How did fairy tales begin?

If we read a fairly tale, we may imagine that the author made it up. This may be so if the book was written in modern times. However, long ago people did not invent fairy tales. They simply used to write what they had heard, for the stories had existed for thousands of years. Some people believe that many fairy tales are based on a memory of something that really happened.

These stories were passed through generations and it is not possible to know the exact time when they started. Handed down from parent to child, happenings that once were quite ordinary are made to appear almost supernatural another day.

Whatever the actual beginning of fairytales there is no doubt that people once believed in fairies. Some of the fairies they believed in were just like human beings, except that they had some magical powers. They could make themselves invisible or change their forms, often appearing as animals or birds. They could pass through walls and other solid objects. They could foretell the future. Some were immortal, others lived hundreds of years.

Today, almost everyone thinks of fairies as those beings with gauzy wings about whom the poets wrote. But the people themselves believed there were many different types of fairies. Some were measured by inches, some were a few feet high, and some were the size of humans. And not all had wings. The types of well known fairies include pixies, elves, leprechauns brownies, goblins, gnomes, and so on.