Fairy Euhemerism
David MacRitchie was a prominent proponent of the euhemeristic origin of fairies, a theory tracable to the early 19th century that considers fairies in British folklore to have been rooted in a historical pygmy, dwarf or short sized aboriginal race, that lived during Neolithic Britain or even earlier.
Read more about this topic: David MacRitchie
Famous quotes containing the word fairy:
“What is a novel? I say: an invented story. At the same time a story which, though invented has the power to ring true. True to what? True to life as the reader knows life to be or, it may be, feels life to be. And I mean the adult, the grown-up reader. Such a reader has outgrown fairy tales, and we do not want the fantastic and the impossible. So I say to you that a novel must stand up to the adult tests of reality.”
—Elizabeth Bowen (1899–1973)