Gnomes and their deeper demeanour

Gnomes were originally based off of the mystic ideology that little men lived underneath the ground. Some magicians and other spiritualists; commonly considered gnomes to be very important elemental spirits to earth (the others being water, fire and air.) It was said that gnomes had the ability to travel along the earth as easily as humans, but if hit with sunlight; were turned to stone. (source: justsaygnome.com)