Outlander has brought Scotland's folklore and myth to worldwide audiences with Diana Gabaldon's bestselling books and subsequent hit TV show.

Mixing history, fantasy and romance, the popular programme has beamed a version of Scotland to the small screen and many fans will be curious about the origins of what they've seen.

Interest is still high even with the show in its seventh series. There are almost 100,000 Google searches a month for the Celtic mythology contained in the Outlander universe, reports the Scottish Daily Express.

The show is the third most popular TV show with Celtic influences, after Game of Thrones and Teen Wolf, according to a study by SlotBox.

Outlander features a number of Gaelic feasts and symbols that have been passed down over generations by Celtic people. Read on for just a few.

Standing stones

The adventure begins when Outlander's protagonist Claire Randall, an English World War II nurse as played by Caitriona Balfe, is whisked away to 1743 through standing stones.

Whilst the most famous stone circle in the UK is Stonehenge, the moment occurs in the fictional Craigh na Dun standing stones. Claire had spied a druid festival at the ancient stone circle on Halloween which is the day before the Gaelic festival of Samhain on November 1.

Some stone circles are thousands of years old and, while there is still debate about how they got there, it is now believed they were used for rituals and ceremonies. Today, people often gather at these structures on the summer and winter solstices.

Callanish on the Isle of Lewis is the most famous of Scotland's standing stones which are particularly abundant in Orkney and Shetland. If you're hoping to visit the iconic Outlander location, the scene was sadly filmed in Perthshire's Ranoch Moor with fake stones.

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Witches and witchcraft

Like Claire, Geillis Duncan is a time traveller who goes back hundreds of years after killing her husband. Both women are put on trial as witches.

The character can be linked to a real person named Geillis Duncan, a woman born in the 1500s who had been accused of witchcraft. As well as having an apparent ability to heal people and a penchant for a midnight walk, Duncan was also said to carry 'the Devil's mark' on her neck.

She was tortured and made a false confession. Despite trying to retract that, she was eventually executed in Edinburgh.

Creatures lurking beneath the water

Scotland's lochs are a significant source of lore and you've likely heard of the Loch Ness monster, but kelpies might be new to you.

In Outlander's books, Claire spots Nessie lurking beneath the surface. It is thought the legend of Nessie emerged from the kelpie myth, with the 'dinosaur' shape of the monster a recent modern phenomenon. One larger than life example of these beasts are the massive statues in Falkirk.

Kelpies were shape-shifting spirits believed to live in the lochs. Outlander makes references to mysterious water creatures in the books and show that appear as horses in their natural form. Like werewolves, it was believed they could be killed with a single bullet and they could even be captured.

Usually seen in equine form or as men, kelpies were said to take humans back to their watery lairs only to devour them and leave their entrails on shore.

Selkies also have a part to play in Outlander in the tale of how Jamie Fraser's parents are married. The mythological creatures feature in Celtic and Norse mythology, said to shape shift between seal and human forms by shedding their skin.

Such was the belief in the fairytale that in the Scottish islands it was rare for people to kill and seal as they thought it was bad luck. One typical tale is of a man stealing a female selkie's skin and marrying her, only for her to continue to long for the sea and will return at the first chance, even leaving behind the human children she has borne.

Male selkies, on the other hand, are said to be extremely handsome and adept at seducing human females.

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