They are mythological creatures that appear in various European folklore stories. Although their origin is not completely known, it is most likely that the elves have appeared together with elves, dwarves and other beings from beyond in legends of Celtic and Scandinavian mythology, in countries like England, Norway and Sweden. The first stories with the character are from antiquity, but he only received that name in the 13th century, when the word duende started to appear in the Spanish vocabulary. By the way, depending on the region of origin of the story, these creatures take on different forms and names. In Irish medieval tales of the 14th century, the leprechaun was born, a little dwarf who hides a pot of gold. In the work of the Swiss alchemist Paracelsus, in the 16th century, the gnomes appear, excellent craftsmen who live isolated in the forests. “But in most countries there is no such distinction.
In England, for example, all these characters are generically called goblins, in Scotland, brownies, and in a good part of Europe they are simply dwarfs”, says journalist Gilberto Schoereder, author of the book Fadas, Elves e Gnomos. In most reports, elves are portrayed as small greenish and mischievous spirits, who live in a parallel universe but interfere in human destinies. When they are treated well, they help with the housework, but if they get angry they can get up to their troubles, turning a pitcher of milk sour or inventing nightmares to disturb our sleep. Therefore, it was customary in some regions of Europe to leave a plate of porridge to please these creatures or to knock on wood three times to wish them good night. “In antiquity, legends about elves served to satisfy the eternal human need to find answers to various inexplicable phenomena.
In a way, these myths played a role that religion played in the following centuries,” says translator Francis Aubert, a specialist in Norse mythology at the University of São Paulo (USP). With the advance of Christianity in Europe, elves ended up being demonized, identified as fallen angels or little devils – so much so that many are still represented with horns and a pointy tail. Even so, ancient beliefs have not completely disappeared. Proof of this is that even today, in more isolated regions of Germany, the legend is believed that children who are born with a physical defect are, in fact, deformed children of elves who were exchanged.
FAIRY – Winged beauty
Although the name did not appear in Europe until the 13th century, several ancestors of this myth populate ancient folklore. The classic example is the nymphs of Greek mythology, but legends of Arab peoples and even American Indians bear resemblance to these creatures. In most accounts, fairies measure less than a hand, are beautiful and have wings. They usually help people with their magic wand, predict the future and make prophecies. In the 20th century, they returned in renewed guises in classic Disney cartoons, such as Cinderella (1950) and Peter Pan (1953).
DUENDE – Interesting spirit
The first legends about leprechauns are part of Celtic and Scandinavian folklore in an imprecise period of Antiquity. The name, however, appears much later, only in 1221, probably as a corruption of the Spanish expression dueño de la casa (“owner of the house”). It is an allusion to the most common description of the character: in most stories, the elf is a spirit, in the form of a little green dwarf, who lives inside the house. If he gets a good gift, he might even help with work. When contradicted, he gets up to various pranks.
ELF – Mortal mage
Stories about elves have been around since Celtic peoples occupied the British Isles in the 3rd century. The oldest writings, however, are the Edda, a 13th-century collection of Icelandic mythology that divides elves into three types: white, good, and elves. the blacks and grays, perverse. Depending on the story, elves take forms ranging from winged spirits to dwarfs. All have magical powers and are almost immortal – they only die if killed. In antiquity, they used to be worshiped in rituals in the forests of Scandinavia.
GNOME – Solitary Craftsman
Named by the Swiss alchemist Paracelsus (1493-1541), gnomes are dwarfs who live isolated in mines or in holes in tree trunks. Skilled artisans produce incredible jewelry and guard buried treasures. In 1583, French dictionaries incorporated the term gnome to identify “little deformed genies that inhabit the Earth”. In fact, in medieval mythology, these beings were represented as little hunchbacked old men. However, in 1937, they gained a more sympathetic portrayal in the cartoon Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, produced by Walt Disney.
GREMLIN – Aerial Terrorist
The pioneering legends about gremlins date back to the Middle Ages. But these ferocious creatures of 40 centimeters, capable of attacking people with claws and sharp teeth, only started to frighten during the Second World War (1939-1945). At the time, the stories of pilots who claimed to see the animals inside planes, messing with and sabotaging equipment, became famous. For skeptics, it was nothing more than a hallucination caused by the lack of air at high altitudes. The creatures became successful in the film Gremlins, directed by Joe Dante in 1984.
LEPRECHAUN – Irish trickster
In the 14th century, a little dwarf with a three-cornered hat and a leather apron appeared in a modernized version of an age-old Irish folklore legend. It was the leprechaun, a fantastic being who makes shoes (he is always fixing his left foot) and can be recognized by the sound of hammering. His greatest asset is being the keeper of a pot of gold. When captured by a human being, he saves himself from death by promising to reveal the hiding place of the treasure, but almost always manages to deceive the one who captured him and disappears.
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