In the 1485 book Le Morte d'Arthur, Morgan le Fay, whose connection to the realm of Faerie is implied in her name, is a woman whose magic powers stem from study. [91] While somewhat diminished with time, fairies never completely vanished from the tradition. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a 14th-century tale, but the Green Knight himself is an otherworldly being. [89] Edmund Spenser featured fairies in his 1590 book The Faerie Queene. [92] In many works of fiction, fairies are freely mixed with the nymphs and satyrs of classical tradition, [93] while in others (e.g., Lamia), they were seen as displacing the Classical beings. 15th-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. [94] The Quarrel of Oberon and Titania by Joseph Noel Paton (1849): fairies in Shakespeare The brownies obviously know Betty's rebellious nature and sure enough she takes no heed when she sets out for a stroll and chances to come across the instruction. With a little secret prodding behind the scenes, Betty ends up in Fairyland – a place she views with utter astonishment. There's a market place full of fairies, elves, brownies and gnomes and at first she thinks they're just children dressed up and wishes she had a fancy dress as well. Then, when a gnome offers her a magic spell she becomes a little cross. She tells him there aren't any fairies and of course that's a terrible thing to say in Fairyland of all places. No fairy drops dead though so the Peter Pan quote may apply only to pantomimes but it's certainly very bad manners to say such a thing and it makes the crowd very angry. The call goes out for Giant Putemright who will be asked to take Betty to prison but Betty's not hanging around and she takes to her heels. Boarding a train, she is whisked past fields of flowers and rose gardens and then in he distance she sees a Glittering Palace. Betty's in disgrace so she probably wouldn't have enjoyed the journey as much as we would have, but she sees the sights and even gets to meet the Fairy Queen who's just had the news imparted that Fairyland is hosting a child who doesn't believe in fairies. The Queen is grave and Betty is told that there is no way she can ever leave Fairyland because of her crime. Well ... there is one way. Untruthful Peggy is next and she makes the mistake of telling a fib to a fairy. You mustn't do that because if you do you'll be marched off to the Land of Pretence and that's not a nice place because no one will believe what you say no matter how truthful you are. Peggy does not enjoy her stay at all. About a century later (c. 335), Athanasius of Alexandria gives an exclusively negative assessment of these same creatures ( On the Incarnation 8.47) as simply "demons ...taking up their abode in springs or rivers or trees or stones and imposing upon simple people by their frauds." While such negative or skeptical ideas remained the majority positions for Christians, some exceptions can be found such as the Scottish minister Robert Kirk who wrote The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Fairies (1893). Richard Firth Green, Elf Queens and Holy Friars: Fairy Beliefs and the Medieval Church (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016)

The King of Fairyland holds a contest to find who can come up with the most useful idea – a prize will be given to the winner. Everyone is told about it excepting for ugly old Bufo the Toad who lives on the edge of Fairyland.Subverted in Seven Soldiers, where "Frankenstein in Fairyland" reveals Fairyland and the Sidhe/Sheeda to be the parasitic dregs of the human race from the Bad Future of One Billion A.D.; the Year Outside, Hour Inside effect is a side effect of being abducted by a race of time travelers. Betty doesn't believe in fairies! Apparently, every time a child says 'I don't believe in fairies' a little fairy somewhere, falls down dead. That information, found in the story of Peter Pan, places Betty near the level of a monster and the brownies who've heard the little girl's declaration decide to do something about it. They put up a sign that the girl's bound to see when she goes for a walk and this is what it says: There have been claims by people in the past, like William Blake, to have seen fairy funerals. Allan Cunningham in his Lives of Eminent British Painters records that William Blake claimed to have seen a fairy funeral: This eternal world is more real than the world we experience through the senses (or Empirical knowledge – knowledge based on our senses), and it is the object of knowledge, pure knowledge, not opinion. What Plato means by the Forms is that they are the essential archetypes of things, having an eternal existence, apprehended by the mind, not the senses, for it is the mind that beholds “real existence, colorless, formless, and intangible, they are behind the way we see the world. Yeats, W. B. (1988). "Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry". A Treasury of Irish Myth, Legend, and Folklore. Gramercy. p.1. ISBN 0-517-48904-X.

There is an outdated theory that fairy folklore evolved from folk memories of a prehistoric race: newcomers superseded a body of earlier human or humanoid peoples, and the memories of this defeated race developed into modern conceptions of fairies. Proponents find support in the tradition of cold iron as a charm against fairies, viewed as a cultural memory of invaders with iron weapons displacing peoples who had just stone, bone, wood, etc., at their disposal, and were easily defeated. 19th-century archaeologists uncovered underground rooms in the Orkney islands that resembled the Elfland described in Childe Rowland, [42] which lent additional support. In folklore, flint arrowheads from the Stone Age were attributed to the fairies as " elfshot", [43] while their green clothing and underground homes spoke to a need for camouflage and covert shelter from hostile humans, their magic a necessary skill for combating those with superior weaponry. In a Victorian tenet of evolution, mythic cannibalism among ogres was attributed to memories of more savage races, practising alongside "superior" races of more refined sensibilities. [44] Elementals Clark, Stephen R.L. (1987). "How to Believe in Fairies." Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy. 30 (4):337-355.

Will O’Wisp

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 Anster Fitzgerald, John Atkinson Grimshaw, Daniel Maclise, and Joseph Noel Paton. [108] 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. [ citation needed] Christian belief in fairies A kobold is a German house fairy similar to the Scottish brownie. But they tend to look younger and wear a brown cap and brown shorts. They are frequently benevolent and enjoy helping out around the house for hardworking people. But they can be mischievous and sometimes outright dangerous. One particular kobold by the name Hodekin became homicidal and had to be exorcised from his castle after killing a child and pushing the cook into the moat. Some legends say kobolds are sprites or even hobgoblins, and they don’t just live in houses. They are also seen aboard ships and in mines. 4. Pixies

Eason, Cassandra (2008). "Fabulous creatures, mythical monsters and animal power symbols". Fabulous creatures, mythical monsters, and animal power symbols: a handbook. Greenwood Publishing. pp.147, 148. ISBN 9780275994259 . Retrieved 11 May 2013.Fairy was used to represent: an illusion or enchantment; the land of the Faes; collectively the inhabitants thereof; an individual such as a fairy knight. [3] Faie became Modern English fay, while faierie became fairy, but this spelling almost exclusively refers to one individual (the same meaning as fay). In the sense of 'land where fairies dwell', archaic spellings faery and faerie are still in use. In Ireland, we have something called fairy mounds. Also called fairy forts or raths. These are essentially ruins of old Medieval forts, but can also be hills or ancient burial mounds. For centuries, at least since the late Medieval Age, the people believed these hills to be the dwellings of the fae folk. Many sightings tell of fairies entering and emerging from fairy mounds. These mounds are portals or doors to the fairy realm. Irish lore says never to disturb a fairy fort – even cutting trees or bushes that surround the fairy fort may warrant the individual’s untimely death. The word fairy was used to describe an individual inhabitant of Faerie before the time of Chaucer. [3]

While I’m inclined to scientifically rationalize and adhere to the previous theory, my magical self thinks the fae folk are more complicated than that. Many people today still believe in the fae, and that instead of being lost souls or fallen angels. Or even a race of small human beings, the fae folk are spiritual in nature. They are liminal creatures, meaning they can manifest in the physical but they are ethereal in form. And if they are truly spiritual beings, this means they can shapeshift and take nearly any form they choose. They could be giants or tiny pixies. A water-logged, majestic water horse like the kelpie or a hideous, human-eating troll under a bridge. They could even take the form of our worst fears or most beautiful dreams. Zaczek, Iain (2005). Angels & fairies. Internet Archive. London: Flame Tree. p.52. ISBN 978-1-84451-264-5. Review by Terry Gustafson Newnes published this book plus The Book of Brownies as later editions in similar format with attractive covers. The two volumes are rather "Special" in the sense that they are about the only two of the very early EB books that have survived through the years with several reprints of each. "Fairies" has the wrap-around picture and the artist is Horace Knowles who is quite well known to Enid Blyton Fans. Despite the similarity in titles, this book is not a saga as "Brownies" is but rather a collection of short stories that include such supernatural beings as Fairies (naturally), Witches, Wizards, Elves, Gnomes, Brownies and there's even one or two Giants. The Fairy Doors of Ann Arbor, MI are small doors installed into local buildings. Local children believe these are the front doors of fairy houses, and in some cases, small furniture, dishes, and various other things can be seen beyond the doors.Joseph Ritson, Fairy Tales, Now First Collected: To which are prefixed two dissertations: 1. On Pygmies. 2. On Fairies, London, 1831