A sylph (also called sylphid) is an air spirit stemming from the 16th-century works of Paracelsus, who describes sylphs as (invisible) beings of the air, his elementals of air. A significant number of subsequent literary and occult … See more

The Swiss German physician and alchemist Paracelsus first coined the term sylph in the 16th century to describe an air spirit in his overarching scheme of elemental spirits … See more

The famous ballet La Sylphide ("The (Female) Sylph", Paris, 1832) is a prominent example of sylph lore in theater in the 19th century. It appeared in a second version in … See more

Because of their association with the ballet La Sylphide, where sylphs are identified with fairies and the medieval legends of fairyland, as well as … See more

"Sylph" is possibly a blend of from Latin sylvestris and nympha, sylvestris being a common synonym for sylph in Paracelsus. Anthon and Trollope … See more

Sylphs are mentioned by that name in the 1668 German novel Simplicius Simplicissimus, though its author Grimmelshausen seems to have taken them to be water spirits. See more

• Willow, a character in Terry Brooks' Magic Kingdom of Landover series of novels (1986), is a sylph and the wife of protagonist See more