Likely deriving from the ancient Greek kobalos, the term that eventually became “goblin” migrated into Latin as gobelinus and then Middle English as gobelyn. Medieval clerics writing in northern France and England wrote about both a particular demon named Goblin and groups of demonic goblins that were threats to non-Christians. These goblins tended to be associated with darkness, ugliness, and sin—often juxtaposed with the light, beauty, and salvation of God. Beneath these vitriolic condemnations of demonic goblins, though, we can glimpse widespread traditions of fairy belief among non-clerics, of which goblins, elves, and fairies were a vibrant part. These preternatural creatures tended to be associated not with satanic threats, but with the otherwise unexplainable (and often unfortunate) occurrences of daily life. They were part of a world that was alive with spirits, which are difficult to categorize as Christian or pagan or something else because such distinctions were of little relevance to those who encountered them. So ubiquitous and powerful were the fairies that, by the middle of the fifteenth century, rebels against the English monarchy affiliated themselves with the Fairy King and Fairy Queen, whose realm was outside the jurisdiction of any human government.