Marie Taglioni
The ballet's libretto was written by tenor Adolphe Nourrit, the first "Robert" in Meyerbeer's "Robert Le Diable", an opera which featured Marie Taglioni in its dance section, "Ballet of the Nuns". Nourrit's scenario was loosely based on a story by Charles Nodier, "Trilby, ou Le lutin d'Argail," but swapped the genders of the protagonists — a goblin and a fisherman's wife of Nodier; a sylph and a farmer in the ballet.