In article: <3sqh8p$p29@viking.dvc.edu> 94fa193@viking.dvc.edu (Raven) writes:
> Since baptism is inherent to this myth, it is obviously a Christian
> addition or mutation. I'd like to know what form this myth took before
> the Christians came to the Isles, if it existed at all. The older version
> would be more reliable, I think.
I don't know about the myth, but I checked the etymology. "Seelie" dates back to about 1200 AD, when it meant "punctual, orderly"; in 1225 it was being used to mean "blessed" or "pious", and 1250, "well-omened, fortunate".
I couldn't find any references in the OED to its use in a supernatural context, funnily enough.
"Unseelie" actually *seems* to be older; it was used in the sense of "unhappy, pitiable" or "unlucky" as early as 900 AD, and its meaning shifted towards "wicked" or "mischievous" before it died out in general usage around the fifteenth century. Again, the OED doesn't give a specifically supernatural interpretation.
In other words, it sounds as though any references to "Seelie" and "Unseelie" fairies originally just meant "nice" and "nasty", and it's only because we've lost the original meanings of the adjectives that we think they refer to some specific concept of factions. I'm sure that both pre-Christian and Christian myth may well have included such ideas as white-hat and black-hat fairies, but trying to nail them down using references to these two words is going to be confused and misguided. The words themselves are probably Christian-era developments, but this proves nothing.
But wait! By the end of the 13th century, "seelie" was shifting in meaning towards "innocent" and "harmless", and over the centuries, it came to have more and more implications of triviality. In fact, we still use it today, with a vowel shift. Yes, don't tell White Wolf or the thousands of other fantasy writers who use it - but the Seelie Court are, in fact, very, very, Silly.
--
Phil Masters
