I've been following this forum months ago. I just decided to join in. ANYWAY...

I have often noticed that the spirits mentioned in the Trilogy are commonly Middle-Eastern (ghul), African (djinn from Hathor's temple) or Latin American (the thunder snake, or barti's serpent of silver plumes guise)... well, apart from the more "contemporary" names like Queezle or Bodmin. Even the basic classification seems to be dominantly Arabic, apart from "imp" or "foliot".

Now, my question is, how do you classify several types of the fairy folk? And by "fairy" I mean the "beings between men and angels" portrayed as physical beings in LOTR, Harry Potter, Spiderwick, etc., not just the typical pixie stereotype. The hadas, the wee men, the diwatas, the encantados, the devas, the daimones, and especially the European fairies. whatever u wanna call them.

I mean, would u classify an Dark/High ELF as a djinn, foliot, etc?
how about a Dryad (which is a tree spirit)? ---> what is she? an earth or air being?
how about a Merrow? ---> it would be really weird if it's a Marid, but marids are spirits of water anyway.
how about a Pixie? ---> definitely a djinni, spirit of air. but a weakly pixie doesn't really look like a promising djinni.
[Will o' wisps have been mentioned though.]
And how about cockatrices? griffins? etc?

Just asking. sorry for the lengthy post. :)

Seeing as none of those "fairy folk" existed in the books, do they need to be classified?

Didier has a point, but as for classifying them I'd try comparing them to existing spirits, for example, would you agree that given their quick wittedness and medium to high power level, elves would probably be djinns?