The Original Folk and Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm (76 page)

57. The Golden Bird (Vom goldenen Vogel). Source: This tale was obtained orally from an elderly female patient in the Elisabeth-Hospital in Marburg and written down by Wilhelm Grimm.

The Grimms indicate that the beginning of the tale is quite often different, and older versions often begin this way:

A king was sick, or had become blind, and nothing in the world could help him. But then he heard (or dreamed) about a bird Phoenix living in a distant country, and this bird's whistling (or song) could heal him. So the king's sons set out one after the other to find the bird, and the various versions of this tale differ in the depiction of the adventures and how the third son survives and brings the bird to his father.

The Grimms believed that this tale type was ancient and could be traced back to the biblical story about Joseph, the medieval
Saga af Artus Fagra
(fourteenth-century Icelandic work),
The Thousand and One Nights
, and
Das Buch des Ritters Herr Johannsen von Montevilla
(1488) by Jean Mandeville and Otto de Demeringen. Many other versions can be found in northern Europe.

58. Loyal Godfather Sparrow (Vom treuen Gevatter Sperling). Source: Margarete Marianne Wild.

59. Prince Swan (Prinz Schwan). Source: Margarete Marianne Wild.

The Grimms state that this tale is similar to one about the three belts in the anonymous
Feen-Mährchen
(1801), and they summarize it as follows:

The queen receives three belts from a fairy, who tirelessly gives her help as an old wicked witch. As long as these belts are not broken in two, the queen can believe in the love and faithfulness of her absent husband. When two of the belts break, the queen disguises herself as a pilgrim and searches for her husband. As she walks through a large forest, three golden nuts fall to her feet one after the other. She picks them up and takes them with her. She meets up with a miller and poses as his cousin and uses a false name. Then she finds the king, and without recognizing the queen, he falls in love with her. She shows that she has affection for him, but when he wants to embrace her, the third belt breaks. She is horrified and asks him to close the doors of the house because she cannot stand the sound of their constant slamming. However, as soon as he closes one door, another springs open, and it continues this way throughout the night. The king can do nothing but close the doors, and because of this he becomes irritated and doesn't return. Instead, he marries a princess to whom he had become engaged. Now the queen opens her first golden nut and finds the most splendid sewing stuff in a casket. Then she takes the casket and goes to the castle and sits down across from the princess's windows and begins to sew. The princess sees her and takes a great liking to the sewing stuff. She bargains for the sewing stuff, and in exchange she must let the queen spend the first night in the king's bedchamber. The next day the queen opens the second nut and finds a precious spindle inside. Then she spins with the spindle before the princess and exchanges it for the permission to spend the second night in the king's bedchamber. Finally, the queen exchanges the jewelry in the third box to spend the third night in the king's bedchamber. After the wedding with the princess takes place the next day, the queen is led to the king, and she reveals to him that she is his wife. On the third morning the king summons the princess, the queen, and all the councilors and relates how he had lost the key to a golden padlock and then had found it again. Then he asks the princess, his new wife, whether he should use the new key to the padlock or the old one. She advises him to use the old one, and by doing this, she passes a sentence on herself and must separate from the king.

60. The Golden Egg (Das Goldei). Source: Henriette Dorothea Wild.

The Grimms discuss another version from a collection of tales from Erfurt and summarize this tale as follows:

The bird that lays a golden egg every morning flees Prince Gunild. A farmer captures the bird, and the farmer gives the bird to a goldsmith, who reads on the bird's wings: “Whoever eats my head will find a thousand gold coins under his pillow every day. Whoever eats my heart will become king in Akindilla one day.” The goldsmith gives the bird to Ynkas, his nephew, to roast so that the goldsmith can eat the bird. However, Ynkas accidentally eats the head and heart of the bird and must flee the angry and deceived goldsmith, who threatens him. In the course of the action, the bird's prediction is fulfilled.

61. The Tailor Who Soon Became Rich (Von dem Schneider, der bald reich wurde). Source: Hassenpflug family.

According to another tale, the man is called Mr. Hands, whom the farmers hate because he is so smart. Out of jealousy they shut him in a baking oven. However, he takes the debris and ashes in a sack to a refined lady and asks her to keep the sack for him. He tells her that there are herbs, cinnamon, pepper, and little nails inside. Later he comes to fetch the sack and leads her astray by crying out that she had robbed the contents of the sack. In this way he compels her to pay him 300 gold coins. The farmers see him counting his money and ask him how he had earned it. He tells them that he got it out of the debris and ashes of baking oven. So all the farmers smash their baking ovens to pieces and carry the debris and ashes into the city to sell. However, they are treated badly. Now the farmers want to kill Mr. Hands out of revenge. But he puts on his mother's clothes, and in this way he escapes them, and his mother is beaten to death. Then he puts his mother into a barrel and rolls her to a doctor and lets her stand there a while. When he returns, he accuses the doctor of having killed her and manages to extort a certain sum of money. He tells the farmers that he received the money for causing his mother's death. So the farmers beat their own mothers to death. Afterward there is the incident with the shepherd who trades places with him in the cask and drowns. At the end the farmers imitate him and jump into the water.

In another tale published by Johann Gustav Gottlieb Büsching in
Volks-Sagen, Märchen und Legenden
(1812), Kibitz lets the farmer beat his wife to death and then puts her next to a basket full of fruit in a market. When a servant wants to buy some fruit from her for his employer and she doesn't answer him, he pushes her into the water. As compensation, Kibitz receives the coach in which the servant had traveled to the market and everything else that belongs to it.

The Grimms discuss another similar version about Rutschki or the citizen of Quarkenquatsch in a 1794 folk book published in Erfurt. They also note the important tale “The Priest Scarpafico” in Giovan Francesco Straparola's
Le piacevoli notti
(1550).

62. Bluebeard (Blaubart). Source: Hassenpflug family.

The Grimms mention that the incident in which the anxious wife sticks the key in hay to rub off the blood can be attributed to a folk belief that hay can really absorb blood from another object.

Among the many similar tales the Grimms note are Charles Perrault's “La Barbe bleue” in
Histoires ou contes du temps passé
” (1697); Giovan Francesco Straparola's “Galeotto” in
Le piacevoli notti
(1550); and Ludwig Tieck's stories, “Ritter Blaubart” (1797) and “Die sieben Weiber des Blaubart” (1797) and his play
Der Blaubart
(1797).

63. The Golden Children (Goldkinder). Source: Friederike Mannel.

The Grimms relate this tale to “Vom Johannes-Wassersprung und Casper-Wassersprung,” and they also draw parallels with Giovan Francesco Straparola's “Cesarin,”
Le piacevoli notti
, and Giambattista Basile's “Lo mercante” and “La cerva fatatam,”
Il Pentamerone
(1634)

64. The Simpleton (Von dem Dummling).

The White Dove (Die weiße Taube). Source: Margarete Marianne Wild.

The Grimms note similarities with a Danish tale, “Historie om trende Bödre.”

The Queen Bee (Die Bienenkönigin). Source: Albert Ludwig Grimm.

The Grimms draw parallels with their own tale, “Herr Fix und Fertig.”

The Three Feathers (Die drei Federn).

The Grimms note differences in several other tales they knew, especially with regard to the tasks that the three sons must perform. In one tale the father gives each one of the three sons an apple, and whoever throws the apple the farthest will obtain the king's realm. The youngest son throws his apple the farthest, but because he is so simple, the father doesn't want to grant him the realm and demands twenty crates of canvas in a nutshell. The oldest son travels to Holland; the second to Silesia, where there is supposed to be very fine canvas. The third son, the simpleton, goes into the forest. A nutshell falls from a tree, and he finds linen in it. After this the king demands a dog that can jump through a wedding ring, then three yards of yarn that can go through the eye of a needle. The simpleton is able to procure all these items.

In another tale the son who can bring the most beautiful smell will win the kingdom.

Simpleton reaches a house where a cat is sitting in front of the door and asks:

“Why are you so sad?”

“Oh, you can't help me!”

“Hey, listen up! Tell me what you need.”

Then the cat obtains the best smell for him.

The Grimms also refer to a version in the
Feen-Mährchen
(1801).

The Golden Goose (Die goldene Gans). Source: Hassenpflug family.

65. All Fur (Allerleirauh). Source: Henriette Dorothea Wild and Carl Nehrlich,
Schilly
(1798).

The Grimms allude to Charles Perrault's “Peau d'Ane,”
Histoires ou contes du temps passé
(1697), and their own version, “Princess Mouseskin.”

66. Hurleburlebutz (Hurleburlebutz). Source: Jeanette Hassenpflug.

The Grimms summarize a tale in
Feen-Mährchen
as follows:

A princess is so proud of her beauty and so arrogant that she mocks all her suitors and depicts them as animals and wants all her wishes to be fulfilled. One time she dreams about a singing, clinging little tree, and her father must set out to find it for her. Fortunately, he finds it, but as he is tearing it out of the ground, a terrifying lion jumps out of the earth. As a consequence the father must promise to give him the first thing that he encounters when he returns home. Indeed, it is the proud princess, who hears the singing, clinging tree as her father approaches. The king is horrified and tells her that she is to be delivered to a lion, but she is not very much worried about this because she has a washerwoman put on her clothes and take her place. After three days the lion comes and says to the washerwoman, “Get on my back,” and he carries her off into the forest. The maiden weeps when she sees a river and says, “Who will now help my mother with the washing?” The lion realizes that he has been deceived. He carries the maiden back and then leaves. After three days he returns to find a shepherd's daughter dressed in the princess's clothes. “Get on my back,” the lion says and carries her off. When she comes to a bright meadow, the maiden sighs: “Oh, who'll console my Hans when I can't lay with him in the meadow!” The lion goes back once more and brings the false bride to the king and threatens the king. Then he runs directly to the princess, who gets on his back and is carried away. He takes her to a cave, where she must do lowly work for eleven sick animals and heal their festering wounds. She gradually becomes remorseful about her previous arrogance and also cures the lion who becomes wounded. She atones for all her sins, and all of a sudden she finds herself once again in her father's splendid castle. Meanwhile, the lion has become a handsome young man and her bridegroom.

In addition to this version, the Grimms recall two short episodes from other oral tales.

67. The King with the Lion (Der Konig mit dem Löwen). Source: Jeanette Hassenpflug.

The Grimms point out that the forgetting of the first fiancée also occurs in “Prince Swan,” “Sweetheart Roland,” and “All Fur.” There are also three tales in Giambattista Basile's
Il Pentamerone
(1634) in which this incident occurs.

68. The Summer and the Winter Garden (Von dem Sommer- und Wintergarten). Source: Ferdinand Siebert.

The Grimms cite Apuleius's “Psyche and Cupid” in
The Golden Ass
(second century) as the ancient source and then briefly summarize the plot of the tale in Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve's
Contes marins ou la jeune americaine
(1740). In this version the beast is a dragon. They also summarize a tale from a Leipzig collection of stories:

The youngest daughter asks her father for a branch from an oak tree that has a twig with three acorns as he leaves on a journey. The father gets lost in a forest and comes upon a splendid castle, which is completely empty. However, he finds everything set out in the best manner. During the night a bear comes and brings a twig with three acorns and demands to have his daughter. At first the father refuses but eventually gives in. Yet, when the father returns home, he locks all the doors of his home. Nevertheless, the bear enters two times at midnight and demands to have the bride. On the third night the suitcases are packed by themselves, and three acorns are on them. The daughter herself is dressed as a bride, and her hair has been curled. She doesn't even know this. The bear stands next to her and puts a golden ring with three acorns on her finger with his paw. Then he carries her off to his castle. When she is there, she sees her father and sisters in a mirror but doesn't return home. After she gives birth to a child and three years pass, the magic spell is broken, and the bear is transformed into a handsome young man.

The Grimms assert that only the beginning of this tale is good and genuine while the ending seems very contrived.

69. Jorinda und Joringel (Jorinde and Joringel). Source: Johann Heinrich Jung-Stilling,
Heinrich Stillings Jugend
(1777).

70. Okerlo (Der Okerlo). Source: Jeanette Hassenpflug.

The Grimms summarize a short incident from
Feen-Mährchen
(1801). The clear source of this tale is Marie-Catherine d'Aulnoy's “L'oranger e l'abaille” in
Contes nouveaux ou les Fées à la Mode
(1697).