There are a lot of people out there who do not have any belief in faeries. They think
that they are just made up beings for children's stories. But faeries have been around
forever, children see because they are not weighed down with adult worries. Faeries
are a part of everyday life wether you believe in them or not. And to show the truth
in that statement you can look up the word faerie in any of our everyday reference books
and you will see them there in black and white. The following page is dedicated to our
dictionary and encyclopedia definitions of the fae.

Taken from The American Heritage Dictionary high-school edition, 1981.

Faerie- Also Faery 1. A Fairy. 2. The land or realm of the fairies.
3. Of or like a fairy or fairies. 4. Enchanted, visionary, fanciful. [Middle
English: faiere, fairie]

Fairy- 1. A tiny supernatural being in human form, depicted as clever,
mischevious, and capable of assisting or harassing humans. 2. Of or associated
with the fairies. 3. Resembling a fairy; fanciful, graceful, or delicate. [Middle
English: faiere; From Old French: faerie, faierie, enchanment from fae, fairy;
From Latin: Fata, the fates, plural of fatum.]


Definitions taken from Collier's Encyclopedia, Volume 8, 1957 (yes, I know it is old).

Elf- Creations of Teutonic mythology, elves are usually prankish,
cause illness and unpleasant dreams, steal children, and attack cattle.
In England prehistoric bolts and arrows have been found which it is
believed, were used by elves to harm cattle. Known as elf bolts and
elf arrows, these relics are worn as protection against lightning, but
it is believed also that they exercise evil influence. Elves belong to a
well-populated world of sprites which includes undines, salamanders,
and gnomes, identified respectively with water, fire, and earth. Elves,
less than a young girl's thumb in size, belong to the air.In spite of their
diminutive size they can hurl huge rocks, bind a strong man, and shake
a well-constructed house. At times elves become domestic servants,
sweeping, dusting, and cleaning, but if they are not fed and otherwise
cared for to their liking, they are easily offended and become vengefully
destructive.

In fanciful descriptions of them, elves are either light or dark, the light
elves having starlike eyes, and faces brighter than the sun, and golden-
colored hair; the dark elves are pitch black and ugly, these traits being
indicative of their evil charcter. Elves usually wear glass slippers and
caps with a little bell. Their habitat varies with the seasons. In winter
they live in secret mountain caves; on spring mornings blossoms are their
home, but at twilight they gambol in moonlit fields. Although usually
invisible, they can be seen by children who were born on Sunday, and
also by others before whom the elves choose to appear.

Fairy- In general, fairies resemble elves, but are described as a few
inches tall and almost transparent. Malevolent fairies are responsible
for diseases of cattle and for the deaths of people who die suddenly for
apparently no other reason. Cautious Irish peasants placate fairies by
calling them "The Good People." The word is derived from fie, faerie
(originally the Latin fatum- fate or destiny) and thus belief in fairies may
be viewed as a personified form of fatalism. The superstition is deeply
rooted among many nationalities.

The ancient Greeks evidently believed in fairies, for in Homer his heroes
have fairy lemans or nymphs. Among the Eskimo and America Indians,
the bird-bride and beaver-bride belong to fairy tradition. In Irish folk-
lore, fairies are organized into human-like groups having corresponding
activities. Whirls of dust are caused by the fairy army on the march. In
The English Parnassus Joshua Poole (seventeenth century) gives the names
of members of fairy courts: Oberon, the king or emperor; Mab, the queen
or empress; Perriwidgin, Perriwinkle, Puck, Hobgoblin, Tomalino, Tom
Thumb, courtiers; Hop, Mop, Drop, Pip, Drip, Skip, Tub, Tick, Pick,
Quick, Gill, Ion, Tit, Wap, Win, Wit, maids of honor; and Nymphidia,
the mother of the maids. Grimm's Fairy Tales, by the brothers Jacob and
Wilhelm Grimm, Edmund Spenser's Fairy Queene, and Shakespeare's
Midsummer Night's Dream are classical descriptions of the character and
habits of fairies.

Definitions taken from The Encyclopedia of Fantasy by John Clute and John Grant,
published 1997. Not exactly an everyday reference, I know, but I thought I would include
it anyway.

Faerie- Faerie, is the Land of the fairies, or Fairyland. It is therefore an otherworld perhaps linked ot ours, though access is seldom physical in the normal sense. The most common methods of access are by going into the woods, by river, by being transported by the winds (usually the North Wind) or by dreams (though Faerie is seldom portrayed as dreamland; rather, memory of being there is as of a dream). Since Fairies were once believed part of our own world, the concept of faerie was a late developement in mythography. Faerie was more closely associated with the underworld where one passed after death, whether a heaven or a hell. The worlds were ruled by spirits equated with fairies, such as Gwynn ap Nudd in Celtic Mythology, or Arawn the King of Annwn. Avalon, ruled by Morgan Le Fey, was another Faerie-Realm linked to the afterlife, as was Tir-Nan-Og..... The very elusiveness of Faerie has been compared to that of of the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow, and thus fairyland may be percieved as over the rainbow.... Fairies- "Fairy" is an anglicization of the french faerie, which absorbed and largely displaced the Anglo-Saxon "Elf" after the Norman Conquest. The term first became common in the 13th century, although many relevant foltales involving such beings had already been recorded by chroniclers....