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Elf sb. World English Historical Dictionary

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Elf sb. World English Historical Dictionary Dictionary Biographies Literary Criticism Welcome Terms of Service ⧏ Previous Next ⧐ Contents Slice Contents Key Bibliographic Record Murray’s New English Dictionary. 1897, rev. 2025. Elf sb. Forms: 1 ælf, ylf (app. recorded only in pl. ylfe), 3 alve, 5 alfe, 5–7 elfe, 4– elf. Plural elves: 1 ylfe, 3 alven, 6–7 elfes, Sc. elvis, 8 elfs, 6– elves. See also ELVEN, AUF, OAF. [OE. ælf str. masc. = OHG. alp (MHG., mod.G. alp nightmare, ON. álfr (Da. alf) elf:—OTeut. *alƀo-z; a parallel type *alƀi-z (cf. Sw. elf, Da. elv) appears in late WSax. *ylf found in pl. ylfe:—*ięlfe) = Mercian, Kent. *ęlf, Northumb. *ǣlf, one or other of which is represented in the mod. word. (The mod.G. elf is believed to be adopted from Eng.; MHG. had elbe a female elf.)

1   Some have compared the Teut. word with the Skr. ṛbhu, the name given to the three genii of the seasons in Hindu mythology.]

2   1.  Mythol. The name of a class of supernatural beings, in early Teutonic belief supposed to possess formidable magical powers, exercised variously for the benefit or the injury of mankind.

3   They were believed to be of dwarfish form, to produce diseases of various kinds, to act as incubi and succubi, to cause nightmares, and to steal children, substituting changelings in their place. The Teutonic belief in elves is probably the main source of the mediæval superstition respecting fairies, which, however, includes elements not of Teutonic origin; in general the Romanic word denotes a being of less terrible and more playful character than the ‘elf’ as originally conceived. In mod. literature, elf is a mere synonym of FAIRY, which has to a great extent superseded it even in dialects. Originally elf was masculine, ELVEN feminine; but in 13th and 14th c. the two seem to have been used indifferently of both sexes. In mod. use elf chiefly, though not always, denotes a male fairy.

4 Beowulf, 112 (Gr.). Fram þanon untydras ealle onwocon eotenas and ylfe.

5 c. 1000.  Sax. Leechd., II. 296. Wið ælfe and wiþ uncuþum fidsan gnið myrran on win.

6 c. 1205.  Lay., 19256. Sone swa he com an eorde; aluen hine iuengen.

7 c. 1386.  Chaucer, Man Lawes T., 656. The mooder was an elf by aventure.

8 1426.  Audelay, Poems, 77 (Mätz.). Alfe Rofyn be-gon to rug.

9 c. 1460.  Towneley Myst. (Mätz.). He was takyn with an elfe.

10 1513.  Douglas, Æneis, VIII. vi. 7. Wyth Nymphis and Favnis apoun euery syde, Quhilk fairfolkis, or than elvis, clepyng we.

11 1579.  E. K., in Spenser’s Sheph Cal., June, 25, Gloss., For Guelfes and Gibelines, we say Elfes & Goblins.

12 1610.  Shaks., Temp., V. i. 33. Ye Elves of hils, brooks, standing lakes and groues.

13 1635.  Herrick, Hesper. (1869), II. App. 477. Come follow, follow me You fairie elves that be.

14 1700.  Dryden, Wife of Bath’s T., 3, in Fables, 479.        The King of Elfs and little Fairy Queen Gamboll’d on Heaths, and danc’d on ev’ry Green.

15 1712–4.  Pope, Rape Lock, I. 33. Airy elves by moonlight shadow seen.

16 1866.  Kingsley, Herew., I. xv. 285. You are an elf, a goddess.

17 1875.  B. Taylor, Faust, I. i. II. 3. Then the craft of elves propitious Hastes to help where help it can.

18   † b.  Sometimes distinguished from a ‘fairy.’ (a) as an inferior or subject species; (b) as a more malignant being, an ‘imp,’ ‘demon’; also fig. Obs.

19 1587.  M. Grove, Pelops & Hipp., E vj b. To exercise your selfe In feates of armes, thereby to shun, of loytring loue the elfe.

20 a. 1591.  H. Smith, Wks., 1867, II. 483. Frenzies, furies (wayward elves): What need ye call for whip or scourge?

21 1623.  J. Abbott, Force Contrition, in Farr’s, S. P. Jas. I. (1848), 353. The raine which this detested elfe must drowne Must from aboue … come downe.

22 a. 1628.  F. Greville, Mustapha, 3rd Chorus. What means … This finite Elfe of mans vaine acts and errors?

23 1651.  Hobbes, Leviath., IV. xlvii. 387. When the Fairies are displeased with any body, they are said to send their Elves to, pinch them.

24 a. 1700.  Dryden, Poems (1773), II. 102 (J.). That we may angels seem, we paint them elves.

25   2.  transf. a. (See quot.)

26 1651.  Hobbes, Leviath., IV. xlvii. 386. The Fairies … are said to take young Children out of their Cradles, and to change them into Naturall Fools, which Common people do therefore call Elves, and are apt to mischief.

27   b.  A tricksy, mischievous, sometimes a spiteful and malicious creature. To play the elf: to act elfishly, maliciously.

28 a. 1553.  Udall, Royster D., III. iii. (1869), 46.        For these women be all such madde pieuishe elues, They will not be wonne except it please them selues.

29 1613.  Uncasing of Machiav., 25. For never it was Ape but plaide the Elfe.

30 1740.  Somerville, Hobbinol, III. (1749), 174. This other Elf, in ev’ry Art Of smiling Fraud, in ev’ry treach’rous Leer, The very Hobbinol!

31 1800.  Bloomfield, Farmer’s Boy, Summer, 243. Happy the man that foils an envious elf, Using the darts of spleen to serve himself.

32 1820.  Scott, Abbot, iv. Stray elf of a page.

33   3.  transf. A diminutive being. a. A dwarf, mannikin; hence as adj. (quots. 1710, 1725).

34 1530.  Palsgr., 216/2. Elfe or dwarf, nain.

35 1547.  Salesbury, Welsh Dict., Nar, an elfe.

36 1725.  New Cant. Dict., Elf, little.

37 1728.  [De Foe], Street-Robberies Consider’d, 31. Elf, little.

38 1742.  Shenstone, School-mistress, xxiii. (J.).        Nor weeting how the Muse thou’d soar on high, Wishes, poor starv’ling Elf! his Paper-Kite may fly.

39 17[?].  Seven Wise Men, in R. Bell, Hist. Eng. (1840), X. vii. 143, note.        When Edgecumbe spoke, the prince in sport   Laughed at the merry elf; Rejoiced to see within his court   One shorter than himself.

40 1840–5.  Barham, Ingol. Leg. (1877), 102. As a muscular Giant would handle an elf.

41   b.  Applied to a child (chiefly with some notion of 2 b), to a small animal or insect.

42 1573.  Tusser, Husb. (1878), 59. Looke to thy cattle, Serue yoong poore elues alone by themselues.

43 1660.  J. M[ilton], in H. Morley, King and Commons (1868). So the little wanton elf [a bee] Most gloriously enshrined itself [in amber].

44 1786.  Burns, Despondency. Ye tiny elves that guiltless sport.

45 1824.  Miss Mitford, Village, Ser. I. (1858), 15. His own pretty little boys, and two or three other four-year-old elves.

46 1886.  G. Allen, Kalee’s Shrine, xii. 128. Tall long-legged herons stand with arched necks and eager eyes, keenly intent on the quick pursuit of the elusive elves in the stream below.

47   † 4.  By Spenser applied to the knights of his allegorical ‘faerie land.’

48 1596.  Spenser, F. Q., I. i. 17. Which when the valiant Elfe perceiu’d. Ibid., I. v. 11. Goe, caytive Elfe.

49   5.  In a vague depreciatory sense, ‘a (poor) creature,’ ‘a (poor, pious) soul,’ ‘a (poor) devil.’

50 1573.  Tusser, Husb. (1878), 203. Like worldly elfe, to moile and toile.

51 1703.  De Foe, Ref. Mann., Misc. 69. Magistrates, like Pious Elves, Let none be Drunk a Sundays but themselves.

52 a. 1849.  Hor. Smith, Addr. Mummy, viii. Still silent, uncommunicative elf.

53   6.  Comb. a. appositive, as elf-child, -girl, -knight, -lady, -woman; b. attributive, as elf-castle, -dance, -flame, -horn, -house, -land, -rod; elf-like adj. Also elf-arrow, -bolt, a flint arrowhead (see ELF-SHOT); also, a belemnite; elf-bore, a hole in a piece of wood, out of which a knot has dropped or been driven; † elf-cake, an enlargement of the spleen attributed to the agency of elves (cf. AGUE-CAKE); elf-cup, a small stone perforated by friction at a waterfall; elf-dart = ELF-SHOT 1; elf-dock, a name of the Elecampane; elf-fire, ignis fatuus, Will o’ the wisp; elf-god, Cupid; elf-knot = ELF-LOCK; elf-queen, queen of the fairies; † elf-skin, a man of shrivelled and shrunken form; elf-stone = ELF-SHOT 2; elf-stricken, -struck ppl. a., bewitched; also elf-striking vbl. sb.; elf-taken ppl. a. (in quot. elfe y-take), bewitched by elves; elf-twisted ppl. a., twisted or gnarled by elves; elf-wort = elf-dock. Also ELF-LOCK, -SHOOT, -SHOT.

54 1590.  in Pitcairn, Crim. Trials, I. 198. Thow directit George Cuik to twa wemen … for ane *elf-arrow-heid.

55 1679.  Plot, Staffordsh. (1686), 396. These … they there [at Aberdeen] call Elf-Arrows.

56 1796.  Morse, Amer. Geog., II. 151. The stones which the country people call elf-arrow heads.

57 1855.  Smedley, Occult Sc., 31. The triangular flints, Belemnites, so numerous in Scotland … are popularly termed Elf arrows.

58 1773.  Johnson, Journ. West. Isl., Wks. 1806, IX. 208. The stone heads of arrows … The people call them *elf-bolts.

59 1883.  G. Allen, Colin Clout’s Calendar, xxxix. 223. The neolithic arrows came to be regarded as elf-bolts.

60 1814.  Northern Antiq., 404 (Jam.). If you were to look through an *elf-bore in wood.

61 1579.  Langham, Gard. Health (1633), 2. To heale the *elfe cake and hardnesse of the side.

62 1586.  Lupton, 1000 Notable Th. (1675), 157. The hardness of the side called the Elfcake.

63 1884.  Child, Ballads, II. § 37. 321/2. After some description of the life at the *elf-castle.

64 1856.  R. A. Vaughan, Mystics (ed. 4), II. 93. When the *Elf-children scatter gold-dust on the ground.

65 1810.  Cromek, Rem. Nithsdale Song, 290 (Jam.). *Elf-cups were placed under stabledoors … as a safeguard against witchcraft.

66 1884.  Child, Ballads, II. § 42. 375/1. Why are you so pale, as if you had been in an *elf-dance?

67 1879.  Prior, Plant-n., *Elf-Dock, the elecampane, from its broad leaves called a dock.

68 1855.  Smedley, Occult Sc., 31. The ‘Ignis fatuus’ has been named *‘Elf fire.’

69 1884.  Child, Ballads, II. § 42. 375/2. Olaf … has to make his way through the *elf-flame.

70 1871.  Rossetti, Poems, 9. Poets’ fancies all are there: There the *Elf-girls flood with wings Valleys full of plaintive air.

71 1859.  Tennyson, Vivien, 98. I saw the little *elf-god eyeless once In Arthur’s arras hall at Camelot.

72 1884.  Child, Ballads, II. § 41. 360/1. Lady Isabel … hears an *elf-horn. Ibid., § 42. 375/1. He rides to the hills and comes to an *elf-house. Ibid., I. § 4. 23/1. An *elf-knight, by blowing his horn, inspires Lady Isabel with love-longing.

73 1824.  Heber, Jrnl., II. xxii. 416. Ghastly Yogis, with their hair in *elf knots.

74 1884.  Child, Ballads, II. § 37. 320/1. The *elf-lady’s costume and equipment.

75 1483.  Cath. Angl., 113. *Elfe lande.

76 1847.  Tennyson, Princess, III. 357. O sweet and far from cliff and scar, The horns of elfland faintly blowing.

77 1583.  Stanyhurst, Æneis, III. (Arb.), 80. Shee sowns, and after long pausing thus she sayd *elflyke.

78 1841.  Lytton, Night & Morn., I. vi. I. 65. His … hair hung elf-like and matted down his cheeks.

79 c. 1386.  Chaucer, Wyf Bathes T., 860. The *elf-queen, with hir joly compaignye.

80 1884.  Child, Ballads, II. § 41. 362/2. He strikes her with an *elf-rod.

81 1596.  Shaks., 1 Hen. IV., II. iv. 270. Away … you *Elfe-skin.

82 1778.  Phil. Surv. S. Irel., 281. I have seen one of those *elf-stones.

83 1825.  Scott, Betrothed (1860), 290. He looks as if he were *elf-stricken.

84 1699.  E. Lhwyd, in Phil. Trans., XXVIII. 99. Some on May Day put them into a Tub of Water, and besprinkle all their Cattle with that Water, to prevent being *Elf-struck, bewitch’d, &c. Ibid. As to this *Elf-stricking, their Opinion is, that the Fairies … do sometimes carry away Men in the Air.

85 a. 1500.  MS., in Promp. Parv., 138, note. A chylde that ys *elfe y-take … may nat broke hys mete.

86 1885.  Chamb. Jrnl., 371. Lo—instead of the Hunter in Green, there was only a brown withered twig, so *elf-twisted and dry.

87 1884.  Child, Ballads, II. § 29. 259/1. Three *elf-women had been not less than fifteen years in weaving it.

88 1878.  Britten & Holland, Plant-n., *Elfwort, Inula Helenium.

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