legends, beliefs, traditional characters and motifs.
The project grew rapidly and, by the end of 2018, the website already contained nearly 150 articles and had begun to develop a clearer identity of its own.
Llegendàrium's first logo
2018-2020
A second stage
From 2019 onwards, Llegendàrium evolved towards longer and more extensively researched articles. The project increasingly focused on the study of Catalan folklore: narrative types, folkloric motifs, the origins of folktales, lesser-known characters, beliefs and traditions associated with particular places, animals, plants and historical events.
The articles drew on an increasingly extensive bibliography, placing Catalan traditions in dialogue with narratives and beliefs from elsewhere in Europe and around the world.
The project’s growing following on social media opened the way to a new stage. Publishers began to take an interest in Llegendàrium, leading to books that explored some of its research topics in greater depth. At the same time, a Patreon membership system was introduced, combining freely available material with exclusive publications for patrons.
Llegendàrium's second logo
2020-2024
Consolidation and books
Between 2020 and 2021, the project focused particularly on collecting and studying folktales, legends and traditions associated with specific geographical areas. Llegendàrium also contributed to publications such as El Salí in Súria, L’Altaveu in Sant Pere de Ribes and El 29 in Vic.
In 2021, Rondalles de Sang was published, the first volume of the Llegendàrium Trilogy: an anthology of essays exploring narratives from Catalan tradition associated with crime, violence and their representation in folklore.
By the end of 2021, the website had grown to more than 450 articles. The sheer amount of material accumulated over the years, together with the evolution of the research itself, made a major overhaul necessary: not only did the website need a new format, but earlier articles also had to be reviewed, expanded and, when necessary, rewritten in the light of new sources and research.
In 2022, the second book in the trilogy, Rondalles de Difunts, was published, comprising ten essays on traditional narratives concerning death, the soul and beliefs surrounding the dead. New outreach projects also began, including the Taller de Llegendes, delivered in schools across Catalonia and Northern Catalonia for the Agrupació del Bestiari Festiu i Popular de Catalunya.
During these years, work also began on a new version of Llegendàrium, designed to organise the project more effectively, give greater prominence to research and prepare it for a more ambitious future.
A new stage for Llegendàrium
2024-2026
Pause and transformation
After years of continuous activity, Llegendàrium entered a period of pause. Far from marking the end of the project, this hiatus provided an opportunity to reconsider its structure, reassess its priorities and prepare a more thorough renewal of both the website and its contents.
The research, however, continued. During this period, Arnau Folch kept working on new texts and on the third volume of the Llegendàrium Trilogy, while expanding his research into further areas of folklore, popular belief, legends and the traditional imagination.
The hiatus thus became a period of transition: a quiet preparation for Llegendàrium’s return with a renewed structure, a broader outlook and new publishing projects.
Preparing the return
2026-
A new chapter
In 2026, Llegendàrium fully resumes its activity with a renewed website and a new chapter that recaptures the original spirit of the project while embracing a much broader outlook.
The return coincides with the publication of Rondalles del Diable, the third volume of the Llegendàrium Trilogy, completing the cycle begun with Rondalles de Sang and continued with Rondalles de Difunts. At the same time, Arnau Folch is preparing new books and publications that will expand Llegendàrium’s publishing project in the near future.
The renewed Llegendàrium revisits and rewrites earlier material whenever necessary, incorporates new sources and progressively broadens its geographical and thematic scope. The project also takes on a more international dimension, with content available in Catalan, Spanish and English.
The website thus becomes the centre of a broader project encompassing research and outreach articles, exclusive content for patrons, a newsletter, books, collaborations and new publications. All of this remains guided by the same purpose that gave rise to Llegendàrium in 2017: to recover old stories, beliefs and traditions, study them rigorously, and tell them anew so that they may remain alive.
Llegendàrium continues
