Sylph

Sylphs or Sylvani are mythological nature spirits that are assigned to the element air, just as Undine are water spirits. The salamander is in turn associated with the fire and the dwarves or gnomes of the earth. Sylphs are therefore an example of the spiritualization of matter. They have a delicate, subtle human-like body and are able to reproduce. However, in contrast to humans, they are soulless.

Known sylphs are Ariel and Oberon.

Paracelsus (1493-1541) is regarded as a literary creator of the sylphs. He has probably oriented in the description of nature spirits to the lower creatures of the Kabbalah.

Grimmelshausenmuseum let his Simplicissimus sylphs of the world of the Mummelsee and dive to the center of the earth; sylphs here seem to be perceived more as water spirits.

Sylphide

Until the first half of the 20th century, also referred to a delicate and graceful girl as Sylphide (after the ballet La Sylphide ). Men can also be Sylphid (or sylphenähnlich, sylphidenhaft ). Today, the term is almost extinct in these meanings.

In the fairy tale The Steadfast Tin Soldier by Hans Christian Andersen is the dancing Paper Princess at the end of the tale, after they had fallen together with the one-legged steadfast tin soldier into the fire, compared due to their elegance and grace with a sylph:

"Then a door opened, the wind took the dancer and she flew like a sylph in the furnace to the tin soldier, blazed up flaming and she was gone! The tin soldier melted together into a lump, and when the girl the day after taking out the ashes, she found him as a little tin heart. "