pairikā

Avestan pairikā, in the ancient Iranian religious texts, described a type of demonic sorceress — a supernatural female being associated with seduction and evil. In the Zoroastrian Gathas and Yashts, pairikā-demons were enemies of the righteous, tempters who led men astray. The word is related to Sanskrit parī and possibly to Greek peri (around, near).

The transformation from demon to fairy began in medieval Persian poetry. By the time of the Shahnameh, Ferdowsi's 10th-century epic of Persian mythology, the peri had been largely rehabilitated into a beautiful, benevolent winged being — a fairy or sprite, sometimes trapped or enslaved by evil forces, often the object of human quest and rescue. The evil connotations were transferred to the div (demon), and the peri took on luminous, helpful characteristics.

Sa'di, Rumi, and Hafez — the great 13th-14th century Persian poets — used peri as a poetic standard for beauty. A face like a peri's was the highest compliment. Thomas Moore's 1817 poem Lalla Rookh brought the Persian peri to English audiences, presenting peri lore from Persian and Arabic sources. Byron, Keats, and Shelley were all familiar with the peri through Moore's enormously popular poem.

The English word fairy does not descend from peri — it comes from Latin fata (fate), through Old French faerie. But the peri entered English as a specific loan, preserving the Persian fairy tradition alongside the Latin-derived one. Both words now coexist in English for supernatural beings, arriving from completely different directions.