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Small humans. Some folklorists and anthropologists have theorized that the original faeries were members of conquered races that were sighted on rare occasions, mistaken for supernatural beings. There is some evidence small-statured races occupied part of Europe in the Bronze Age and Neolithic periods before the population by the Celts. Known at the Thuatha de Danaan in Ireland, they lived in shelters burrowed under mounds and hills. As more aggressive races migrated into their territories, these secretive little people retreated into the forests. However, some possibly maintained a guerilla warfare against the newcomers, giving rise to the legends of Rob Roy and Robin Hood.
Fallen angels. In the lore of Scandinavia, Scotland, and Ireland, when God cast out the arrogant angels from heaven, they became the evil spirits that plague mankind, tormenting us and inflicting us with harm. The ones who fell into hell and into caves and abysses became devils and death-maidens. However, those who fell onto the earth became goblins, imps, dwarfs, thumblings, alps, noon-and-evening-ghosts, and will-o'-the-wisps. Those who fell into the forests became the wood-spirits who live there: the hey-men, the wild-men, the forest-men, the wild-women, and the forest-women. Finally, those who fell into the water became water spirits: water-men, mermaids, and merwomen. These angels were condemned to remain where they were, becoming the faeries of seas and rivers, the earth, and the air.
The souls of dead pagans. Like vampires, the fairies were believed to be originally the souls of the pagan dead. Since the pagans are unbaptized, they are neither considered good enough to go to heaven nor bad enough to go to hell. They are therefore caught in a netherworld, becoming faeries.
According to the Eddas (Norse), the elves are the worms that went out from the corpse of the giant Ymir. There are two main races : the elves of night, and the elves of light. The latter became the allies of Odin against the Giants.
Nature spirits : in most pagan religions, supernatural forces are associated with animals, the five elements and the Goddess. Sometimes the fairies were called Goddesses themselves. In several folk ballads the Fairy Queen is adressed as 'Queen of Heaven.' Welsh fairies were known as 'the Mother's Blessing.' Breton peasants called the fairies Godmothers.
The children of Adam and Lilith / Adam and Eve. Before living Adam for Lucifer, Lilith begot a few monsters called faeries in Greece and Scandinavia. In Norse folklore.
According to a scandinavian myth, Eve went on to have a multitude of children after Cain, Abel, and Seth. Once upon a time, God Almighty came to visit Adam and Eve. They received him with joy, and showed him everything they had in the house. They also brought their children to him, to show him, and these he found promising and full of hope. Then he asked Eve whether she had no other children than these whom she now showed him. She said "None." But it so happened that she had not finished washing them all, and, being ashamed to let God see them dirty, had hidden the unwashed ones. This God knew well, and said therefore to her, "What man hides from God, God will hide from man." These unwashed children became forthwith invisible, and took up their abode in mounds, and hills, and rocks. From these are the elves descended, but we men from those of Eve's children whom she had openly and frankly shown to God. And it is only by the will and desire of the elves themselves that men can ever see them.
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