fairy

Dictionary: fair·y   (fâr'ē)

1. A tiny imaginary being in human form, depicted as clever, mischievous, and possessing magical powers.
2. Offensive Slang. Used as a disparaging term for a homosexual man.

[Middle English fairie, fairyland, enchanted being, from Old French faerie, from fae, fairy, from Vulgar Latin Fāta, goddess of fate, from Latin fātum, fate. See fate.]

Idioms beginning with fairy:
fairy godmother

In addition to the idiom beginning with fairy, also see tooth fairy.

For more information on fairy, visit Britannica.com.

The basic European repertoire of beliefs and tales about fairies is less fully preserved in England than in the Celtic areas of Wales, Ireland, and Highland Scotland, though much of it was well known here in the 17th century, and later. Unfortunately it has been overshadowed by literary portrayals, medieval, Shakespearian, or modern; the rural lore collected by regional folklorists made little impact on public awareness until the 1960s and 1970s, when Katharine Briggs brought all the evidence together, demonstrating its coherence and power.

Folklorists generally use the term ‘fairy’ rather loosely, to cover a range of non-human yet material beings with magical powers. These could be visible or invisible at will, and could change shape; some lived underground, others in woods, or in water; some flew. Some were believed to be friendly, giving luck, prosperity, or useful skills to humans who treated them respectfully; many were regarded as troublesome pranksters, or, in extreme cases, as minor demons; sometimes they were blamed for causing sickness, stealing human babies, and leaving changelings. Human adults might be invited (or abducted) into fairyland.

Fairies can be divided into two major groups: ‘social’ fairies, imagined as living in communities and pursuing group activities such as dancing and feasting; and ‘solitary’ fairies, of which some (the brownie type) attach themselves to human households as helpers and luck-bringers, while others (the bogey/ boggart type) haunt an open-air site, often as a more-or-less serious threat to passers-by. But it is not always clear-cut; pixies, for example, can be either ‘social’ or ‘solitary’, while Robin Goodfellow behaves equally readily as prankster or helpful household sprite. Conversely, informants sometimes insist on rigid separations between categories; a brownie, for instance, might be regarded as a quite different creature from a fairy, and a shape-changing apparition like the Yorkshire guytrash as something different again—which, from a functionalist point of view, is true enough. The number of local words for species and sub-species, and for individuals, is considerable. The original English term for the whole species was elf, but in Middle English this was largely replaced by ‘fairy’, borrowed from French.

The clergy, whether Catholic or Protestant, usually insisted that all such creatures could only be devils; many realized their similarity to the fauns, satyrs, nymphs, etc., of classical mythology, which they also regarded as demons. In popular belief, however, fairies were fitted into the Christian frame of reference in ways which left them morally ambiguous; in Cornwall, they were said to be angels who refused to side either with God or with Lucifer when the latter rebelled, and so, being ‘too good for Hell and too bad for Heaven’, were thrown down to earth and lived wherever they happened to fall. Alternatively, they could be identified with ghosts—either of the dead in general, or of special categories such as unbaptized infants. The latter was commonly said of the Will-o'-the-Wisp.

Belief in the household brownie (or pixy, or puck) was closely linked to farming; he threshes corn, tends horses, herds sheep, churns butter, cleans the kitchen, and so on, like an ideal farm servant. He also brings prosperity, and can take it away again if offended; he punishes anyone who mocks him, and those who work badly. The knockers had a similar role in tin and lead mining, but not in coal mines, indicating that this belief had faded by the time the latter industry was established.

The Anglo-Saxon charm against elves shows how they were once dreaded for the diseases they inflicted; there are scattered indications that the fear persisted, to some extent, into Tudor and Stuart times. There are records of village healers seeking to cure children ‘haunted with a fairy’ by prayer and by magic measurements (Thomas, 1971: 184). On the other hand, people claiming unusual powers might say they had been granted them by fairies; there are instances of 16th- and 17th-century healers using ointments and powders alleged to be fairy gifts, or saying fairies enabled them to identify witches (Thomas, 1971: 186, 248, 266, 608-9). More sophisticated magicians used rituals to conjure up fairies, hoping to obtain great wealth, or occult secrets (Thomas, 1971: 236-7, 608-9, 613).

In the final stage of fairy-lore, belief is deliberately instilled by adults (who do not themselves share it) as a way of controlling children and ensuring their safety by threats of danger from a bogey figures, e.g. Jenny Greenteeth, hytersprites, or poldies. This strategy was still used in the upbringing of some people now in middle age, but probably no longer is. A more amiable item of fairy-lore for children is that fairies take away shed teeth, leaving money instead (see teeth and Tooth Fairy).Briggs, 1959,1967, 1976, 1978; Thomas, 1971: 606-14. For narratives embodying the beliefs see Briggs, 1970-1: B; Philip, 1992: 307-36. Narváez 1991 contains valuable recent papers on various special topics.

The diminutive, supernatural beings in human form are frequently depicted in all modern Celtic traditions. In common with counter-parts in other European traditions, Celtic fairies may be seen as clever, mischievous, and capable of assisting or harassing human endeavour. Discussion in English of such phenomena is hampered by an often indiscriminate use of the word ‘fairy’ to translate dozens of more precise terms from Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Manx, Welsh, Cornish, and Breton. More confusingly, ‘fairy’ has sometimes been used to describe (and implicitly to dismiss) many characters from ancient Celtic myth, legend, saga, and folklore. Yet the first citations of fairy lore appear in the writings of the learned elite, such as Giraldus Cambrensis (c.1146–1223). These are few, however, and the great bulk of fairy lore was recorded in oral tradition in modern times. Although there is a quasi-orthodoxy in the portrayal of fairies, much in Celtic conceptions bears a striking resemblance to those found in English, Scandinavian (e.g. hulda-fólk), and Continental traditions. The lack of a single shared term for fairy implies the lack of a singular, discrete Celtic tradition: Irish sídheog (unreformed), síóg (reformed), sheogue (anglicized), boctogaí; Scottish Gaelic s'thiche; Manx ferrish; Welsh y tylwyth teg [Welsh, fair family]; Cornish spyrys [Cornish, spirit]; Breton korriganez, boudig. Out of courtesy the fairy may also be known by a number of euphemisms: Irish daoine maithe [good people], daoine sídhe, áes sídhe/aos sí [people of the mound], daoine uaisle [the noble people, gentry], bunadh na croc/bunadh na gcnoc [host/stock of the hills], bunadh beag na farraige [wee folk of the sea]; Scottish Gaelic daoine s'th [people of the mound]; Manx ny guillyn beggey [the little boys], ny mooinjer veggey [the little kindred], ny sleih veggey [the little people]; Welsh bendith y mamau [Welsh, mother's blessings]; Cornish an bobel vyghan [the little people].

Celtic conceptions of fairies, which approach an orthodoxy, depict diminutive or pygmy persons. Fairies are often invisible or can become so at will, often by donning a magical cap. They prefer to live underground, especially under a hill, in a cave or burrow, or in a heap of stones, such as the raths of Ireland. Their preferred colour is green, not only for dress but sometimes for skin and hair as well; at other times they may favour the palest of whites. Fairies are not generally malevolent or harmful, but they are feared as abductors of children and as administrators of the fairy stroke, which may render the victim speechless; the colloquial use of the word ‘stroke’ for cerebral haemorrhage alludes to this once widespread belief. If affronted, a fairy will retaliate with resolute vengeance; common fairy punishments are burning houses and despoiling crops. Some of their mischievous pranks are only tenuously linked to human provocations; these include curdling milk or milking cows in the field, snatching unwatched food, and soiling clothes left out to dry. Often fairies are seen as benevolent, taking money or food to give to the poor, providing toys for children, or counteracting the spells cast by witches.

Great distinction is made between solitary and social fairies, although the first commentators to note it were W. B. Yeats (1888) and James MacDougall (1910). The solitary fairy may elect to wear red, brown, or grey instead of the customary green. He or she avoids large gatherings and prefers to be left by himself or herself, disdaining the unbridled gaiety of social or trooping fairies. The solitary fairy is often associated with a specific household, place, or occupation, notably the shoemaking leprechaun of Ireland. According to many stories the solitary fairy appears ominous to mortals and is easily irritated. None the less, such a fairy is not indifferent to human kind, and is more likely to interact with lives of men, women, or children. Solitary fairies generously lavish gifts upon mortals, but the consequences of accepting them may be dire. Faithful but suspicious Christians have accused solitary fairies of being in league with the devil, a perception not widely shared; such fairies, however, may be on close terms with death. Among those fairies classed as solitary are the banshee, baobhan sith, brownie, bwci, cadineag, caoineag, caointeag, cluricaune, dooiney marrey, dooiney oie, dullahan, ellyll, fairy lover [Irish leannán sídhe/sí], fenodyree, fr'de/fridean, glaistig, gruagach, leprechaun, piskie, pooka, pwca, síabraid, s'thich.

In defining the two divisions W. B. Yeats (1888) introduced the term ‘trooping fairies’ for those perceived to be in groups; they may also be known as social fairies, the sociable fairies, the fairy nation, or the fairy race. Although they may be friendly or sinister to humans, they are described as dancing and singing while in each other's company. Mortals may eavesdrop upon this celebration by entering a fairy mound [Irish sídh/sí] or may find the evidence from fairy rings, e.g. circular tracks left in grass or flower beds. Trooping fairies prefer green to other colours and may range more widely in size than the solitary; some may be so tiny as to have caps the size of heather bells while others may be large enough to have intercourse with humans. Although they may have higher spirits than the solitary fairies, they still may present a threat to mortals; especially to be feared is the fearsome Scottish Gaelic sluagh, the host of unforgiving dead.

Fairyland, always perceived to embrace an enormous host, is always a monarchy, with queens, ruling without consort, appearing more often than mateless kings. Among the queens are Aíbell, Aacute;ine (1), Clídna, and Grian; Queen Medb of the Táin Bó Cuailnge [Cattle Raid of Cooley] becomes a fairy queen in oral tradition. Leading kings include Cuilenn and Gwyn ap Nudd; Midir, a character from Old Irish literature, becomes a fairy king in oral tradition. Some fairy monarchs are married couples, such as King Finnbheara and Queen Uacute;na, Iubdán and Bebo. In many respects the realm of the fairy seems heavenly or elysian. Time appears not to exist in fairyland, and neither is there any ugliness, sickness, age, or death. Mortals taken to fairyland may pass as much as 900 years there, thinking it only one night. Although no one dies in fairyland there appears to be a fairy birth, as there are many stories of fairy infants and children who require mortal mothers to nurse them. Fairy palaces (see Irish BRUG; SÍDH/SÍ) are thought to be lavishly decorated in gold and silver, where the residents and their guests spend much time consuming immense banquets of the richest, most delicious food. Much time is given to dancing and music. Fairies favour two domestic animals, the dog and the horse, although fearful dogs and cats are sometimes ascribed fairy powers (see FAIRY CAT; FAIRY DOG). Fairies ride in procession on their white horses, their manes braided and decorated with tinkling silver bells. See also GWLAD Y TYLWYTH TEG; MAG MELL; OTHER-WORLD; TÍR NA MBAN; TÍR NA NÓG.

Although it was never the challenge to Christianity that witchcraft was and never accumulated a dogma, liturgy, or priesthood, the fairy faith was once far more than the literary conceit and narrative device it has been in recent times. Individual Christian clergymen offered accommodating rationales for lay adherence to fairy beliefs and practices. One was to suggest that fairies were descended from pre-Adamic beings or that fairies, who lacked human souls, might escort the souls of the faithful departed to the gates of heaven. Occasional clerical condemnation of fairy belief seems to be at the root of the thesis that fairies must pay a yearly tribute of their own children to the lords of hell. To spare their own children, fairies were thought to seek out human infants, especially the unbaptized. When mortal children were snatched for tribute, fairies would leave their own as substitutes; these ‘changelings’ were thought to bear a slight outward resemblance to the stolen child but were paler, more sickly, and more irritable. In the nineteenth century roads in Ireland were rerouted to avoid disturbing fairy mounds. Belief in fairies was still widespread in the early twentieth century, according to the testimony of W. Y. Evans-Wentz in The Fairy Faith in the Celtic Countries (London, 1911). An American-born believer in fairies, Evans-Wentz travelled all the Celtic countries on foot and collected material from all social classes, during which respondents spoke of their convictions without condescension or scepticism. In more recent times the fairy faith has fallen sharply, and many residents of all Celtic lands have found inquiries about such beliefs to be insulting. Nevertheless, as late as 1990 a privately funded Fairy Investigation Society maintained an office in Dublin, dedicated to collecting reports of fairy sightings while promising to protect the anonymity of the contributors.

Learned speculation on the origin of the fairy faith has centred on four theories. 1. Fairies embody a folk memory of a region's original inhabitants. When a new people seized a territory through force of arms or technological superiority, remnants of the conquered and displaced people would linger in caves and remote areas, preying upon their conquerors in the night. The survival in all Celtic countries of prehistoric monuments, apparently built by people of smaller stature, would support this perception. 2. Fairies are composed of the discarded gods and diminished heroes of the old native religion. While this thesis may explain the existence of fairies and fairy-like creatures in other traditions, its applications to Celtic instances requires several qualifications. The full nature of Celtic religion is not known. Characters in the oldest Celtic literature, e.g. Lug Lámfhada, Cúchulainn, and the Tuatha Dé Danann, are now thought to be derived from the older faith, yet they are by no means fairies. When characters from the oldest literature reappear in fairy lore, specifically Medb and Midir, they are greatly transformed. In addition, many characters in fairy lore, such as the merrow or the pooka, have no antecedents in the oldest Celtic literature but have many counterparts in international folklore.

3. Fairies are personifications of primitive spirits of nature. Earlier Celtic peoples, like pre-technological societies studied by modern anthropologists, may have endowed every object with a spiritual nature that was anthropomorphized over the centuries, especially after the arrival of Christianity. 4. Fairies embody the spirits of the dead. This view accommodates well the fearsome aspect of many solitary fairies and also explains the danger to mortals of eating fairy food, i.e. that they would be prevented from returning to the realm of the living. Further reading on these complex issues may be found in Katharine M. Briggs, The Vanishing People (London, 1978), 27–38, and in Lewis Spence, British Fairy Origins (London, 1946).

The ash and the birch were thought to have powers to resist fairy magic in different parts of the Celtic world. The hazel, on the other hand, was thought so favoured by the fairies that it was not often burned; trooping fairies are described as dancing around or camping under the hawthorn. See ALPLUACHRA, the joint-eater; BOCTOGAÍ; BUGELNOZ; BUGGANE; CNÚ DEIREÓIL, the fairy musician; CORANIAID, demonic dwarfs; ELF; ELLYLL, Welsh elves; ENFANT-OISEAU, sacrificial childbird; FETCH, the doppelganger; FFERYLLT, alchemist or magician; GANCONER, the love-talker; GILLE DUBH; GÍRLE GUAIRLE; SPRIGGAN. See also Katharine M. Briggs, An Encyclopedia of Fairies (London and New York, 1976); The Vanishing People: A Study of Traditional Fairy Beliefs (London, 1978); Reidar Th. Christiansen, ‘Some Notes on the Fairies and the Fairy Faith’, Béaloideas, 39–41 (1971–3), 95–111, repr. in Hereditas: Essays and Studies Presented to Professor Séamus Ó Duilearga, ed. B. O. Almqvist (Dublin, 1975); Seán Ó hEochaidh, Fairy Legends from Donegal, trans. Maire MacNeill, ed. Séamas Ó Catháin (Dublin, 1977); Lucy Allen Paton, Studies in the Fairy Mythology of Arthurian Romance (Cambridge, Mass., 1903; repr. New York, 1960); Carolyn White, A History of Irish Fairies (Cork, 1976); William Butler Yeats (ed.), Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry (London, 1888); (ed.), Irish Fairy Tales (London, 1892); Yeats's 1888 and 1892 volumes were condensed in Irish Fairy and Folk Tales (New York, c.1935) and bound together as Fairy and Folk Tales of Ireland (Gerrards Cross, 1973). James Stephens's widely read Irish Fairy Tales (London and New York, 1920) is a highly individualized literary adaptation of traditional stories.

A species of supernatural beings or nature spirits, one of the most beautiful and important of mythological concepts. Belief in fairies is ancient and widespread, and similar ideas concerning them are found in primitive as well as civilized societies. Fairies have been celebrated in folklore, stories, songs, and poems. The term fairy comes from the Latin fata and fatum (fate), and in Middle English implied enchantment, or an enchanted land and its inhabitants. Fairies were known as "fays" or "fées" in the British Isles and Europe.

Fairies were often said to be invisible, usually of smaller stature than humans. It was believed they could be helpful to humans, but might be dangerous and evil if offended. They were often considered just mischievous and whimsical in a childlike manner, but were believed to have magical powers.

The strongest traditions of fairies are those of the British Isles and Europe, but belief in fairies has also been found in Asia, America, and Africa. There are scores of characteristic fairies in the European tradition, but the main types include the trooping fairies, who are the aristocrats of the fairy world, living in palaces or dancing and feasting underground; the hobgoblin fairies of a rougher, workman type; nature spirits of rivers, gardens, and woods; and deformed monsters, like hags and giants. For a comprehensive listing of pixies, nixies, elves, fauns, brownies, dwarfs, leprechauns, bogies, banshees, and other fairies, see the excellent work A Dictionary of Fairies (1976), by Katharine Briggs, a modern authority on the subject.

Typical activities of fairies in relation to human beings include abducting babies and putting changelings in their place; helping plants and flowers to grow; sweeping floors; bestowing miraculous gifts for friendship (such as removing deformities or breaking the spells of witches); performing mischievous pranks like milking cows in the fields, soiling clothes put out to dry, curdling milk, and spoiling crops.

Fairyland was usually underground or in some magical other dimension. Here time became mystically changed—one night in fairyland might equal a lifetime in the human world. Some of the most romantic and poignant folktales concern mortals who fall in love with a fairy queen and are transported to the magical world of fairyland where all wishes come true, but through breaking some taboo or indulging in homesickness for earthly existence, the mortal is suddenly returned to his world, in which scores of years have passed.

In the seventeenth century, Rev. Robert Kirk investigated the fairies of Aberfoyle in Scotland, much as a visiting anthropologist might study a native tribe. In his book The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns, and Fairies (1691), Kirk confidently describes the life, occupations, and activities of the fairies in their subterranean world. Kirk's tomb is in Aberfoyle, but legend has it that he swooned away while crossing a fairy hill and after apparent death and burial appeared in a dream to a relative, stating that he was a prisoner in fairyland. He gave instructions for his release, but his cousin was too frightened to complete them, and Kirk was lost forever.

There are many folklore stories of fairies assisting humans, mainly in a bucolic setting. Household fairies were said to assist in everyday tasks like washing dishes, laying the fire, sweeping the floor, making bread bake properly, and so on but asked to be treated respectfully and given a cup of milk for their trouble.

Other fairies played mischievous pranks of a poltergeist nature, pelting mortals with stones, preventing bread from rising, blowing out candles, knocking pans off shelves, sending gusts of smoke, or annoying horses and cattle. Often this was deemed a punishment for lack of respectful treatment. In rural areas, fairies were often referred to in flattering terms as "the good people" to avoid offending them.

According to superstition, the fairies would sometimes steal a human baby and put a changeling fairy child in its place, often ugly and bad-tempered. The changeling might be tricked into a sudden admission of its fairy origin, but there was also a folk superstition that it should be set on fire for this purpose. Undoubtedly some temperamental babies were fatally burned because of this belief, which persisted until some two centuries ago in isolated peasant districts.

Fairy traditions have been strongest in Celtic countries. In Scotland and Ireland, fairies were called daoine sithe (men of peace) and it was believed that every year the devil carried off a tenth part of them. In Scotland and Ireland, Neolithic flint arrowheads were believed to be fairy weapons, and water in which they were dipped was said to be a cure for many ills. The Celts believed fairy music could be heard in certain spots, and it was usually described as sublime. Some folk music airs are said to have originated in fairy music.

"Fairy rings" are small dark green circles in the grass of meadows, fields, or lawns caused by a certain fungus. These rings were once said to be the dancing places of the fairies. In Ireland, mound burials were believed to be the haunts of fairies.

Theories of Fairies

There were many different beliefs concerning fairies. Peasant traditions said they were fallen angels who were neither good enough to be saved nor bad enough to be lost. Folklorists hypothesize that fairies are a folk recollection of an ancient pygmy race, are mythological personifications of natural phenomena, or are remnant figures from ancient religious beliefs. Household tales of folk heroes like Jack the Giant-Killer are probably transplanted from ancient Indo-European folklore, and folk traditions have been made sophisticated in the tales of the Countess d'Aulnoy and Hans Christian Andersen.

Different beliefs and folk memories have no doubt merged, but when all this is sifted and evaluated there remains a body of tradition and testimony, even today, of an elusive ghostly order of life on the borderland of mind and matter, usually depicted in the natural setting of wild and lonely places rather than in the skeptical materialistic bustle of towns and cities.

W. Y. Evans-Wentz, in his The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries (1911) presents a living testimony of fairies, the recorded traditions of Celtic literature and mythology, an examination of various theories for fairies, and a case for the reality of fairy life. In the final section, Evans-Wentz correlates fairy life with the ghosts and spirits of psychical phenomena, quoting the French researcher Camille Flammarion, who suggests in his book Mysterious Psychic Forces (1907): "Either it is we who produce these phenomena, or it is spirits. But mark this well: these spirits are not necessarily the souls of the dead; for other kinds of spiritual beings may exist, and space may be full of them without our ever knowing anything about it, except under unusual circumstances. Do we not find in the different ancient literature, demons, angels, gnomes, goblins, sprites, spectres, elementals, etc.? Perhaps these legends are not without some foundation in fact."

Evans-Wentz concludes that "we can postulate scientifically, on the showing of the data of psychical research, the existence of such invisible intelligences as gods, genii, daemons, all kinds of true fairies, and disembodied men." In his assertions, Evans-Wentz goes far beyond the territory usually covered by his colleagues, who usually limit themselves to the study of folklore traditions.

In his foreword to the 1966 reissue of Evans-Wentz's book, Leslie Shepard cites the protean aspect of fairies (i.e., their ability to change form in accordance with the convention of the viewer) and says, "I have a strong suspicion that in the newer mythology of flying saucers some of those 'shining visitors' in spacecraft from other worlds might turn out to be just another form of fairies." Since then, similar views have been advanced by UFO commentators like Jacques Vallee and Brad Steiger. Other ufologists have suggested that fairies and flying saucer phenomena can be correlated with such miraculous religious apparitions as those of Fatima or Lourdes.

Real Fairies

Claims of contact with fairies are numerous. In 1907 Lady Archibald Campbell interviewed an old blind man and his wife living in an Irish glen who claimed to have caught a fairy and kept it captive for two weeks before it escaped (see Occult Re-view, 6, no. 5, November 1907). A friend of the couple claimed he had seen fairies on the Hill of Howth at early morning, "little men about three feet high, riding on donkeys to scale." Around the same time a reporter on Irish radio interviewed a woman in the west of Ireland who had been "infested with fairies" for several weeks after cutting down a fairy thornbush. The thornbushes believed to be jealously cherished by fairies are still sometimes left undisturbed in Irish fields.

The most famous case of alleged fairy contact came in 1917, when Elsie Wright, age 16, and Frances Griffiths, 10, who lived in the small Yorkshire village of Cottingley, England, claimed they saw and played with fairies near a brook in the local countryside. No one believed them, so they borrowed a camera and produced photographs of their fairies. These pictures later came to the attention of the author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and became the basis of his book The Coming of the Fairies (1922). Doyle accepted the girls' story. The evidence for the genuineness of these photographs was quite strong, and a number of attempts were made to disprove them. Skeptics suggested a number of explanations (all of which proved wrong) and it was not until a thorough study of the photographs was made in the 1980s that the source and means of the hoax became known. Shortly before their deaths, the women admitted the hoax.

Doyle's book continues to be reprinted and circulated, primarily in theosophical circles. Many Theosophists became convinced of the truth of the girls' story after independent claims regarding the reality of the Cottingley fairies came from Theosophist Geoffrey Hodson, who visited the Cottingley glen with the two girls in 1921 and affirmed that he saw wood elves, gnomes, goblins, and other nature spirits.

In her book The Real World of Fairies (1977), theosophical leader Dora van Gelder, who grew up in Java, states that she played with fairies and later even saw them in New York's Central Park.

Other British psychics, including Vincent Turvey and Horace Leaf, also claimed to see fairies, and in 1927 the Fairy Investigation Society was formed in Britain to collate information on fairy sightings. The society eventually became inactive, largely as a result of unwelcome newspaper reports ridiculing the subject. Other organizations that take an interest in fairies include the Gnome Club of Great Britain and Gnome International.

Sources:

Arrowsmith, Nancy, and G. Moorse. A Field Guide to the Little People. New York: Macmillan, 1977.

Baring-Gould, S. A Book of Folk-Lore. London, [1913].

Briggs, Katharine M. The Anatomy of Puck: An Examination of Fairy Beliefs Among Shakespeare's Contemporaries and Successors. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1959.

——. A Dictionary of Fairies. London: Allen Lane, 1976. Reprint, London: Penguin, 1977.

——. The Personnel of Fairyland. Oxford, England: Alden Press, 1953. Reprint, Singing Tree Press, 1971.

——. The Vanishing People: A Study of Traditional Fairy Beliefs. London: B. T. Batsford, 1978.

Cooper, Joe. The Case of the Cottingley Fairies. London: Robert Hale, 1990.

Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Coming of the Fairies. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1922. 2nd ed., rev. and enl. London: Psychic Press, 1928. Reprint, New York: Samuel Weiser, 1972.

Edwards, Gillian. Hobgoblin and Sweet Puck: Fairy Names and Natures. London: Geoffrey Bles, 1974.

Evans-Wentz, W. Y. The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries. Ox-ford: Oxford University Press, 1911. Reprint, New Hyde Park, N.Y.: University Books, 1966.

Froud, Brian, and Alan Lee. Faeries. London: Souvenir Press, 1978. Reprint, New York: Bantam Books, 1979. Reprint, London: Pan Books, 1979.

Gardner, Edward L. Fairies: The Cottingley Photographs and Their Sequel. London: Theosophical Publishing House, 1945.

Haining, Peter. The Leprechaun's Kingdom. London: Souvenir Press, 1979.

Halliwell-Phillipps, J. O. Nursery Rhymes and Nursery Tales of England. London, 1853.

Hartland, Edwin, W. The Science of Fairy Tales: An Enquiry Into Fairy Mythology. London, 1891. Reprint, Detroit: Singing Tree Press, 1968.

Kirk, Robert. The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns, and Fairies. 1691. Reprint, London: D. Nutt, 1893.

Latham, M. W. The Elizabethan Fairies. New York: Columbia University Press, 1931.

Mac Manus, D. A. The Middle Kingdom: The Faerie World of Ireland. London: Max Parrish, 1959.

O'Donnell, Elliot. The Banshee. London: Sands, 1919.

Ritson, Joseph. Fairy Tales, Now First Collected: To Which Are Prefixed Two Dissertations: 1. On Pygmies; 2. On Fairies. London, 1831.

Sikes, Wirt. British Goblins. London, 1880. Reprint, Wakefield, England: EP Publishing, 1973.

Spence, Lewis. British Fairy Origins. London: Watts, 1946.

——. The Fairy Tradition in Britain. London: Rider, 1948.

Van Gelder, Dora. The Real World of Fairies. London: Theosophical Publishing House, 1977.

White, Carolyn. A History of Irish Fairies. Ireland: Mercier Press, 1976.

Yearsley, Macleod. The Folklore of Fairy-Tale. London: Watts, 1924. Reprint, Detroit: Singing Tree Press, 1968.

Yeats, W. B., ed. Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry. London & New York, 1888.

n.

A creature, variously fashioned and endowed, that formerly inhabited the meadows and forests. It was nocturnal in its habits, and somewhat addicted to dancing and the theft of children. The fairies are now believed by naturalist to be extinct, though a clergyman of the Church of England saw three near Colchester as lately as 1855, while passing through a park after dining with the lord of the manor. The sight greatly staggered him, and he was so affected that his account of it was incoherent. In the year 1807 a troop of fairies visited a wood near Aix and carried off the daughter of a peasant, who had been seen to enter it with a bundle of clothing. The son of a wealthy bourgeois disappeared about the same time, but afterward returned. He had seen the abduction been in pursuit of the fairies. Justinian Gaux, a writer of the fourteenth century, avers that so great is the fairies' power of transformation that he saw one change itself into two opposing armies and fight a battle with great slaughter, and that the next day, after it had resumed its original shape and gone away, there were seven hundred bodies of the slain which the villagers had to bury. He does not say if any of the wounded recovered. In the time of Henry III, of England, a law was made which prescribed the death penalty for "Kyllynge, wowndynge, or mamynge" a fairy, and it was universally respected.

"Fay" redirects here. For other uses, see Fay (disambiguation).

Fairy

AKA: Fay, Fae, Faerie, Wee Folk, Good Folk, Fair Folk
Take the Fair Face of Woman… by Sophie Anderson
Creature
Grouping	Mythological creature
Data
First reported	In folklore
Country	Global
Habitat	Woodland Gardens

For other uses, see Fairy (disambiguation).

A fairy (also fay, fey, faery, faerie; collectively, "fae", wee folk, good folk, people of peace, fair folk, and other euphemisms)^[1] is a type of mythological being or legendary creature, a form of spirit, often described as metaphysical, supernatural or preternatural.

The word fairy derives from the term fae of medieval Western European (Old French, from Latin fata: Fate) folklore and romance, one famous example being Morgan le Fay ('Morgan of the Fae'). "Fae-ery" was therefore everything that appertains to the "fae", and so the land of "fae", all the "fae". Finally the word replaced its original and one could speak of "a faery or fairy", though the word fey is still used as an adjective or to refer to the word fairy as a plural.

Fairies resemble various beings of other mythologies, though even folklore that uses the term fairy offers many definitions. Sometimes the term describes any magical creature, including goblins or gnomes: at other times, the term only describes a specific type of more ethereal creature.^[2]

Contents 1 Characteristics 2 Origin of fairies 2.1 Folk beliefs 2.1.1 Dead 2.1.2 Elementals 2.1.3 Demoted angels 2.1.4 Demons 2.1.5 Humans 2.1.6 Babies' laughs 2.1.7 Pagan deities 2.2 Sources of beliefs 2.2.1 A hidden people 2.2.2 Christianised pagan deities 2.2.3 Spirits of the dead 3 Fairies in literature and legend 3.1 Practical beliefs and protection 3.1.1 Changelings 3.1.2 Classifications 3.2 Legends 3.3 Literature 4 Fairies in art 5 Fairies in popular culture 6 See also 7 Bibliography 8 References 9 External links

Characteristics

Fairies are generally described as human in appearance and having magical powers. Their origins are less clear in the folklore, being variously dead, or some form of angel, or a species completely independent of humans or angels.^[3] Folklorists have suggested that their actual origin lies in a conquered race living in hiding,^[4] or in religious beliefs that lost currency with the advent of Christianity.^[5] These explanations are not always mutually incompatible, and they may be traceable to multiple sources.

Much of the folklore about fairies revolves about protection from their malice, by such means as cold iron (iron is like poison to fairies and will not go near it) or charms of rowan and herbs, or avoiding offense by shunning locations known to be theirs.^[6] In particular, folklore describes how to prevent the fairies from stealing babies and substituting changelings, and abducting older people as well.^[7] Many folktales are told of fairies, and they appear as characters in stories from medieval tales of chivalry, to Victorian fairy tales, and up to the present day in modern literature.

Although in modern culture they are often depicted as young, sometimes winged, humanoids of small stature, they originally were depicted much differently: tall, radiant, angelic beings or short, wizened trolls being some of the commonly mentioned. Diminutive fairies of one kind or another have been recorded for centuries, but occur alongside the human-sized beings; these have been depicted as ranging in size from very tiny up to the size of a human child.^[8] Even with these small fairies, however, their small size may be magically assumed rather than constant.^[9]

Wings, while common in Victorian and later artwork of fairies, are very rare in the folklore; even very small fairies flew with magic, sometimes flying on ragwort stems or the backs of birds.^[10] Nowadays, fairies are often depicted with ordinary insect wings or butterfly wings.

Various animals have also been described as fairies. Sometimes this is the result of shape shifting on part of the fairy, as in the case of the selkie (seal people); others, like the kelpie and various black dogs, appear to stay more constant in form.^[11]

Origin of fairies

Folk beliefs

Dead

One popular belief was that they were the dead, or some subclass of the dead.^[12] The Irish banshee (Irish Gaelic bean sí or Scottish Gaelic bean shìth, which both mean "fairy woman") is sometimes described as a ghost.^[13] The northern English Cauld Lad of Hylton, though described as a murdered boy, is also described as a household sprite like a brownie,^[14] much of the time a Barghest or Elf.^[15] One tale recounted a man caught by the fairies, who found that whenever he looked steadily at one, the fairy was a dead neighbor of his.^[16] This was among the most common views expressed by those who believed in fairies, although many of the informants would express the view with some doubts.^[17]

Elementals

Another view held that the fairies were an intelligent species, distinct from humans and angels.^[18] In alchemy in particular they were regarded as elementals, such as gnomes and sylphs, as described by Paracelsus.^[19] This is uncommon in folklore, but accounts describing the fairies as "spirits of the air" have been found popularly.^[20]

Demoted angels

A third belief held that they were a class of "demoted" angels.^[21] One popular story held that when the angels revolted, God ordered the gates shut; those still in heaven remained angels, those in hell became devils, and those caught in between became fairies.^[22] Others held that they had been thrown out of heaven, not being good enough, but they were not evil enough for hell.^[23] This may explain the tradition that they had to pay a "teind" or tithe to Hell. As fallen angels, though not quite devils, they could be seen as subject of the Devil.^[24]

Demons

A fourth belief was the fairies were devils entirely.^[25] This belief became much more popular with the growth of Puritanism.^[26] The hobgoblin, once a friendly household spirit, became a wicked goblin.^[27] Dealing with fairies was in some cases considered a form of witchcraft and punished as such in this era.^[28] Disassociating himself from such evils may be why Oberon, in A Midsummer Night's Dream, carefully observed that neither he nor his court feared the church bells.^[29]

The belief in their angelic nature was less common than that they were the dead, but still found popularity, especially in Theosophist circles.^[30][31] Informants who described their nature sometimes held aspects of both the third and the fourth view, or observed that the matter was disputed.^[30]

Humans

A less-common belief was that the fairies were actually humans; one folktale recounts how a woman had hidden some of her children from God, and then looked for them in vain, because they had become the hidden people, the fairies. This is parallel to a more developed tale, of the origin of the Scandinavian huldra.^[30]

Babies' laughs

A story of the origin of fairies appears in a chapter about Peter Pan in J. M. Barrie's 1902 novel The Little White Bird, and was incorporated into his later works about the character. Barrie wrote, "…when the first baby laughed for the first time, its laugh broke into a thousand pieces, and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies."^[32]

Pagan deities

Many of the Irish tales of the Tuatha Dé Danann refer to these beings as fairies, though in more ancient times they were regarded as Goddesses and Gods. The Tuatha Dé were spoken of as having come from Islands in the north of the world, or, in other sources, from the sky. After being defeated in a series of battles with other Otherworldly beings, and then by the ancestors of the current Irish people, they were said to have withdrawn to the sídhe (fairy mounds), where they lived on in popular imagination as "fairies."

Sources of beliefs

A hidden people

One common theme found among the Celtic nations describes a race of diminutive people who had been driven into hiding by invading humans. They came to be seen as another race, or possibly spirits, and were believed to live in an Otherworld that was variously described as existing underground, in hidden hills (many of which were ancient burial mounds), or across the Western Sea.^[4]

In old Celtic faery lore the sidhe (fairy folk) are immortals living in the ancient barrows and cairns. The Tuatha de Danaan are associated with several Otherworld realms including Mag Mell (the Pleasant Plain), Emain Ablach (the Fortress of Apples or the Land of Promise or the Isle of Women), and the Tir na nÓg (the Land of Youth).^[33]

The concept of the Otherworld is also associated with the Isle of Apples, known as Avalon in the Arthurian mythos (often equated with Ablach Emain). Here we find the Silver Bough that allowed a living mortal to enter and withdraw from the Otherworld. According to legend, the Faery Queen sometimes offered the branch to worthy mortals, granting them safe passage and food during their stay.

Some 19th century archaeologists thought they had found underground rooms in the Orkney islands resembling the Elfland in Childe Rowland.^[34] In popular folklore, flint arrowheads from the Stone Age were attributed to the fairies as "elf-shot".^[35] The fairies' fear of iron was attributed to the invaders having iron weapons, whereas the inhabitants had only flint and were therefore easily defeated in physical battle. Their green clothing and underground homes were credited to their need to hide and camouflage themselves from hostile humans, and their use of magic a necessary skill for combating those with superior weaponry.^[4] In Victorian beliefs of evolution, cannibalism among "ogres" was attributed to memories of more savage races, still practicing it alongside "superior" races that had abandoned it.^[36] Selkies, described in fairy tales as shapeshifting seal people, were attributed to memories of skin-clad "primitive" people traveling in kayaks.^[4] African pygmies were put forth as an example of a race that had previously existed over larger stretches of territory, but come to be scarce and semi-mythical with the passage of time and prominence of other tribes and races.^[37]

Christianised pagan deities

Another theory is that the fairies were originally worshiped as gods, but with the coming of Christianity, they lived on, in a dwindled state of power, in folk belief. In this particular time, fairies were reputed by the church as being 'evil' beings. Many beings who are described as deities in older tales are described as "fairies" in more recent writings.^[5] Victorian explanations of mythology, which accounted for all gods as metaphors for natural events that had come to be taken literally, explained them as metaphors for the night sky and stars.^[38] According to this theory, fairies are personified aspects of nature and deified abstract concepts such as ‘love’ and ‘victory’ in the pantheon of the particular form of animistic nature worship reconstructed as the religion of Ancient Western Europe.^[39]

Spirits of the dead

A third theory was that the fairies were a folkloric belief concerning the dead. This noted many common points of belief, such as the same legends being told of ghosts and fairies, the sídhe in actuality being burial mounds, it being dangerous to eat food in both Fairyland and Hades, and both the dead and fairies living underground.^[40]

Fairies in literature and legend

Fairies of the meadow, by Nils Blommér

The question as to the essential nature of fairies has been the topic of myths, stories, and scholarly papers for a very long time.^[41]

Practical beliefs and protection

When considered as beings that a person might actually encounter, fairies were noted for their mischief and malice. Some pranks ascribed to them, such as tangling the hair of sleepers into "Elf-locks", stealing small items or leading a traveler astray, are generally harmless. But far more dangerous behaviors were also attributed to fairies. Any form of sudden death might stem from a fairy kidnapping, with the apparent corpse being a wooden stand-in with the appearance of the kidnapped person.^[7] Consumption (tuberculosis) was sometimes blamed on the fairies forcing young men and women to dance at revels every night, causing them to waste away from lack of rest.^[42] Fairies riding domestic animals, such as cows or pigs or ducks, could cause paralysis or mysterious illnesses.

As a consequence, practical considerations of fairies have normally been advice on averting them. In terms of protective charms, cold iron is the most familiar, but other things are regarded as detrimental to the fairies: wearing clothing inside out, running water, bells (especially church bells), St. John's wort, and four-leaf clovers, among others. Some lore is contradictory, such as Rowan trees in some tales being sacred to the fairies, and in other tales being protection against them. In Newfoundland folklore, the most popular type of fairy protection is bread, varying from stale bread to hard tack or a slice of fresh home-made bread. The belief that bread has some sort of special power is an ancient one. Bread is associated with the home and the hearth, as well as with industry and the taming of nature, and as such, seems to be disliked by some types of fairies. On the other hand, in much of the Celtic folklore, baked goods are a traditional offering to the folk, as are cream and butter.^[31]

“The prototype of food, and therefore a symbol of life, bread was one of the commonest protections against fairies. Before going out into a fairy-haunted place, it was customary to put a piece of dry bread in one’s pocket.”^[43]

Bells also have an ambiguous role; while they protect against fairies, the fairies riding on horseback — such as the fairy queen — often have bells on their harness. This may be a distinguishing trait between the Seelie Court from the Unseelie Court, such that fairies use them to protect themselves from more wicked members of their race.^[44] Another ambiguous piece of folklore revolves about poultry: a cock's crow drove away fairies, but other tales recount fairies keeping poultry.^[45]

In County Wexford, Ireland, in 1882, it was reported that “if an infant is carried out after dark a piece of bread is wrapped in its bib or dress, and this protects it from any witchcraft or evil.”^[46]

A resin statue of a fairy

While many fairies will confuse travelers on the path, the will o' the wisp can be avoided by not following it. Certain locations, known to be haunts of fairies, are to be avoided; C. S. Lewis reported hearing of a cottage more feared for its reported fairies than its reported ghost.^[47] In particular, digging in fairy hills was unwise. Paths that the fairies travel are also wise to avoid. Home-owners have knocked corners from houses because the corner blocked the fairy path,^[48] and cottages have been built with the front and back doors in line, so that the owners could, in need, leave them both open and let the fairies troop through all night.^[49] Locations such as fairy forts were left undisturbed; even cutting brush on fairy forts was reputed to be the death of those who performed the act.^[50] Fairy trees, such as thorn trees, were dangerous to chop down; one such tree was left alone in Scotland, though it prevented a road being widened for seventy years.^[51] Good house-keeping could keep brownies from spiteful actions, because if they didn't think the house is clean enough, they pinched people in their sleep. Such water hags as Peg Powler and Jenny Greenteeth, prone to drowning people, could be avoided by avoiding the bodies of water they inhabit.^[35]

Other actions were believed to offend fairies. Brownies were known to be driven off by being given clothing, though some folktales recounted that they were offended by inferior quality of the garments given, and others merely stated it, some even recounting that the brownie was delighted with the gift and left with it.^[52] Other brownies left households or farms because they heard a complaint, or a compliment.^[53] People who saw the fairies were advised not to look closely, because they resented infringements on their privacy.^[54] The need to not offend them could lead to problems: one farmer found that fairies threshed his corn, but the threshing continued after all his corn was gone, and he concluded that they were stealing from his neighbors, leaving him the choice between offending them, dangerous in itself, and profiting by the theft.^[55]

Millers were thought by the Scots to be "no canny", owing to their ability to control the forces of nature, such as fire in the kiln, water in the burn, and for being able to set machinery a-whirring. Superstitious communities sometimes believed that the miller must be in league with the fairies. In Scotland fairies were often mischievous and to be feared. No one dared to set foot in the mill or kiln at night as it was known that the fairies brought their corn to be milled after dark. So long as the locals believed this then the miller could sleep secure in the knowledge that his stores were not being robbed. John Fraser, the miller of Whitehill claimed to have hidden and watched the fairies trying unsuccessfully to work the mill. He said he decided to come out of hiding and help them, upon which one of the fairy women gave him a gowpen (double handful of meal) and told him to put it in his empty girnal (store), saying that the store would remain full for a long time, no matter how much he took out.^[56]

It is also believed that to know the name of a particular fae could summon it to you and force it to do your bidding. The name could be used as an insult towards the Faerie in question, but it could also rather contradictorily be used to grant powers and gifts to the user.

Changelings

Main article: Changeling

A considerable amount of lore about fairies revolves around changelings, fairy children left in the place of stolen human babies.^[4] Older people could also be abducted; a woman who had just given birth and had yet to be churched was regarded as being in particular danger.^[57] A common thread in folklore is that eating the fairy food would trap the captive, as Persephone in Hades; this warning is often given to captives who escape by other people in the fairies' power, who are often described as captives who had eaten and so could not be freed.^[58] Folklore differed about the state of the captives: some held that they lived a merry life, others that they always pined for their old friends.^[59]

Classifications

Main article: Classifications of fairies

In Scottish folklore, fairies are divided into the Seelie Court, the more beneficently inclined (but still dangerous) fairies, and the Unseelie Court, the malicious fairies.While the fae from the Seelie court enjoyed playing pranks on humans they were usually harmless pranks, compared to the Unseelie court that enjoyed bringing harm to humans as entertainment.^[35]

Trooping fairies refer to fairies who appear in groups and might form settlements. In this definition, fairy is usually understood in a wider sense, as the term can also include various kinds of mythical creatures mainly of Celtic origin; however, the term might also be used for similar beings such as dwarves or elves from Germanic folklore. These are opposed to solitary fairies, who do not live or associate with others of their kind.^[60]

Legends

In many legends, the fairies are prone to kidnapping humans, either as babies, leaving changelings in their place, or as young men and women. This can be for a time or forever, and may be more or less dangerous to the kidnapped. In the 19th Century Child Ballad, "Lady Isabel and the Elf-Knight", the elf-knight is a Bluebeard figure, and Isabel must trick and kill him to preserve her life.^[61] Child Ballad "Tam Lin" reveals that the title character, though living among the fairies and having fairy powers, was in fact an "earthly knight" and, though his life was pleasant now, he feared that the fairies would pay him as their teind (tithe) to hell.^[61] Sir Orfeo tells how Sir Orfeo's wife was kidnapped by the King of Faerie and only by trickery and excellent harping ability was he able to win her back. Sir Degare narrates the tale of a woman overcome by her fairy lover, who in later versions of the story is unmasked as a mortal. Thomas the Rhymer shows Thomas escaping with less difficulty, but he spends seven years in Faerie. Oisín is harmed not by his stay in Faerie but by his return; when he dismounts, the three centuries that have passed catch up with him, reducing him to an aged man.^[62] King Herla also visited Fairy and returned three centuries later; although only some of his men crumbled to dust on dismounting, Herla and his men who did not dismount were trapped on horseback, this being one folkloric account of the origin of the Wild Hunt.^[63]

A common feature of the fairies is the use of magic to disguise appearance. Fairy gold is notoriously unreliable, appearing as gold when paid, but soon thereafter revealing itself to be leaves, gorse blossoms, gingerbread cakes, or a variety of other useless things.^[64]

These illusions are also implicit in the tales of fairy ointment. Many tales from the British islands tell of a mortal woman summoned to attend a fairy birth — sometimes attending a mortal, kidnapped woman's childbed. Invariably, the woman is given something for the child's eyes, usually an ointment; through mischance, or sometimes curiosity, she uses it on one or both of her own eyes. At that point, she sees where she is; one midwife realizes that she was not attending a great lady in a fine house but her own runaway maid-servant in a wretched cave. She escapes without making her ability known, but sooner or later betrays that she can see the fairies. She is invariably blinded in that eye, or in both if she used the ointment on both.^[65]

Fairy Funerals : There have been claims by people in the past, like William Blake, to have seen fairy funerals. Allan Cunningham (author) in his Lives of Eminent British Painters records that William Blake claimed to have seen a fairy funeral. 'Did you ever see a fairy's funeral, madam? said Blake to a lady who happened to sit next to him. 'Never, Sir!' said the lady. 'I have,' said Blake, 'but not before last night.' And he went on to tell how, in his garden, he had seen 'a procession of creatures of the size and colour of green and grey grashoppers, bearing a body laid out on a rose-leaf, which they buried with songs, and then disappeared'. They are believed to be an omen of death.

Literature

"Prince Arthur and the Fairy Queen" by Johann Heinrich Füssli; scene from The Faerie Queene

Fairies appeared in medieval romances as one of the beings that a knight errant might encounter. A fairy lady appeared to Sir Launfal and demanded his love; like the fairy bride of ordinary folklore, she imposed a prohibition on him that in time he violated. Sir Orfeo's wife was carried off by the King of Faerie. Huon of Bordeaux is aided by King Oberon.^[66] These fairy characters dwindled in number as the medieval era progressed; the figures became wizards and enchantresses.^[67] Morgan Le Fey, whose connection to the realm of faerie is implied in her name, in Le Morte d'Arthur is a woman whose magic powers stem from study.^[68] While somewhat diminished with time, fairies never completely vanished from the tradition. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a late tale, but the Green Knight himself is an otherworldly being.^[67] Edmund Spenser featured fairies in The Faerie Queene.^[69] In many works of fiction, fairies are freely mixed with the nymphs and satyrs of classical tradition;^[70] while in others (e.g. Lamia), they were seen as displacing the Classical beings. Fifteenth century poet and monk John Lydgate wrote that King Arthur was crowned in "the land of the fairy", and taken in his death by four fairy queens, to Avalon where he lies under a "fairy hill", until he is needed again.^[71]

Study for The Quarrel of Oberon and Titania by Noel Paton: fairies in Shakespeare

Fairies appear as significant characters in William Shakespeare's A Midsummer's Night Dream, which is set simultaneously in the woodland, and in the realm of Fairyland, under the light of the moon.^[72] and in which a disturbance of Nature caused by a fairy dispute creates tension underlying the plot and informing the actions of the characters. According to Maurice Hunt, Chair of the English Department at Baylor University, the blurring of the identities of fantasy and reality makes possible “that pleasing, narcotic dreaminess associated with the fairies of the play”.^[73]

Shakespeare's contemporary, Michael Drayton features fairies in his Nimphidia; from these stem Alexander Pope's sylphs of The Rape of the Lock, and in the mid 1600s, précieuses took up the oral tradition of such tales to write fairy tales; Madame d'Aulnoy invented the term contes de fée ("fairy tale").^[74] While the tales told by the précieuses included many fairies, they were less common in other countries' tales; indeed, the Brothers Grimm included fairies in their first edition, but decided this was not authentically German and altered the language in later editions, changing each "Fee" (fairy) to an enchantress or wise woman.^[75] J. R. R. Tolkien described these tales as taking place in the land of Faerie.^[76] Additionally, not all folktales that feature fairies are generally categorized as fairy tales.

Fairies in literature took on new life with Romanticism. Writers such as Sir Walter Scott and James Hogg were inspired by folklore which featured fairies, such as the Border ballads. This era saw an increase in the popularity of collecting of fairy folklore, and an increase in the creation of original works with fairy characters.^[77] In Rudyard Kipling's Puck of Pook's Hill, Puck holds to scorn the moralizing fairies of other Victorian works.^[78] The period also saw a revival of older themes in fantasy literature, such as C.S. Lewis's Narnia books which, while featuring many such classical beings as fauns and dryads, mingles them freely with hags, giants, and other creatures of the folkloric fairy tradition.^[79] Victorian flower fairies were popularized in part by Queen Mary’s keen interest in fairy art, and by British illustrator and poet Cicely Mary Barker's series of eight books published in 1923 through 1948. Imagery of fairies in literature became prettier and smaller as time progressed.^[80] Andrew Lang, complaining of "the fairies of polyanthuses and gardenias and apple blossoms" in the introduction to The Lilac Fairy Book, observed that "These fairies try to be funny, and fail; or they try to preach, and succeed."^[81]

Fairies are seen in Neverland, in the novel Peter and Wendy, the version of James Barrie's famous Peter Pan stories that was published in 1911. In the part of the story where Peter Pan and the lost boys had built a house for Wendy on Neverland, he stays up late that night to guard her from the pirates, but then the story says: "After a time he fell asleep, and some unsteady fairies had to climb over him on their way home from an orgy. Any of the other boys obstructing the fairy path at night they would have mischiefed, but they just tweaked Peter's nose and passed on."^[82]

Fairies in art

See also: Fairy painting

"Momentarily, she was trans-formed into a little, exquisitely beautiful fairy". Illustration from Alfred Smedberg's The Seven Wishes among Gnomes and Trolls by John Bauer.

Images of fairies have appeared as illustrations, often in books of fairy tales, as well as in photographic-based media and sculpture. Some artists known for their depictions of fairies include Cicely Mary Barker, Arthur Rackham, Brian Froud, Alan Lee, Amy Brown, David Delamare, Meredith Dillman, Jasmine Becket-Griffith, Warwick Goble, Kylie InGold, Ida Rentoul Outhwaite, Myrea Pettit, Florence Harrison, Nene Thomas, Gustave Doré, Rebecca Guay and Greta James.

The Victorian era was particularly noted for fairy paintings. The Victorian painter Richard Dadd created paintings of fairy-folk with a sinister and malign tone. Other Victorian artists who depicted fairies include John Atkinson Grimshaw, Joseph Noel Paton, John Anster Fitzgerald and Daniel Maclise.^[83] Interest in fairy-themed art enjoyed a brief renaissance following the publication of the Cottingley Fairies photographs in 1917 and a number of artists turned to painting fairy themes.

Fairies in popular culture

See List of fairy and sprite characters

See also

• Pixie
• Fairy Investigation Society
• The Fairy witch trials of Sicily

Bibliography

• D. L. Ashliman, Fairy Lore: A Handbook (Greenwood, 2006)
• Brian Froud and Alan Lee, Faeries, (Peacock Press/Bantam, New York, 1978)
• Ronan Coghlan Handbook of Fairies (Capall Bann, 2002)
• Lizanne Henderson and Edward J. Cowan, ''Scottish Fairy Belief: A History'' (Edinburgh, 2001; 2007)
• C. S. Lewis, The Discarded Image: An Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature (1964)
• Patricia Lysaght, The Banshee: the Irish Supernatural Death Messenger (Glendale Press, Dublin, 1986)
• Peter Narvaez, The Good People, New Fairylore Essays (Garland, New York, 1991)
• Eva Pocs, Fairies and Witches at the boundary of south-eastern and central Europe FFC no 243 (Helsinki, 1989)
• Joseph Ritson, Fairy Tales, Now First Collected: To which are prefixed two dissertations: 1. On Pygmies. 2. On Fairies, London, 1831
• Diane Purkiss, Troublesome Things: A History of Fairies and Fairy Stories (Allen Lane, 2000)
• Tomkinson, John L. Haunted Greece: Nymphs, Vampires and other Exotika, (Anagnosis, 2004) ISBN 960-88087-0-7

References

1. ^ Briggs, Katharine Mary (1976) An Encyclopedia of Fairies. New York, Pantheon Books. "Euphemistic names for fairies" p. 127 ISBN 0-394-73467-X.
2. ^ Briggs (1976) p. xi.
3. ^ Lewis, C. S. (1994 (reprint)) The Discarded Image: An Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. p. 122 ISBN 0-521-47735-2.
4. ^ ^{a b c d e} Silver, Carole B. (1999) Strange and Secret Peoples: Fairies and Victorian Consciousness. Oxford University Press. p. 47 ISBN 0-19-512199-6.
5. ^ ^{a b} Yeats, W. B. (1988) "Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry", in A Treasury of Irish Myth, Legend, and Folklore. Gramercy. p.1 ISBN 0-517-489904-X.
6. ^ Briggs (1976) pp. 335–6.
7. ^ ^{a b} Briggs (1976) p. 25.
8. ^ Briggs (1976) p. 98.
9. ^ Yeats (1988) p. 2.
10. ^ Briggs (1976) p. 148.
11. ^ Briggs, K.M. (1967) The Fairies in English Tradition and Literature. Chicago, University of Chicago Press. p. 71.
12. ^ Lewis (1994) p. 136.
13. ^ Briggs (1976) p. 15.
14. ^ Briggs (1976) pp. 68–9.
15. ^ Henry Tegner, Ghosts of The North Country, 1991 Butler Publishing ISBN 0946928401.
16. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 15.
17. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 141.
18. ^ Lewis (1994) p. 134.
19. ^ Silver (1999) p. 38.
20. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 146.
21. ^ Lewis (1994) pp. 135–6.
22. ^ Briggs (1976) p. 319.
23. ^ Yeats (1988) pp. 9–10.
24. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 9.
25. ^ Lewis (1994) p. 137.
26. ^ Briggs (1976) "Origins of fairies" p. 320.
27. ^ Briggs (1976) p. 223.
28. ^ Briggs (1976) "Traffic with fairies" and "Trooping fairies" pp. 409–12.
29. ^ Lewis (1994) p. 138.
30. ^ ^{a b c} Briggs (1967) pp. 143–7.
31. ^ ^{a b} Evans-Wentz, W. Y. (1966, 1990) The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries. New York, Citadel. pp. 167, 243, 457 ISBN 0-8065-1160-5.
32. ^ J. M. Barrie, Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens and Peter and Wendy, Oxford Press, 1999, p. 32.
33. ^ Witchcraft and the Mystery Tradition.
34. ^ Yolen, Jane (2000) Touch Magic. p. 49 ISBN 0-87483-591-7.
35. ^ ^{a b c} Froud, Brian and Lee, Alan (1978) Faeries. New York, Peacock Press ISBN 0-553-01159-6.
36. ^ Silver (1999) p. 45.
37. ^ Silver (1999) p. 50.
38. ^ Silver (1999) p. 44.
39. ^ The Religion of the Ancient Celts: Chapter XI. Primitive Nature Worship.
40. ^ Silver (1999) pp. 40–1.
41. ^ Terri Windling, "Fairies in Legend, Lore, and Literature".
42. ^ Briggs (1976) p. 80.
43. ^ Briggs (1976) p. 41.
44. ^ Briggs (1976) "Bells" p. 20.
45. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 74.
46. ^ Opie, Iona and Tatem, Moira (eds) (1989) A Dictionary of Superstitions Oxford University Press. p. 38.
47. ^ Lewis (1994) p. 125.
48. ^ Silver (1999) p. 155.
49. ^ Lenihan, Eddie and Green, Carolyn Eve (2004) Meeting The Other Crowd: The Fairy Stories of Hidden Ireland. pp. 146–7 ISBN 1-58542-206-1.
50. ^ Lenihan (2004) p. 125.
51. ^ Silver (1999) p. 152.
52. ^ Briggs (1976) "Brownies" p. 46.
53. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 34.
54. ^ Briggs (1976) "Infringement of fairy privacy" p. 233.
55. ^ Briggs (1976) "Fairy morality" p. 115.
56. ^ Gauldie, E. (1981) The Scottish Miller 1700 – 1900. Edinburgh, John McDonald. p. 187.
57. ^ Silver (1999) p. 167.
58. ^ Briggs (1976) pp. 62–66.
59. ^ Yeats (1988) p. 47.
60. ^ Briggs (1976) "Traffic with fairies" and "Trooping fairies" pp. 409-12.
61. ^ ^{a b} Child, Francis The English and Scottish Popular Ballads.
62. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 104.
63. ^ Briggs (1967) pp. 50–1.
64. ^ Lenihan (2004) pp. 109–10.
65. ^ Briggs (1976) "Fairy ointment" p. 156.
66. ^ Lewis (1994) pp. 129–30.
67. ^ ^{a b} Briggs (1976) "Fairies in medieval romances" p. 132.
68. ^ Briggs (1976) "Morgan Le Fay" p. 303.
69. ^ Briggs (1976) "Faerie Queen", p. 130.
70. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 174.
71. ^ The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Fairies, Anna Franklin, Sterling Publishing Company, 2004, p. 18.
72. ^ Shakespeare, William (1979). Harold F. Brooks. ed. The Arden Shakespeare "A Midsummer Nights Dream". Methuen & Co. Ltd.. cxxv. ISBN 0415026997. 
73. ^ Hunt, Maurice. "Individuation in A Midsummer Night's Dream." South Central Review 3.2 (Summer 1986): 1–13.
74. ^ Zipes, Jack (2000) The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: From Straparola and Basile to the Brothers Grimm. W. W. Norton. p. 858 ISBN 0-393-97636-X.
75. ^ Tatar, Maria (2003) The Hard Facts of the Grimms' Fairy Tales. Princeton University Press. p. 31 ISBN 0-691-06722-8.
76. ^ Tolkien, J. R. R. "On Fairy-Stories", The Tolkien Reader, pp. 10–11.
77. ^ Briggs, (1967) pp. 165–7.
78. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 203.
79. ^ Briggs (1967) p. 209.
80. ^ "Lewis pp. 129-130".
81. ^ Lang, Andrew Preface The Lilac Fairy Book.
82. ^ J.M.Barrie, Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens as well Peter and Wendy, Oxford Press, 1999, p. 132.
83. ^ Windling, Terri, "Victorian Fairy Paintings".

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Fairies

• Academic discussion on BBC Radio 4's In Our Time, May 11, 2006 (streaming and podcast)
• Audio recording of a traditional fairy story from Newfoundland, Canada (streaming and downloadable formats)

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Dansk (Danish)
n. - fe, alf, homoseksuel, bøsse
adj. - fe-, alfe-, eventyr-, fin, let

idioms:

• fairy godmother    god fe, velgører
• fairy lamp    kulørt elektrisk pære
• fairy lights    kulørte elektriske pærer
• fairy ring    ringplet
• fairy story    eventyr, røverhistorie
• fairy tale    eventyr, røverhistorie

Nederlands (Dutch)
fee, homo (negatief)

Français (French)
n. - fée, tapette (injur)
adj. - féerique

idioms:

• fairy godmother    bonne fée, (fig) marraine gâteau
• fairy lamp    lampe magique
• fairy lights    (GB) guirlande électrique
• fairy ring    auréole
• fairy story    histoire/conte de fée, histoire à dormir debout
• fairy tale    histoire/conte de fée, histoire à dormir debout

Deutsch (German)
n. - Fee, (Slang)(abwert.) Schwuler
adj. - zauberhaft

idioms:

• fairy godmother    gute Fee
• fairy lamp    Keramiklampe, Glaslampe
• fairy lights    kleine bunte Lichter
• fairy ring    (Bot.) Hexenring
• fairy story    Märchen
• fairy tale    Märchen

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - νεράιδα, (καθομ.) ομοφυλόφιλος, αδερφή

idioms:

• fairy godmother    καλή νεράιδα
• fairy lamp    χαρτοφάναρο
• fairy lights    χαρτοφάναρα
• fairy ring    (κυκλικό) τεμάχιο γρασιδιού με διαφορετικό χρώμα
• fairy story    παραμύθι
• fairy tale    παραμύθι

Italiano (Italian)
fata

idioms:

• fairy godmother    benefattrice
• fairy lights    lampioncini
• fairy ring    circolo magico
• fairy story/tale    fiaba

Português (Portuguese)
n. - fada (f)

idioms:

• fairy godmother    fada-madrinha (f)
• fairy lamp    lâmpada (f) decorativa (na árvore de Nata)
• fairy lights    luzes (f pl) decorativas (na árvore de Natal)
• fairy ring    círculo (m) de vegetação mais escura, em florestas, prados, etc.
• fairy story/tale    conto (m) de fadas

Русский (Russian)
фея, волшебница, гомосексуалист

idioms:

• fairy godmother    добрая фея
• fairy lamp    цветные фонарики
• fairy lights    китайские фонарики
• fairy ring    грибы, растущие кругом
• fairy story/tale    сказка, небылица

Español (Spanish)
n. - hada, hombre homosexual
adj. - relativo a las hadas, imaginario

idioms:

• fairy godmother    hada madrina, bienhechora, patrocinadora
• fairy lamp    una lámpara con una vela como fuente de luz, usualmente hecha de vidrio o cerámica con una base metálica
• fairy lights    lamparitas de colores
• fairy ring    anillo mágico, círculo oscuro de hierba
• fairy story    cuento de hadas
• fairy tale    cuento de hadas

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - älva

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
仙女, 精灵, 仙女的

idioms:

• fairy godmother    恩人, 仙女
• fairy lamp    仙灯
• fairy lights    彩色小灯
• fairy ring    仙人圈
• fairy story    童话故事
• fairy tale    神话故事, 谎言, 童话

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 仙女, 精靈
adj. - 仙女的

idioms:

• fairy godmother    恩人, 仙女
• fairy lamp    仙燈
• fairy lights    彩色小燈
• fairy ring    仙人圈
• fairy story    童話故事
• fairy tale    神話故事, 謊言, 童話

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 요정 동성애의 남자
adj. - 요정 같은, 가공의, 상상의

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 妖精
adj. - 妖精の, 妖精のような

idioms:

• fairy godmother    主人公を助ける妖精, 親切な人
• fairy lamp    豆ランプ
• fairy lights    豆電球
• fairy ring    妖精の輪, 菌環
• fairy story/tale    おとぎ話, 作り話

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) جن‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮פייה, הומו‬
adj. - ‮דמוי פייה, עדין, קטן‬

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