elf
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: enpr: ĕlf
ipa: /ɛlf/
rhymes: -ɛlf
Forms: form: elves
form: elfs
form: elve
Etymology: From Middle English elf, from Old English ielf, ælf, from Proto-West Germanic *albi, from Proto-Germanic *albiz. Ultimately probably derived from Proto-Indo-European *h₂elbʰós (“white”). Doublet of alf, awf, and oaf. The modern fantasy literature sense was popularised by the works of J.R.R. Tolkien.
Senses: examples: text: […] if theyr children at any time vvere frowarde and vvanton, they would ſay to them that the Guelfe or the Gibeline came. VVhich vvords novve from them (as many thinge els) be come into our vſage, and for Guelfes and Gibelines, we ſay Elfes & Goblins.
ref: 1579, E. K., “[Iune. Ægloga Sexta.] Glosse.”, in Immeritô [pseudonym; Edmund Spenser], The Shepheardes Calender: […], London: […] Hugh Singleton, […], →OCLC, folio 25, recto:
text: The man whom heauens haue ordaynd to bee / The ſpouſe of Britomart, is Arthegall: / He wonneth in the land of Fayeree, / Yet is no Fary borne, ne ſib at all / To Elfes, but ſprong of ſeed terreſtriall, / And whylome by falſe Faries ſtolne away, / Whyles yet in infant cradle he did crall; / Ne other to himſelfe is knowne this day, / But that he by an Elfe was gotten of a Fay.
ref: 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto III”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, page 433:
text: Their Robbin-good-fellowes, Elfes, Fairies, Hobgoblins of our latter age, which idolatrous former daies and the fantasticall world of Greece ycleaped Fawnes, Satyres, Dryades & Hamadryades, did most of their merry prankes in the Night.
ref: 1594, Tho[mas] Nashe, The Terrors of the Night or, A Discourse of Apparitions, London: […] Iohn Danter for William Iones, […]:
text: Every elf, and fairy sprite, / Hop as light as bird from brier.
ref: c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]:
text: […] I had rather have a Child which my Wife ſhould bring me, though by another man, then to have a Changeling brought me by a company of Fairies, Elfs and Goblins: […]
ref: 1649, ΕΙΚΩΝ Ἡ ΠΙΣΤΗ. Or, The Faithfull Pourtraicture of a Loyall Subject, in Vindication of ΕΙΚΏΝ ΒΑΣΙΛΙΚΉ. […], page 16:
text: The quarrel ſpreading into parties, called the Guelfs and the Gibellines, became at laſt the wonder and amazement of all good people: inſomuch as ſome are of opinion, that the fiction of the Elfs and Goblins, wherewith we uſe to fright young children, was derived from hence.
ref: 1657, Peter Heylyn, Cosmographie in Four Books. Containing the Chorographie and Historie of the Whole World, and All the Principal Kingdoms, Provinces, Seas, and Isles Thereof., 2nd edition, London: […] Henry Seile, […], page 131:
text: The opinion of Fairies and Elfs is very old, and yet ſticketh very religiously in the minds of ſome. But to root that rank opinion of Elfs out of mens hearts, the truth is, that there be no ſuch things, nor yet the ſhadows of the things, but only by a ſort of bald Friers and knaviſh ſhavelings ſo faigned; […]
ref: 1678, The Shepherds Calendar: Containing Twelve Æglogues, Proportionable to the Twelve Months. […], London: […] Henry Hills for Jonathan Edwin, […], page 26:
text: This Juno heard; And ſhall ſuch Elfs, ſhe cry’d, / Diſpute my Juſtice, or my Pow’r deride?
ref: 1717, Laurence Eusden, “Book IV. [The Transformation of the Theban Matrons.]”, in Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Fifteen Books. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, page 127:
text: […]the Devaſtations under the Goths, Guelphs, and Gibelines [whence ſome would derive the Terms of Elfs (or Elves) or Fairies, and Goblins (or Hobgoblins) or Spectres, &c.] […]
ref: 1760, Andrew Brice, “TUSCANY”, in The Grand Gazetteer; or, Topographic Dictionary, &c., page 1322, column 1:
text: Here in the interior the saga placed the descendants of the demons (Troll) and elves (Alfvar), more hateful than all other men.
ref: 1845, Eric Gustave Geijer, The History of the Swedes, London: Whittaker and Co., page 17, column 2:
text: These Picts are the Clan Alpin, the Alps, or Elfs or Elves,—[…]
ref: 1850, Matthew Stewart, Remarks on the Subject of Language, with Some Observations in the Form of Notes, Illustrative of the Information Which Language May Afford of the History and Opinions of Mankind, London: […] Richard and John Edward Taylor, […], for, […] the Author, page 14:
text: The Arbhus became in Teutonic mythology the Alben, Elben or Elfen, our Elfs, and in Scandinavian the Alfar.
ref: 1868, S[abine] Baring-Gould, “The Piper of Hameln”, in Curious Myths of the Middle Ages, second series, Philadelphia, Pa.: J[oshua] B[allinger] Lippincott & Co.; London: Rivingtons, page 173:
text: The elfs or elves were inhabitants of the fields and groves, the progenitors of the fairies of the middle ages; […]
ref: 1868, David Hume, William Cooke Stafford, The History of England, from the Earliest Period to the Present Time; Compiled from the Most Authentic Sources, volume I, London; New York, N.Y.: The London Printing and Publishing Company, Limited, page 53, column 1:
text: Eve, Danish legend of her concealing her unwashed children, from whom come elfs, trolls, &c.
ref: 1879, William Henderson, “Index”, in Notes on the Folk-Lore of the Northern Counties of England and the Borders. […], London: […] [F]or the Folk-Lore Society by W. Satchell, Peyton and Co., […], page 364:
text: NAT,[…]; a term applied to all spiritual beings, angels, elfs, demons, or what not, including the gods of the Hindus.
ref: 1903, Henry Yule, A[rthur] C[oke] Burnell, “NAT, s.”, in William Crooke, editor, Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymological, Historical, Geographical and Discursive, London: John Murray, […], page 619, column 2:
text: Elfs and fays, from their haunts in the mountains, whistle their eerie ballads above the gray roof of “Dove Cottage,” and dance their ghostly jigs on the huge hearthstone, among whose blazing logs the Fire God paints his immortal canvases, with colorings splendid beyond the dream of man.
ref: 1917 November, Elizabeth Clendenning Ring, “Florence Earle Coates: Some Phases of Her Life and Poetry”, in The Book News Monthly, volume 36, page 109, column 1:
text: Alfs [elfs]: Another name for the elfs or elves.
ref: 2010, Heilan Yvette Grimes, The Norse Myths, Hollow Earth Publishing, →ISBN, page 254:
text: Cain got no good from committing that murder
because the Almighty made him anathema
and out of the curse of his exile there sprang
ogres and elves and evil phantoms[.]
ref: 1999, Seamus Heaney, Beowulf, London: Faber and Faber, page 6:
topics: human-sciences
mysticism
mythology
philosophy
sciences
glosses: A supernatural being or spirit associated with illness, mischief, and harmful or dangerous magical influence; in later Norse sources, sometimes divided into benevolent light elves (inhabiting Álfheimr) and malevolent dark elves.
examples: text: For there and ſeveral other places / About mill dams and green brae faces, / Both Elrich, Elfs and Brownies ſtayed, / And Green gown’d Farries daunc’d and played; […]
ref: a. 1690, William Cleland, A Collection of Several Poems and Verses, Composed upon Various Occasions, published 1697, page 59:
text: IN Days of Old when Arthur fill’d the Throne, / Whoſe Acts and Fame to Foreign Lands were blown; / The King of Elfs and little Fairy Queen / Gamboll’d on Heaths, and danc’d on ev’ry Green.
ref: 1700, [John] Dryden, “The Wife of Bath Her Tale [by Geoffrey Chaucer]”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, page 479:
text: Farefolkis, fairies, elfs, or elves; […]
ref: 1802, J[ames] Sibbald, “Glossary; or An Explanation of Ancient Scottish Words”, in Chronicle of Scottish Poetry; from the Thirteenth Century, to the Union of the Crowns: To Which Is Added a Glossary, volume IV, Edinburgh: […] [F]or J. Sibbald, […], [b]y C. Stewart & Co. […]:
text: Prithee, young one, who art thou, and what has ailed thy mother to bedizen thee in this strange fashion? Art thou a Christian child,—ha? Dost know thy catechism? Or art thou one of those naughty elfs or fairies, whom we thought to have left behind us, with other relics of Papistry, in merry old England?
ref: 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, “The Elf-Child and the Minister”, in The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, →OCLC, page 130:
text: The next species of these airy nothings are the elfs, or elves; […]
ref: 1852, William Bell, Shakespeare’s Puck, and His Folkslore, Illustrated from the Superstitions of All Nations, but More Especially from the Earliest Religion and Rites of Northern Europe and the Wends, London, page 58:
text: Since you’ve been out, the news arrives / The Elfs’ Insurance Company’s gone.
ref: 1877, Sidney Lanier, “The Hard Times in Elfland. A Story of Christmas Eve.”, in [Mary Lanier], editor, Poems of Sidney Lanier, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, published 1884, page 159:
text: We may add, and our author has knowledge of the fact, that not even the Germans, those masterly delineators and imaginators of fairy-land, have shown greater or more exquisite insight into the lives and ways of elfs and fays than that which was shown by George Cruikshank.
ref: 1882 October 7, “The Life of George Cruikshank: in Two Epochs. By Blanchard Jerrold. […]”, in The Athenæum: Journal of Literature, Science, the Fine Arts, Music, and the Drama, number 2867, London: […] John C. Francis, […], page 471, column 1:
text: All the fairy tales of my childhood were conjured up before my startled imagination, and appeared to be realised in the forms which surrounded me; I saw the whole forest filled with trolls, elves, and sporting dwarfs.
ref: 1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 281:
text: Much of fairy lore clusters around the so-called fairy rings, that is, the green circles in old pastures within which the elfs were supposed to dance at night by the light of the moon.
ref: 1889 May, “[Literary Notices.] The Folk-Lore of Plants. By T. F. Thiselton Dyer. […]”, in Popular Science, page 128, column 1:
topics: arts
folklore
history
human-sciences
literature
media
publishing
sciences
glosses: A small, magical creature similar to a fairy, often mischievous, playful, or occasionally helpful.
examples: text: He was not speaking troll-talk now, but the language of Elfland, that grander tongue that he had had to speak when he was before the King: for he knew the language of Elfland although it was never used in the homes of the trolls, who preferred troll-talk. This language was spoken in those days also by men, for there were fewer languages then, and the elves and the people of Erl both used the same.
ref: 1924, Lord Dunsany, chapter VII, in The King of Elfland's Daughter, New York: G.P. Puttnam's Sons, page 59:
text: So they laughed and sang in the trees; and pretty fair nonsense I daresay you think it. Not that they would care they would only laugh all the more if you told them so. They were elves of course. Soon Bilbo caught glimpses of them as the darkness deepened. He loved elves, though he seldom met them; but he was a little frightened of them too.
ref: 1937, J. R. R. Tolkien, “3: A Short Rest”, in The Hobbit, Unwin Paperbacks, published 1983, page 56:
text: Fantasy elves have human shapes. They're thin. They're tall. They're beautiful. They're blond. They have pointy ears.
ref: 2018, Virginia Loh-Hagan, Elves, Ann Arbor: 45th Parallel Press, page 9:
topics: fantasy
glosses: A member of a race of tall, slender, graceful beings with pointed ears, typically immortal or very long-lived and possessing wisdom and magical abilities.
glosses: A very diminutive person; a dwarf.
glosses: Bluefish (Pomatomus saltatrix).
Synonyms: sense: supernatural creature
english: hostile
translation: hostile
word: goblin
sense: supernatural creature
english: small, mischievous
translation: small, mischievous
word: fairy
Hyponyms: elfe
elven
wood elf
wood-elf
Derived terms: Christmas elf
dark elf
dwelf
elf and safety
elf arrow
elf-bolt
elf-cap moss
elf-child
elf circle
elf-craft
elf-cup
elf-damsel
elf-dance
elfdock
elf-dock
elfdom
Elfenland
elfess
elfette
elf-folk
elf-girl
elfhood
elfin wood
elfish
elfishly
elfishness
elfism
elfist
elfkin
elfkind
elf king
elf-knight
elf-lady
Elfland
elfless
elf-light
elflike
elflock
elflore
elfmaid
elf-maid
elf-maiden
elf-man
elfness
elfology
elf owl
elfpunk
elf queen
elfship
elf-shot
elfwife
elfwise
elfwoman
elfwort
half-elf
light elf
machine elf
mountain-elf
sea-elf
were-elf
wood elf
wood-elf
Related terms: elfin
elven
elvan
elvish