A banshee is a female spirit from Irish folklore believed to be the harbinger of death.
Banshees, known as "crying/wailing women", heralded the death of a person, a relative in most of the stories.
Banshees looked like young women combing their hair with a silver or golden comb or sometimes old women.
They also had red eyes because they wept all the time.
According to the myth, King James I of Scotland met one of these wailing women who told him that he would be killed by Earl of Atholl and his co-conspirators. He actually fell victim to their conspiracy eventually.
In the old times, people were warned about not to pick a comb if they found one as it might have belonged to a banshee.