sylph

美容や健康に良いとされている温泉が、外国人から注目を集めているようです。

Beauty Passport: Japanese Hot Springs

The cartoons on the wall left nothing to interpretation: Take off your clothes, leave them in a cubby, and forget about modesty (OK, that last part was implied). An elderly woman handed me a washcloth the size of my palm and smiled. Of course she was smiling. She got to keep her clothes on.

Once naked, I proceeded into the next room—holding that meager washcloth strategically in a battle to preserve whatever dignity I could. (I lost.) I pushed open a heavy door into a room thick with steam and the smell of sulfur. And I wasn't alone. Through the steam, I could make out sylphlike silhouettes bathing together in a shallow pool. So I did what was expected of me: I joined them.

Untoward it was not. This is just how it goes at an onsen, a traditional Japanese bathhouse or natural hot spring. (The word "onsen" actually means "hot springs" in Japanese.) Generations of Japanese women and men have practiced the ritual of bathing in mineral-rich onsens for purposes ranging from beautification to stress relief. The country is home to thousands of onsens fed by geothermal waters that are believed to impart myriad health benefits: soothing achy muscles, relieving various skin conditions, even easing arthritis. These hot springs are frequently found in the prettiest parts of nature—you might find a small tub on a mountaintop, say, or overlooking the ocean. But the mineral-rich waters, often hotter than the average Jacuzzi, are also piped into pools in traditional Japanese inns ("ryokans") and public bathhouses.

（以下省略）

http://www.allure.com/story/japanese-hot-springs-onsen

今回取り上げる単語は、 “sylphlike”/ˈsɪlflʌɪk/です。

Oxford Dictionary of English (Second Edition Reserved, Oxford University Press)によると、 “(of a woman or girl) slender and graceful”とのことでした。

『ジーニアス英和辞典』（第五版，大修館）で調べたところ、「〈女性が〉ほっそりとしていて優美な」と書かれておりました。

以上から女性の外見を表す形容詞であることが分かりました。

ちなみに “sylph”で、「空気の精（nymph），ほっそりとして優美な女性，シルフ（鳥）」などが載っておりました。またnymphは「ニンフ（海・川・山・森などにすむといわれる少女の姿をした妖精），おとめ，美少女」とのことでした。（『ジーニアス英和辞典』第五版，大修館）（Gomez）

PS 日産にブルーバードシルフィ（BLUEBIRD SYLPHY ）という車名のクルマがありますが，関係はあるのでしょうか。