I have applied to exhibit my work at the New Forest Fairy Festival, so I'm thinking about fairies a lot and what they mean to me. Fairies seem to have become smaller and cuter over the centuries, to the point where in the Victorian era the fairies became tiny children with insect wings. But what were fairies seen as back in the middle ages? They were scary creatures, and you could be condemned to death for consorting with the fair folk. In 1691, a Scottish clergyman, Robert Kirk, recorded popular folklore of the time in The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Fairies: "These siths, or fairies, they call Sleagh Maith, or the Good People, it would seem, to prevent the dint of their ill attempts, (for the Irish use to bless all they fear harm of,) and are said to be of middle nature betwixt man and angel, as were daemons thought to be of old; of intelligent fluidious spirits, and light changeable bodies, (like those called astral,) somewhat of the nature of a condensed...