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The size of faeries is one of the most hotly-debated subjects related to the magickal world.
Many people tried to protect themselves from faeries. For example, a pattern of iron nails in a front door stopped faeries from entering the home. Scissors near a baby's cradle kept the child from being swapped with a changeling. The bell around the cow's neck prevented faeries from drawing close enough to sour the milk. Attitudes changed when Shakespeare presented an entirely fresh view of faeries in A Midsummer Night's Dream. In this play, Robin Goodfellow was a mere prankster. This was an almost revolutionary concept. A few earlier works (including a poem attributed to Ben Jonson) introduced the concept of friendly faeries, but it was Shakespeare's play which made this idea credible and popular. When did the faeries become the "little people?" The term may have been a sarcastic one, since most faeries are human-size or larger. Perhaps the expression was taken literally by people who did not see the faeries. We really don't know where this idea began. The first known representation of small faeries was in the 16th century play, Endimion, by John Lyly. However, up through the early 19th century, folklore and actual experience maintained the idea of large faerie folk. Many people blame the change on the faked Cottingley Glen photos, showing faeries exclusively as tiny creatures with wings. No doubt, these images contribute to today's misconceptions. However, the surge of affordable magazines and books in the late 19th century, probably misled people as much as any single source of information. Because the print (and, later, video) media are entertainment, they often present fiction with the intention of convincing us--at least briefly--that it is real. Cute faerie images sold magazines and books, so that's what was featured. As the faeries retreated from our increasingly busy world, the public relied more upon the media for their concepts of Otherworlds. Thus, today's most popular image of a faerie is a cute figure, a few inches tall at most, with wings. Peter Pan's Tinkerbell may be a child's earliest image of a faerie. That's not to say that there are no small faeries. Certainly, there seem to be. However, the important study, Conjuring Up Philip, showed us that it's possible that belief has contributed to the appearance of small faeries, not vice versa. Go To Page: 1 2
The copyright of the article Big faeries, little faeries in Spirits, Ghosts & Legends is owned by Fiona Broome. Permission to republish Big faeries, little faeries in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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