Fey is another spelling of Fay, which is an ebonic slang term for "white man". It's generally derogative, but in some contexts is merely familiar. Fey/Fay is also Scots slang, relating to one fated to die, doomed, especially as portended by peculiar, usually elated behaviour. It also can be traced back to a Gallic word meaning to clean out, or scour. Fey was also once Scots spelling for the word "fee" It can also mean eccentric, slightly mad, whimsical, supernatural fairy-like and elfin. It is generally these last few meanings for which the word is used nowadays. Twee is a colloquial adjective meaning small and sweet, sentimentally pretty. There are two theories for its etymology, whether 'tweet' being used as a term meaning 'extra sweet' got contracted, or whether it's more Gallic, and thus a combination of T-iny and WEE. Conjugations accepted by Chambers are the adverb "Tweely" and the noun "Tweeness" Twee is/was also a Scots interjectory term, used as a call to calves at feeding time. The OED says that twee means dainty, chic, over-nice, over-refined, precious, mawkish. The OED puts the etymology down to a juvenile pronunciation of the word "sweet". Hope this helped in some small way. I'm trying to distract myself with reference books because I have an interview in a minute. Love Harry +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the undead Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail sinister@missprint.org. To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to majordomo@missprint.org. WWW: http://www.missprint.org/sinister +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "tech-heads and students" +-+ +-+ "the cardie wearing biscuit nibbling belle & sebastian list" +-+ +-+ "sinsietr is a bit freaky" - stuart david, looper +-+ +-+ "pasty-faced vegan geeks... and we LOST!" - NME April 2000 +-+ +-+ "peculiarly deranged fanbase" "frighteningly named +-+ +-+ Sinister List organisation" - NME May 2000 +-+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+