Puck (mythology)

In English folklore, Puck, sometimes known as Robin Goodfellow, is a domestic and nature sprite, demon, or fairy.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the etymology of the name Puck is "unsettled"; it is compared to Old Norse puki (Old Swedish puke, Icelandic puki, Frisian Puk). Celtic origins (based on Welsh pwca, Cornish Bucca and Irish púca) have also been proposed, but as the Old English and Old Norse attestations are considerably older than the Celtic ones, loan from Germanic to Celtic seems more probable. The Old English púcel is a kind of half-tamed woodland spirit, leading folk astray with echoes and lights in nighttime woodlands (like the German and Dutch "Weisse Frauen" and "Witte Wieven" and the French "Dames Blanches," all "White Ladies"), or coming into the farmstead and souring milk in the churn. The etymology of Puck is examined by Katharine Mary Briggs, in Anatomy of Puck (New York: Arno) 1977. The term pixie is in origin a diminutive of puck (compared to Swedish word "pyske" meaning "small fairy").

Puck may also be called "Robin Goodfellow" or "Hobgoblin", in which "Hob" may substitute for "Rob" or may simply refer to the "goblin of the hearth" or hob. The name Robin is Middle English in origin, deriving from Old French Robin, the pet form for the name Robert. The earliest reference to "Robin Goodfellow" cited by the Oxford English Dictionary is from 1531. Anthony Munday mentions Robin Goodfellow in his play The Two Italian Gentlemen, 1584, and he appears in Skialtheia, or a Shadowe of Truth in 1598. William Shakespeare may have had access to the manuscript of Lewes Lewkenor’s translation of The Spanish Mandevile of Miracles, or, The Garden of Curious Flowers (1600) a translation of Antonio de Torquemada's, Le Jardin Flores Curiosas. The following passage from The Spanish Mandeville discusses the mischievous spirits-

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