Wizard's Nomenclature and 3.5

Skade · Mar 17, 2003

Since picking up 3E something has been bothering me. The [Fey] descriptor. My understanding was that "fey" meant deathly, fated or doomed, and that "fae" meant, otherworldly or fairytale like.

So I finally looked it up on www.dictionary.com.

Word History: The history of the words fey and fay illustrates a rather fey coincidence. Our word fay, “fairy, elf,” the descendant of Middle English faie, “a person or place possessed of magical properties,” and first recorded around 1390, goes back to Old French fae, “fairy,” the same word that has given us fairy. Fae in turn comes from Vulgar Latin Fta, “the goddess of fate,” from Latin ftum, “fate.” If fay goes back to fate, so does fey in a manner of speaking, for its Old English ancestor fge meant “fated to die.” The sense we are more familiar with, “magical or fairylike in quality,” seems to have arisen partly because of the resemblance in sound between fay and fey.

Turns out "fae" has become "fay", which "fey" came to share usage with. I think my preference for the "fae" spelling is the unusual, and thereby otherworldly nature of it. So, is this a change anyone else would like to see in 3.5?

Also, are there any other terms that you disagee with or that you have changed yourself?

s/LaSH · Mar 17, 2003

So there's a difference... of course, faeries could well be involved in horrible fates, so there's another link between the words. (Ever read Cecilia Dart-Thornton? Now that's fairies done right. People don't go outside because they're so dangerous.)

I'll take this opportunity to discuss the word 'angel'. It's not really a problem, but there are two good reasons we shouldn't see it, no matter how much thematic sense it makes to call holy beings with wings angels.

There was a thread a while ago talking about celestials and why they weren't just called angels. Gygax chimed in and said he deliberately veered away from angels, using the theosophical term celestial instead.

I went off and looked up the Oxford English Dictionary (short version, the one in two VCR-sized volumes). It defined 'angel' as any supernatural being of greater intelligence or power than a human (as well as giving an alternate meaning as in the Christian theological rank on the heirachy of Heaven). So by that definition, demons, formians, slaadi, all that weird stuff, they're angels too. You could probably build a strong case for illithids, while you're at it.

Isn't etymology cool?