Elves

The Elves are widely considered by outsiders to be a doomed race, and an undeniable strain of pessimism and cynicism runs through elves in general. Outsiders do not interact with elves in significant enough quantities for them to have a well-define set of prejudices. Since the Elven presence on the mainland has been essentially nil for at least a thousand years, they have passed into legend for most of the population. As such, elves largely occupy a place of mythology, either cruel or kind depending on region.

Although in the past they were quite numerous, occupying significant portions of the mainland, they are now entirely isolated to their home isles of Sidhe-Praxen. The number of elves in the known world is quite small, probably in the low five-figures, and is assumed to be stagnant, if not in decline. For many centuries, the elves have all-but closed themselves off from the world. They conduct only the most limited trade, and outsiders are forbidden in all but one elven city. Elves, likewise, are forbidden from leaving, and those who do are never allowed to return.

History

1. Primal Age - Same as everyone else - who fucking knows? Maybe they weren't there?
2. Time of the Eight - Live in what is now the (Dust) Valley of the Sidhe, which was then a dense temperate forest. Probably the tree hugging elves of trope, but who knows all this stuff is possibly lies anyway.
3. First War - The first elf dies at the hand of another elf and for the next 2,000 years it's War On Heaven and Earth type stuff.
4. Early Age of Demigods - All of the new gods, who live side by side with mortals, get up to a lot of mischief. Particularly in the offspring department, though Elves are for sure the worst of the lot. A lot of fractional-god Gilgamesh-types go on to cause their own mischief. Eventually the gods all agree - or force the resisters - to retreat to the outer planes and lock themselves out of the world. Possibly a series of Usurper assassinations contributed to this decision.
5. Middle Age of Demigods - Elves watch (along with Dwarves) as Ubrekt goes ham all over like 3/5ths of the Mainland. After the Halflings and Gnomes are swallowed by the Ubrekt war machine, Dwarves, Elves, and Humans come to a three party agreement that has Gnomes force migrated to Dwarven lands.
6. Late Age of Demigods - A single generation of elves continue to get up to mischief with neighboring human lands, but treat the resulting offspring as second class people and develop a caste system that has half-elves doing all the shit work. All the half-elves in the elven lands, anyway. The half elves in the human lands work to arm and aid their cousins and eventually there is a Soviet style coup that sees the elves undergo a bloodbath that includes the slaughter of the vast majority of the elven royals . The survivors retreat to what is now Sidhe-Praxen to forge a new society. The victors on the mainland begin a rapid process of development that involves clear-cutting the forests, but political cohesion never occurs and the region becomes Greek-style city states that constantly fight with one another. Over the centuries, the Elves-in-Exile become master navigators and sovereigns of the sea. Elven naval hegemony allows them to become the dominate power on the mainland in the wake of the breakup of the Ubrekti empire.