Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Fairy-locks


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.  

The result was keep. John254 00:45, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Fairy-locks

 * – (View AfD) (View log)

This article has been speedy deleted twice, but it appears the author is making an honest attempt to establish notability with references, so I would rather allow discussion via AfD than unilaterally deleting for a third time. With that said, I don't believe this is an article of encyclopedic importance - it really seems more like a dictionary definition if anything. Delete. Tijuana Brass 01:48, 7 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep: Needs a lot of work, but with cleanup it looks like it'd make a decent folklore stub. A discussion of a folklore trope certainly is beyond a dictdef, and given the sources so far I see no reason it shouldn't be of encyclopedic value. The relevant WikiProject should probably be notified that it needs help. —Quasirandom 02:22, 7 November 2007 (UTC)


 * ?????: I would have thought the first attempts after reading a new article would be to improve it, expand it, and make it better. It was deleted once because I included a reference and the reviewer felt I was promoting the book. (Would have been better, then, to put in no references as I see on more than a few articles.) Another time it was deleted because the reviewer did a quick Google search on "Fairy Locks" and it wound up being the name of a shampoo. Had he tried a bit farther with a +tangles or -shampoo, he might have started seeing more relevant search results. Now, I spend some time working it up and collecting a list of urls which mention or allude to fairy or elf-locks and it is still being reviewed for deletion instead of being added to. Rsweeney 02:33, 7 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep Seems a perfectly reasonable and sourced piece of folklore to me. It needs a rewrite, not deletion. Nick mallory 02:46, 7 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep Proposer seems to be unnecessarily disrupting a good faith attempt to create a valid new article. Tsk.  Colonel Warden 03:33, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Erm... no. This is listed here in order to gain wider community input on whether the article is appropriate for the encyclopedia - it had previously been deleted twice within 24 hours, and as I explained above, I elected to move it to AfD rather than delete it a third time to see if the reasoning of past admins represented community consensus. That is good faith, friend. Tijuana Brass 04:44, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Erm was it deleted twice in twenty four hours by you by any chance? It seems those deletions were mistaken, given the clear majority to keep expressed on this AfD. Nick mallory 07:23, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
 * . Tijuana Brass 17:59, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment It perhaps should be renamed as Elf-lock since the OED does not contain fairy-lock but does contain a significant entry for Elf-lock. Besides Shakespeare, its other cites include:


 * 1596 LODGE Wits Miserie (Halliw.), Curl'd and full of elves-locks.


 * 1637 HEYWOOD Dialogues xvii. Wks. 1874 VI. 241 What though my thin and unkemb'd scattered haire Fell in long Elfe-locks from my scalpe, now bare?


 * 1810 Gentl. Mag. LXXXVI. I. 214 Their hair remains matted and wreathed in elves-locks.


 * 1848 KINGSLEY Saint's Trag. II. iv. 84 The listless craftsmen through their elf-locks scowled.


 * 1647 R. STAPYLTON Juvenal VII. 83 The elfe-lockt fury all her snakes had shed.


 * 1946 W. DE LA MARE Traveller 23 Plaiting cramped fingers in the elf-locked mane. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Colonel Warden (talk • contribs) 18:41, 7 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep - more than a dictionary definition, but it does need some secondary sources. Hal peridol 03:34, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep, but it urgently needs rewriting. Mr_pand 14:39, 7 November 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mr pand (talk • contribs)

Essentially, if you change the name to Elf-Lock, you'll have to find a clear way of disambiguating elf-locks as 'elf-mischief' (sleeping girls), elf locks as 'messy-hair' without elf mischief (the hag's messy hair), and elf-locks as the dreadlock hair of Celt warriors and Rastafarians (who twist their own hair up on purpose). One of the works sited, the children's book of fairies, calls the tangles "fairy-locks" which seems to clearly distinguish between these tangles and dreadlocks. Thus, the reason I used it originally as the title. Rsweeney 19:08, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - Elf-Locks already redirects to the Dreadlocks page. (I find the words here hard to express succinctly, forgive me if I'm being confusing.) It seems that the folklore that elves twist knots in a sleeper's hair, by proxy of the Lear character 'elfing up his hair' and other references can also be taken to mean locks of twisted hair created by the owner and blamed on elves (to feign insanity). I have also seen the term used to describe a hag's messy hair, which would be unlikely to have been expected to be a creation of elves, but merely descriptive of the type of tangling resulting from elves or fairies twisting up hair. Queen Mab's 'elf-locks' in horses' manes seems to have mud or mire twisted into it, which might make them appear more like traditional dreadlocks.
 * Once this AfD passes, you may want to consider posting that up on the talk page for Dreadlocks. You make a good case for splitting off the material into a different article. Tijuana Brass 20:46, 7 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.