Duendes de Costa Rica

Origin and tradition

Costa Rican oral tradition adapts the broader duende figure into household and roadside stories about small beings who hide children, tools, and travelers.

Illustration in this atlas

Tiny old men or children in broad hats, with quick hands, wrinkled faces, and the habit of vanishing near walls, roots, and abandoned paths.

References and further reading

1. folklore.usc.edu — Duendes de Costa Rica

These references offer further reading. Accounts and depictions vary; the atlas illustration is interpretive artwork, rather than historical or scientific evidence.