Fairy

sb. and a. Forms: 4 feir-, feyr-i(e, -ye, (5 fery, 6 feirie), 4–5 fai-, fayerie, -ye, (4 fayryȝe), 4–6 fair-, fayr-é, -ey, -ie, -y(e, (6 fayere, 6–7 pharie, 7 farie, phair-, pherie), 4– fairy; also FAERIE, -Y. [a. OF. faerie, faierie (mod.F. féerie), f. OF. fae (mod.F. fée) FAY sb.²]

  A.  sb.

  † 1.  The land or home of the fays; fairy-land. Obs.: see FAERIE.

c. 1320.  Orfeo, 273.

c. 1386.  Chaucer, Sqr.’s T., 88. Though he were comen ayeyn out of ffairye.

c. 1400.  Maundev. I (Roxb.), xvi. 73. A sperhawke sittand apon a perke, and a faire lady of Fairye sittand þerby.

1593.  Drayton, Eclogues, iii. 15. [Collin] is to fayrie gone a Pilgrimage.

1610.  B. Jonson, Alch., I. ii.

  † 2.  A collective term for the fays or inhabitants of fairyland; fairy-folk. Obs.

c. 1320.  Orfeo, 189. Awey with the fayré sche was ynome.

c. 1350.  Will. Palerne, 230. Þemperour wend witerly for wonder of þat child, þat feiȝþely it were of feyrye.

c. 1489.  Caxton, Sonnes of Aymon, xiv. 337. The horse … that cam of the fery.

1523.  Ld. Berners, Froiss., II. ccxxiv. [ccxx.] 700. Suche as knowe the condycions of that isle, affyrmeth that the fayry and the nympes be moche conuersaunt there.

c. 1540.  Pilgrim’s Tale, 88.

1603.  Philotus, cxxviii.

  † 3.  Enchantment, magic; a magic contrivance; an illusion, a dream. Obs.

c. 1300.  K. Alis., 6924. That thou herdest is fairye.

c. 1310.  E. E. P. (1862), 134. Hit nis but fantum and feiri.

1362.  Langl., P. Pl., A. Prologus, 6. Me bi-fel a ferly · A Feyrie me þouhte.

c. 1430.  Pilgr. Lyf Manhode, II. xxxvi. (1869), 89. I wot not what this tokeneth, but if it be a fairye.

a. 1533.  Ld. Berners, Huon, clvi. 595. To y³ entente that the monke shuld not begyle hym, thus by the fayrey and enchauntement.

  4.  One of a class of supernatural beings of diminutive size, in popular belief supposed to possess magical powers and to have great influence for good or evil over the affairs of man. See ELF and FAY sb.²

1393.  Gower, Conf., II. 371. And as he were a fairie.

c. 1450.  Voc., in Wr.-Wüulcker, 571. Cavni, fayryes.

1563.  Fulke, Meteors (1640), 68 b. Those round circles which are seen in many feilds, that ignorant People affirme to be the rings of the Fairies dances.

1583.  Sempill, Ballates, xxxv. 210. Ane carling of the Queue of Phareis.

1650.  Baxter, Saint’s R., II. (1654), 270. He wonders that any should deny that there are such Spirits as from the effect are called Hags (or Fairies,) that is, such as exercise familiarity with men, and do without hurting mens bodies, come to them, and trouble them, and as it were, play with them.

1743.  Collins, Epistle to Sir Thomas Hanmer, 97.

1813.  Shelley, Q. Mab, 167. I am the Fairy Mab.

1832.  W. Irving, Alhambra, I. 128. She is small enough to be a fairy, and a fairy she may be for aught I can find out.

1891.  Daily News, 30 Oct., 5/1. The first appearance of the conventional Fairy … is made in Perrault’s ‘Contes’ (1697).

  b.  Fairy of the mine: a goblin supposed to inhabit mines. (The designation is used by Milton; later writers use it as the equivalent of the German kobold or gnome.) † Fairy of the sea: a Nereid.

1555.  Eden, Decades (Arb.), 74. If they be wrought with the cunninge hande of Phidias or Praxiteles, and shaped to the similitude of the fayre nimphes or fayeres of the sea (cauled Nereiades) or the fayres of the wods (cauled Hamadriades) they shal neuer lacke byers.

1607.  Topsell, Four-f. Beasts (1673), 261. The Virgin lived among the Pharies of the Sea.

1634.  [see FAERIE 3].

18[?].  Scot. Encycl., s.v. The Germans believed in two species of Fairies of the Mines.

  5.  transf. † a. One possessing more than human power; an enchantress. Obs.

1606.  Shaks., Ant. & Cl., IV. viii. 12. To this great faiery [Cleopatra], Ile commend thy acts.

  b.  A small graceful woman or child.

1838.  Lytton, Alice, 21. Miss Merton herself, if more at her ease, was equally surprised by the beauty and unconscious grace of the young fairy before her.

  B.  adj.

  1.  Of or pertaining to fairies; of the nature of fairies; enchanted, illusory, fictitious.

c. 1640.  Waller, To one who libelled C’tess Carlisle, iii.

1699.  Bentley, Phal., 286. Phalaris is still to be indicted for a Sophist; for saying his two Fairy Poets wrote Tragedies against him.

1713.  The Guardian, No. 141, 22 Aug., ¶ 1. The desire of fame grows languid in a few years, and thoughts of ease and convenience erase the fairy images of glory and honour.

1821.  Shelley, Epipsych., 192.

  2.  Resembling a fairy, fairy-like; delicate, finely formed or woven.

1788.  W. Gilpin, Mount. & Lakes, II. 223. Little fairy scenes, where the parts, tho trifling, are happily disposed.

1838.  Lytton, Alice, II. ii. Delicate and fairy cast of beauty so well became her graceful abandon of manner.

a. 1839.  Praed, Poems (1864), I. 229, ‘L’Inconnue.’

1864.  Tennyson, Aylmer’s F., 91.

1883.  Aldrich, Ponkapog to Pesth, 243. Fairy textures from looms of Samarcand.

  C.  attrib. and Comb.

  1.  General relations: a. simple attrib., as fairy-arrow, -book, etc.; also in various local names for the Foxglove (Digitalis purpurea), fairy-bell, -cap, -fingers, -glove, -thimble, -weed; b. appositive, as fairy-folk, -godmother; c. instrumental and originative, as fairy-born, -haunted, -pencilled adjs.; d. parasynthetic and similative, as fairy-featured, -formed, -like adjs.

1864.  Tennyson, Aylmer’s F., 94.

1870.  Science Gossip, 1 June, 135. In Anglo-Irish we call it [the Foxglove] … *fairy bell.

1850.  Mrs. Browning, Poems, II. 213, ‘L. E. L.’s Last Question.’

1871.  Palgrave, Lyrical Poems, 11, ‘Melusine.’

c. 1620.  The Convert Soule, in Farr, S. P. Jas. I. (1848), 89.

1828.  Miss Mitford, Village, 3rd Ser. (1863), 83. The prettier Irish name of that superb plant [the fox-glove], the *fairy-cap.

1681.  Dryden, The Spanish Friar, II. i.

1778.  Langhorne, Owen of Carron, lxvii. The *fairy-featured vale.

1878–86.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n. *Fairy fingers, Digitalis purpurea L.

1513.  Douglas, Æneis, VIII. vi. 7.

1827.  Pollok, The Course of Time, III.

1864.  Tennyson, Aylmer’s F., 88.

1816.  Byron, Ch. Har., III. cii.

1870.  Science Gossip, 1 June, 135. Its [foxglove’s] other name *‘fairy glove.’

1883.  Ouida, Wanda, I. 43–4. An old lady, but so delicate, so charming, so pretty, so fragile, that she seemed lovelier than all the young ones; a very *fairy godmother, covered up in lace and fur, and leaning on a gold-headed cane, and wearing red shoes with high gilt heels, and smiling with serene blue eyes, as though she had just stepped down out of a pictured copy of Cinderella, and could change common pumpkins into gilded chariots, and mice into horses, at a wish.

1792.  S. Rogers, The Pleasures of Memory, II. 3.

1603.  S. Harsnet, Declaration of Egregious Popish Impostures, 21. The poore wench was so *Fayrie haunted, as she durst not goe, especially to Ma: Dibdale his chamber alone.

1891.  Sale Catal. Glass Wks. Stourbridge. Five *fairy lamps.

1598.  Shaks., Merry W., IV. iv. 57.

1840.  Dickens, Old C. Shop, i. So very young, so spiritual, so slight and fairy-like a creature passing the long dull nights in such an uncongenial place,—I could not dismiss it from my thoughts.

1867.  Deutsch, Rem. (1874), 5. A book that would lead us through the stupendous labyrinths of fact, and thought, and fancy, of which the Talmud consists, that would rejoice even in hieroglyphical fairy-lore, in abstruse propositions and syllogisms, that could forgive wild outbursts of passion, and not judge harshly and hastily of things, the real meaning of which may have had to be hidden under the fool’s cap and bells.

1813.  Shelley, Q. Mab, I. 91.

1810.  Associate Minstrels, 105.

1884.  Holland, Chester Gloss., *Fairies’ Petticoats, the foxglove.

1794.  Mrs. Radcliffe, Myst. Udolpho, i.

1590.  Shaks., Mids. N., II. ii. 1. Queen. Come, now a Roundell, and a *Fairy song.

1864.  Tennyson, Aylmer’s F., 89. Told her *fairy-tales.

1878–86.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n. *Fairy Thimbles, Digitalis purpurea L.

1732.  Berkeley, Alciphr., VII. § 25. They have exposed their *fairy Ware not to cheat but divert us.

1870.  Science Gossip, 1 June, 135. In Anglo-Irish we call it [the Foxglove] … *fairy weed.

  2.  Special Comb.: fairies-arrow, = ELF-SHOT 2; fairies’ bath, Peziza coccinea; fairy-beads (see quot.); fairy-bell (see quot. 1861); fairy-bird (see quot.); fairy (fairies’) butter, (a) (see quot. 1777), (b) Tremella albida; fairy-cheeses, Malva rotundiflora, from the shape of the seeds; fairy-circle, (a) = FAIRY-RING, (b) a fairy-dance, (c) a circle of fairies dancing; hence fairy-circled a.; fairy-court, the court of some fairy king or queen; fairy-cucumber (see quot.); fairy-cups, (a) Primula veris, (b) = fairies’ bath; hence fairy-cupped a.; fairy-dance, (a) = FAIRY-RING, (b) dance of the fairies, in quot. fig.; fairy-dart, = ELF-SHOT; fairy-eggs (see quot.); fairy-fingermarks (see quot.); fairy-flax, Linum catharticum; fairy-grass Briza media; fairy-green, = FAIRY-RING; fairy-groat (see quot.); fairies’-hair, Cuscuta epithymum; fairy-hammer (see quot.); fairy-hillock (see quot.); fairies-horse, Senecio Jacobæa; fairy-lint, = fairy-flax; fairy-loaf (see quot.); fairy-martin, Australian name for Hirundo ariel; fairy-money, money given by fairies, said to crumble away rapidly; fairy-mushroom, a toadstool; † fairy-nips (see quot.); fairy-pavements, cubes used in Roman pavements; fairy-pipe, an old kind of tobacco-pipe, frequently dug up in Great Britain; fairy-purse (see quot.); fairy-queen, the queen of the fairies; fairy-rade, Sc., the expedition of the fairies to the place where they are to hold their annual banquet; fairy-shrimp, = Chirocephalus diaphanus, a British fresh-water crustacean; fairy-sparks (see quot. 1875); fairy-stone, (a) a fossil sea-urchin or echinite, (b) a flint arrow-head, = ELF-SHOT 2; fairies’-table, various fungi; fairy (fairies’)-treasure, -wealth, = fairy-money; † fairy-walk, = FAIRY-RING.

1794.  Sutherland, in Statist. Acc. Scotl., X. 15. The common people confidently assert, that they [celts] are *fairies arrows, which they shoot at cattle, when they instantly fall down dead, though the hide of the animal remains quite entire.

1878–86.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n. *Fairies’ Bath.

1831.  J. Hodgson, in Raine, Mem. (1858), II. 222. The bones were intermixed with a soil that was intimately filled with the crinoidea or enchrinal fossil, which in Cumberland is called *fairy beads, an in Northumberland St. Cuthbert’s beads.

1861.  Mrs. Lankester, Wild Flowers, 47. The tiny white flowers [of Wood Sorrel], with their delicate purple veins, are called by the Welsh *‘fairy bells,’ and are believed to ring the merry peals which call the elves to ‘Moonlight dance and revelry.’

1885.  Swainson, Prov. Names Brit. Birds, 204. Little Tern … *Fairy bird (Galway).

1777.  Brand, Pop. Antiq. (1813), II. 339. There is a substance found … in crevices of lime-stone rocks … near Holywell … which is called Menyn Tylna Teg or *Fairies Butter. So also in Northumberland the common people call a certain fungous excrescence, sometimes found about the roots of old trees, *Fairy Butter.

1878–86.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n. Fairy-Butter. Ibid., *Fairy cheeses.

1653.  H. More, Antid. Ath., III. xi. § 1. Those dark Rings in the grass, which they call *Fairy-Circles, whether they be the Rendezvous of Witches, or the dancing places of those little Puppet-Spirits, which they call Elves or Fairies.

1710.  Death of T. Whigg, II. 44. Tom, after he had giddy’d his Guests by a Chase of various Meanders and winding Ways, trod out Fairy Circles at the Head of each Tribe, danc’d away the Hays with them in regular Platoons.

1854.  in Proc. Berw. Nat. Club (1873) VII. 32. In the churchyard there is a large … fairy circle.

1859.  Tennyson, Guinevere, 255.

1777.  Warton, Monody, Poems, 7.

a. 1649.  Drumm. of Hawth., Poems, Wks. (1711), 44.

1708.  Phil. Trans., XXVI. 78. The Ecknite Spoke, or *Fairy Cucumber.

1878–86.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n. Fairy Cups.

1863.  Browning, Poems, By Fire-side, 59. The *fairy-cupped Elf-needled mat of moss.

1675.  Evelyn, Terra (1786), 63. A florid green circle, or *fairy dance, at the bottom, which the impregnated rains have enriched with what has washed from the heap.

1798.  Sotheby, trans. Wieland’s Oberon (1826), I. 51.

1877.  Brewer, Dict. Phrase & Fable, 284. *Fairy-darts, flint arrowheads now called celts.

1860.  J. F. Campbell, Tales W, Highl., I. Introd. 1. Fishermen … often find certain hard, light floating objects … which they call sea-nuts … and *fairy-eggs.

1869.  Peacock, Lonsdale Gloss. *‘Fairy finger-marks’ = Hollow marks in limestone, as if fingers had been pressed upon the stones when soft.

1841.  Longf., Wreck Hesp., ii. Blue were her eyes as the *fairy-flax.

1878–86.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n. *Fairy grass.

1819.  Edin. Mag., July, 19/1.

1577–87.  Harrison, England, II. II. xxiv. 218. Some peeces [of coine] … are dailie taken vp, which they call … *Feirie groats.

1627.  Drayton, Nymphidia, 71.

1878–86.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n. *Fairies’ hair.

1815.  Clan-Albin II. 240, note. *Fairy-hammers are pieces of green porphyry, shaped like the head of a hatchet.

1808–79.  Jamieson. *Fairy-hillocks … verdant knolls … from the vulgar idea that these were anciently inhabited by the fairies, or that they used to dance there.

1877.  Brewer, Dict. Phrase & Fable, 284. Fairy-hillocks.

1878–86.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n. *Fairies’ Horse. Ibid., *Fairy lint.

1877.  Brewer, Dict. Phrase & Fable, 284. *Fairy loaves … fossil sea-urchins (echini), said to be made by the fairies.

1865.  Gould, Handbk. Birds Australia, I. 113. The *Fairy Martin is dispersed over all the southern portions of Australia.

1690.  Locke, Hum. Und., I. iv. (1695), 38. Such borrowed Wealth, like *Fairy-money, though it were Gold in the Hand from which he received it, will be but Leaves and Dust when it comes to use.

1849.  Lytton, Caxtons, XVII. vi. Pisistratus draws the bills warily from his pocket, half suspecting they must already have turned into withered leaves, like fairy money; slowly convinces himself that the bills are good bills; and, by lively gestures, testifies his delight and astonishment.

1884.  Miller, Plant-n., 137. Toadstool … *Fairy-Mushroom. Any of the poisonous Fungi.

1656.  T. Ady, A Candle in the Dark, 129. There be also found in Women with Childe … certain spots black and blew, as if they were pinched or beaten, which some common ignorant people call *Fairy-nips.

1787.  Archæol., VIII. 364. Some small stone cubes … which the country people called *fairy pavements.

1867.  Chambers’ Encycl., s.v. Tobacco-pipes, From their smallness, some ancient tobacco-pipes are called *fairy pipes.

1877.  E. Peacock, Manley & Corringham Gloss. *Fairy-purses, a kind of fungus … something like a cup, or old-fashioned purse.

1590.  Shaks., Mids. N., II. i. 9. I serue the *Fairy Queene.

1813.  Shelley, Q. Mab, 59. The chariot of the Fairy Queen!

1859.  Tennyson, Elaine, 1248. Look how she sleeps—the Fairy Queen so fair!

1810.  Cromek, Remains Nithsdale Song, 298. At the first approach of summer is held the *‘Fairy Rade.’

c. 1820.  Hogg, Wool-gatherer, in Tales & Sk. (1837), I. 196. There have been fairy raids i’ the Hope, an’ mony ane ill fleyed.

1857.  A. White, Brit. Crustacea, 263. The *Fairy Shrimp seems to live on dead animal or vegetable matter.

1674.  Ray, S. & E. C. Words, 65. *Fairy-sparks or Shel-fire: Kent: often seen on clothes in the night.

1875.  Parish, Sussex Gloss., Fairy-sparks. Phosphoric light seen on various substances in the night-time.

1646.  Sir T. Browne, Pseud. Ep., II. i. 53. That we call a *Fayrie stone, and is often found in gravell pits amongst us.

1791.  Ford, in Statist. Acc. Scotl., I. 73. Adder-stones, arrow points of flint, commonly called elf or fairy stones, are to be seen here [Lauder].

1881.  Isle of Wight Gloss. Fairy stones, fossil echini.

1878–86.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n. *Fairies Table or Tables, (1) Agaricus campestris … (2) Hydrocotyle vulgaris.

[1632.  Massinger & Field, Fatal Dowry, IV. i.

1698.  Norris, Pract. Disc. (1707), IV. 15. Every man keeps it [Religion] as a Fairy-Treasure.

1686.  Phil. Trans., XVI. 207. The circles in Grasse called commonly *Fairy Walkes.

1652.  Brief Char. Low Countries 26 (Brand). She falls off like *Fairy Wealth disclosed.