Folk Tales and Legends from EUROPE

Once upon a time, in Albania, a wealthy man lived with his wife and their only son. They had a fine house and more gold than the boy had ever thought to count. Yet when the man grew old and knew that his life was nearing its end, it was not his wealth that troubled him.

He called his son to his bedside.

“Listen carefully,” he said. “There is one place I beg you never to visit: the village where E Bukura e Dheut lives—the Beauty of the Earth. However much you may hear of her, stay away.”

The boy promised. After his father died, he remained at home with his mother, and for some years the warning was easy to obey. He did not even know the road to that village. But travelers spoke of E Bukura e Dheut, and every tale made him more curious. Some said she was more beautiful than anyone living. Others said that men who wished to see her spent everything they possessed and came away with almost nothing.

At last the boy could think of little else. His mother reminded him of his father’s dying words, but he filled a bag with gold pieces and set out.

After a long journey he came to an old woman’s house. She offered him a place to rest, and he asked whether the village of E Bukura e Dheut lay nearby.

“It does,” she replied. “But you would do well to turn back. Many young men have come here with purses full of money. All they won was a moment’s glimpse of her. Some were allowed to see a finger, some a hand, and some an arm. They left the palace poorer than they entered it.”

Even this warning only increased his desire. The old woman told him how to reach the palace, and he went there with his bag of gold.

The servants asked what he wanted.

“I have come to see the Beauty of the Earth,” he answered, showing them the coins.

They took his message inside. At length he was admitted to a room where he was permitted to see one of E Bukura e Dheut’s fingers. The sight lasted no more than a moment. Then the servants took his gold and sent him outside the gates.

He returned to the old woman’s house without his money, but he was not disappointed. On the contrary, he was restless to see more. The old woman listened to his account and encouraged him to return. He had rewarded her for her help, and she was glad to receive another gift.

The boy hurried home. His mother saw that the gold was gone and heard how little he had received for it.

“My son,” she said, “your father warned you. Do not throw away what he worked all his life to leave you.”

But the boy would not listen. He gathered more money and made the journey again. This time the servants allowed him to see E Bukura e Dheut’s hand. They kept the money and dismissed him just as before.

In this way he spent his fortune on no more than glimpses of the woman he longed to meet. He had still never stood before her face to face. A young man who had once been rich now had nothing left to spend.

Still he searched the house for something he might use. In his father’s room, among possessions that had long been put aside, he found a cap. It looked ordinary enough. He placed it on his head and called out to his mother.

She turned toward his voice in surprise.

“Where are you?” she asked. “I can hear you, but I cannot see you!”

The boy took off the cap, and she saw him standing before her. He put it on once more and vanished from sight. At once he understood that he had found an enchanted cap, and he was certain it would take him where his gold had failed.

He traveled back to the palace. Wearing the cap, he passed unseen through the gates, along the corridors, and into E Bukura e Dheut’s chamber. There he finally saw her, not merely a finger or a hand, but the woman herself. He remained hidden through the night, watching in wonder.

When morning came, he spoke. E Bukura e Dheut heard an unfamiliar voice, but no person stood before her.

“Who is here?” she demanded.

“It is the young man who came to your palace,” he replied. “I have wished to see you for so long.”

She questioned him, and they talked until he began to trust her. In his eagerness to prove that he meant no harm, he told her about his father’s cap and removed it so she could see him.

E Bukura e Dheut seized the cap. Before he could recover it, she called her servants. They drove him from the palace, and the gates closed behind him.

For a time the young man wandered in misery. Once more he had trusted the Beauty of the Earth, and once more he had lost what he carried. Yet even now he could not forget her.

Back at his father’s house, he searched again. In a dusty corner he came upon an old jug. He turned it in his hands and rubbed its surface. Suddenly armed warriors stood before him, ready to obey.

“What do you command?” they asked.

The young man stared in astonishment. At last he possessed something that might make even the proud palace listen.

He took the jug and went to the village, stopping once more with the old woman. First he sent her to ask E Bukura e Dheut to receive him peacefully. The palace servants turned her away. He asked her to try again with a stronger message, and this time the servants beat her and cast her out.

When the old woman came back bruised and frightened, the young man knew that a polite request would not open the gates.

He rubbed the jug. The warriors appeared in fine clothes and armor, and he ordered them to assemble before the palace. Then he sent the old woman with his message once more: E Bukura e Dheut could welcome him willingly, or she would have to face the soldiers at her door.

From her windows the Beauty of the Earth saw the armed company. She grew afraid and ordered the gates opened. The young man entered to a welcome unlike any he had received before. Servants bowed to him, and E Bukura e Dheut herself spoke kindly.

“You have caused me trouble enough,” he said. “I could send you far away, to Tinglimaimun, where no one would find you.”

But she answered him so gently that his anger faded. They made peace, and soon he was convinced that her affection for him was sincere. When she asked how he had summoned his army, he showed her the jug.

She waited until he was off his guard. Then she caught up the jug and rubbed it.

The warriors appeared.

“Tell us what you wish,” they said to her.

The young man sprang to his feet. “You are mine! I called you here!”

“The jug is in her hands,” they answered.

E Bukura e Dheut gave her command: “Take this young man to Tinglimaimun.”

The warriors seized him. Before he could protest again, they carried him out of the palace and away to that far-off land.

There, in a lonely wilderness, he found himself without money, friends, or food. He walked until hunger weakened him. At last he noticed a cluster of red grapes growing nearby. He picked a grape and ate it.

A horn sprang out of his face.

He touched it in terror. Thinking he must be mistaken, he swallowed another grape. A second horn appeared. Each red grape he ate brought another horn, until he scarcely dared look at his reflection.

He stumbled onward in search of something else to eat and discovered a vine bearing white grapes. He tasted one. At once a horn fell away. He tried another, and a second horn disappeared. Soon his face was as it had been before.

The young man stood among the vines and considered what he had found. Red grapes brought horns; white grapes took them away. He gathered the two kinds carefully into separate baskets. With them, he thought, he might recover everything E Bukura e Dheut had stolen.

The road back was long. After many days he reached the sea, but no boat waited at the shore. He watched the horizon until at last a ship came into view. He needed something to wave as a signal. Having no cloth or handkerchief, he took off his trousers and waved them above his head.

The sailors saw him, drew near, and took him aboard. They carried him across the water to his own country.

By then the season for grapes had passed. The young man brought his red grapes to the market near the palace, and people crowded around to look at the unexpected fruit. Word reached E Bukura e Dheut, who ordered a maid to buy some for her.

On her way back, the maid could not resist tasting a single grape. A horn appeared on her face. Horrified, she hid herself and sent the rest of the fruit to her mistress by another servant.

E Bukura e Dheut ate the grapes eagerly. Then, one after another, horns grew upon her face. She cried out for help, but no one in the palace knew what had happened or how to undo it. She called for physicians and warned them that failure would cost them their heads.

The physicians had no cure. Days passed. The maid still hid her face, and the Beauty of the Earth became more desperate.

The young man knew that the time had come to return. He dressed as a physician and carried with him a remedy made from the white grapes, crushed until they no longer looked like fruit. At the palace he announced that he could heal the mysterious affliction.

The guards led him first to the maid, whose horn had appeared before her mistress’s illness. He listened to her account and asked her to tell him exactly what she had eaten. Trembling, she confessed that she had taken a grape from the basket meant for E Bukura e Dheut.

He gave her a little of his remedy. The horn fell away.

The news raced through the palace. E Bukura e Dheut ordered that the physician be brought to her at once.

He entered her chamber, but did not immediately offer the cure.

“If I am to heal you,” he said, “you must tell me everything. No secrets can remain between the sick person and the physician.”

She spoke of the money she had taken from a young admirer, and the physician asked her to bring it before him. She told him of the cap with which that admirer had made himself invisible, and he had the cap brought too.

“Is that all?” he asked.

She said it was.

“Think again,” he answered. “There is something you have not returned.”

At last she admitted that she had also taken a jug with power over a company of warriors. She sent for it and placed it beside the gold and the cap.

Only then did the young man give her the white-grape remedy. The horns vanished, and E Bukura e Dheut’s face was restored.

He took the jug in his hands and rubbed it. The familiar warriors appeared, waiting for his orders. Now the Beauty of the Earth understood who had cured her.

“I am the young man you sent away,” he told her. “You took my gold, my cap, and my jug, and you had me carried to Tinglimaimun. But I found the road home again.”

He ordered the warriors to take E Bukura e Dheut with him and to move her palace and its treasures to his own village. The servants obeyed, and the entire splendid palace was brought to the place where his mother lived.

When the mother saw her son return with the Beauty of the Earth, with the lost riches restored and a marvelous palace besides, she rejoiced. The young man and E Bukura e Dheut were married, and in the old telling they lived there together happily ever after.

Source: Traditional Albanian tale recorded by Thimi Mitko in Albanikê Melissa / Bëlietta Sskiypêtare (Alexandria, 1878). Narrative cross-checked against Robert Elsie, Albanian Folktales and Legends (2001). This is a newly written English retelling, not a reproduction of Elsie’s translation.

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Long ago, in the mountains of the Pyrenees, there was a narrow way into the valleys of Andorra. The road passed near Auvinyà, between steep slopes, dark woods, and the winding paths that led toward Alt Urgell. Anyone who wished to enter the country from the south had to make the journey through those mountains.

For generations, the watch over that passage belonged to one family. From their high lookout they guarded the way into the valleys. The years went by, however, and the family grew smaller. One member was lost, then another, until at last only a single woman remained to keep watch.

When that woman died, it seemed that the old duty must die with her. Yet the people of the valleys soon began to speak of another guardian. Near Auvinyà, where the trees grew thick and the mountain paths twisted out of sight, a mysterious lady appeared. She was always dressed in white, and no one could say whence she came or how she knew when danger approached.

They called her the White Lady of Auvinyà.

Some said they had seen her near the place where the old watch had stood. Others spoke of a pale figure moving between the trees and vanishing before anyone could draw near. Whether she was a woman with strange powers or a spirit of the mountains, no one knew. But the people believed that she watched the entrance to their valleys as faithfully as the guardians before her.

In those days, so the legend tells, the bishop of Urgell wished to hold the Andorrans firmly under his power. He demanded such heavy taxes that the people found it hard to keep what they had earned by their labor. The valleys were small, their mountain fields were precious, and the burdens laid upon them were great.

The bishop was accustomed to having his way. What could the people of a handful of mountain villages do against a powerful man? He did not imagine that the narrow road near Auvinyà might be guarded by someone he could neither command nor frighten.

One night, when the moon was waning and the mountains lay beneath a faint silver light, the bishop was traveling toward Andorra. The road took him close to Auvinyà. Beyond its edge, the forest waited in deep shadow.

There he saw the White Lady.

She stood before him in her white clothing, strange and beautiful against the dark trees. There was something about her that drew his gaze and held it. The bishop, who had come to make others obey him, found himself following her instead.

She turned toward the forest. He went after her. Soon the trees closed around them, and the path was lost among the shadows.

What happened in those woods, no one could ever say. The lady’s secrets were her own, and the bishop never told the story. But the next morning he returned a changed man. His face showed such fear that even those who knew his pride could scarcely recognize him. He was shaken and bewildered, as though the night had shown him something no human power could master.

He swore that he would never pass that way again.

For a time he kept his word. The valleys breathed more freely, and the people went about their lives. Seasons followed one another. Snow covered the mountain tracks, melted into streams, and returned again. Years passed, and the White Lady was scarcely spoken of. Few claimed to have seen her; fewer still knew where she kept her watch.

At last the bishop began to think that the danger he had once feared had gone. He remembered the taxes he wished to impose and the obedience he expected. He convinced himself that nothing remained to stop him from entering Andorra again.

So he set out once more along the mountain road.

Near Auvinyà, the White Lady appeared to him again. Once again the quiet woods received them. But this time the bishop did not return in the morning. Nor did he return the next day, or the day after that.

No one ever saw him again.

The people might have thought their troubles were ended. The bishop had vanished, and the weight of his demands was lifted from the valleys. Yet before long a new terror came down from the mountains.

A great black wolf began to roam the country.

It was no ordinary wolf, or so the frightened shepherds said. It was enormous, fierce, and dreadful to look upon. Its eyes seemed to carry a darkness deeper than the night. It attacked flocks and houses, and those who tried to stand against it were no match for its strength. Everywhere it passed, it left fear and loss behind.

People who had once dreaded the bishop’s arrival now dreaded the coming of darkness. Shepherds listened for the terrible creature among the rocks. Families worried about their animals and watched the paths above their homes. The wolf seemed to have brought the valleys a new kind of suffering.

At last the leading men of Andorra gathered in council. They could not let the beast destroy their flocks and threaten their people any longer. They agreed that a hunt must be organized, and the bravest among the country’s syndics—a man chosen to represent the valleys—undertook the task of bringing the wolf down.

The hunters searched the mountains and the woods. They followed the fearsome creature until the courageous syndic finally faced it and killed it.

The black wolf was dead. The shepherds could return to their flocks without the same dread, and once more the valleys grew quiet.

But the syndic’s own peace did not return.

Soon after the hunt, a terrible dream came to him. In his sleep he saw the great black wolf again. Though the animal had been killed, it stood before him as though death had no hold upon it. The sight filled him with horror.

The next night the wolf returned in his dreams. And the night after that, it returned again. However far the syndic went by day, however firmly he told himself that the creature was dead, he could not escape it when he closed his eyes.

The man who had faced the beast so bravely began to lose his strength. Sleep brought him no rest. Fear wore down his health, and the people saw that something was wrong far beyond any wound he might have received in the hunt. His thoughts grew troubled, and his condition worsened.

Those who cared for him remembered the White Lady. If anyone understood the dark thing that haunted the syndic, surely it must be the mysterious guardian of Auvinyà. The people sought her out and begged her to use her powers to help the man who had saved their flocks.

But there are sorrows, the legend says, that even the White Lady could not heal.

She revealed the secret of the black wolf. Within that dreadful creature had dwelt the dark soul of the bishop who had disappeared in the forest. Though the wolf was dead, the evil connected with it had not passed without leaving its mark upon the brave hunter.

The White Lady could tell the people what had happened, but she could not restore the syndic’s health. The man who had freed the valleys from the beast continued to weaken, and in the end he died.

His courage was not forgotten. The wolf would trouble the flocks no more, and the bishop’s cruelty had come to an end. Yet the legend remembers the cost of that deliverance, too. The valleys had been saved by a man who did not live to enjoy the peace he helped restore.

And what became of the White Lady?

She did not leave the mountains. To this day, people say that a figure dressed in white may sometimes be glimpsed among the woods of Auvinyà. She keeps watch near the old way into Andorra, alert to those who might come to take away the freedom of the valleys.

For as long as her story is told, the White Lady stands guard in the imagination of the people: a mysterious protector on the mountain road, where the forest remembers what the world has forgotten.

Source: Traditional Andorran legend of La Dama Blanca d’Auvinyà, cross-checked against material published by the cultural association Esbart Laurèdia and the official cultural portal of Andorra. This is a newly written English retelling.

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In Tyrol, where the road from Innsbruck runs toward the Brenner Pass, there rises a mountain so striking that travelers have long looked at it and wondered what story it carries in its stone. Its peak is called Serles. Beside it stand two lesser heights, and the people of the region say that these are not merely mountains at all, but beings turned to rock long ago.

Once, so the old legend says, there lived in those valleys a giant named Serles. He was known as a king among the mountains, but he was not a king who protected his land. He was fierce, violent, and proud, and whatever strength had been given to him, he used for cruelty. His wife was as hard-hearted as he was, and his closest counselor was worse still. The three delighted in power and took pleasure in seeing others fear them.

Serles loved the hunt above all things. Yet he did not hunt like an ordinary hunter, taking what he needed from the wild and respecting the order of the mountains. He hunted for the joy of destruction. Whenever a stag fled across the high meadows and rocky slopes, the giant would pursue it with a wild pack of hounds and a whole company at his heels. Nothing mattered to him but the chase.

If the frightened animal ran among flocks grazing on the hillsides, Serles did not hold back his dogs. On the contrary, he urged them on. Sheep were torn apart, cows were driven mad with panic, and goats were scattered down the slopes. If a shepherd dared protest, the giant laughed and turned the hounds against him as well. More than one poor herdsman was dragged down simply because he tried to defend his animals.

Whenever this happened, Serles shouted in triumph, “Lustig gejaid!”—“A merry hunt!” To him it was sport when the mountains echoed with barking, bleating, and cries of terror. His wife rode beside him and mocked the suffering of the herdsmen. His wicked counselor praised every brutal deed and urged him never to show mercy. Thus the three passed through the valleys like a storm of ruin.

For a long time the people endured what they could not prevent. The shepherds led their flocks to the high pastures with dread in their hearts, never knowing when the giant king might appear. Mothers crossed themselves when thunder rolled over the ridges, and old people said that the mountains themselves must surely grow weary of such wickedness.

At last there came a day when the evil could no longer go unanswered. Serles was out hunting once again. A stag, desperate for safety, rushed into a herd on a mountain meadow. The dogs sprang after it and in moments were attacking not only the stag but the cattle as well. The herdsmen shouted and ran forward, trying to save what they could. One of them, seeing a dog tearing at the animals and knowing that many more would die if he stood idle, pulled his crossbow from his shoulder and fired. The bolt struck one of the giant’s hounds, and the beast fell dead on the grass.

Serles was mad with rage. His face darkened, and his savage wife and counselor inflamed him still further. They mocked him for allowing a shepherd to resist him. They cried out that the man should be punished, and the giant gave the terrible order. He set the whole pack upon the defenseless herdsmen.

What followed was so cruel that the legend remembers it with horror. The dogs rushed upon the men, and Serles watched with dreadful delight. But before the violence could run its full course, the sky changed. Clouds gathered with unnatural speed. Thunder cracked above the peaks. Lightning blazed over the slopes. A storm unlike any ordinary storm burst over the mountain.

The wind roared. Rain lashed the meadow. Fire seemed to tear the heavens open. The giant, his wife, and his counselor had no time to escape. When at last the thunder passed and the storm-light faded, the shepherds looked up in awe. The wicked king and his companions were gone. In their place stood three great masses of stone rising toward the sky.

There in the center towered Serles himself, turned forever into a mountain. Beside him stood his wife on one side and his counselor on the other. The destroyers of the valleys had become part of the landscape they had tormented. What had once ridden shouting across the meadows now stood silent in rock and ice.

From that day on, people said that the mountain peak of Serles and the heights beside it bore witness to heaven’s judgment. No shepherd ever forgot the story, and travelers along the Brenner road were told to look up and remember what cruelty can bring upon itself. The shape of the mountain kept the legend alive, for even from far off it seemed possible to imagine a giant ruler set in the middle, with his companions at his sides.

Yet the tale does not end there. The old people of Tyrol say that on stormy nights the howling of spectral dogs may still be heard around the Serles. Some say it is only the wind among the rocks. Others believe the hunt of the giant king has never entirely died away. When lightning strikes near the crags and thunder rolls between the peaks, they say that the mountains are remembering what happened when Serles, his wife, and his counselor were overtaken by judgment.

So the legend of the Giant King Serles remained in Tyrol: a mountain story, a warning, and an explanation woven together. It tells of power without mercy, of people who suffered long, and of a moment when cruelty rose so high that the heavens answered it. And thus the great peak of Serles stands not only as a landmark of the Alps, but also as a reminder that even the mightiest hunter may one day be brought to stillness.

Source: Tyrolean legend of Serles, based primarily on Tales and Legends of the Tyrol collected and arranged by Madame La Comtesse A. von Günther (1874), cross-checked against the Tyrol tourism overview of Tyrolean legends. This is a newly written English retelling.

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Once upon a time, in a village in Azerbaijan, there lived an old grandmother and her grandson. The boy was so small that everyone called him Jirtdan, which means “tiny.” But a small person, as the villagers would discover, may have a very quick mind.

One morning Jirtdan saw the neighboring children getting ready to go into the forest to gather firewood. He hurried to his grandmother.

“Grandmother, I want to go with them!”

His grandmother knew how little he was, but he pleaded until she agreed. She called the other children to her, gave each a piece of bread spread with butter, and asked them to look after her grandson.

Off they went along the forest path. Before they had traveled very far, Jirtdan sat down upon the ground.

“Why have you stopped?” asked his companions.

“My grandmother put me in your care,” he replied. “You must carry me.”

The children took turns bearing him on their backs until they reached the forest. Then they set to work, picking up fallen branches and tying them into bundles. Jirtdan sat and watched.

“Why aren’t you gathering wood?” they asked.

“My grandmother put me in your care,” he answered. “Gather some for me, too.”

The other children gathered a bundle for him. When they were ready to return, everyone lifted a load of firewood, but Jirtdan again remained seated.

“And why aren’t you carrying your bundle?” his companions demanded.

“My grandmother put me in your care,” said Jirtdan. “You should carry it.”

At last the boys took his wood as well. They had scarcely gone any distance when Jirtdan began to cry that he was tired. This time the others had had enough.

“You will never learn to walk if someone is always carrying you,” they told him. “Come along on your own feet.”

So Jirtdan followed them, and they made their way beneath the trees. But they had lingered too long. Evening darkened the woods, the paths became difficult to see, and soon none of the children could say which direction led home.

Then they noticed two things. Far off on one side came the barking of a dog; on the other side a light glimmered in the darkness.

“Which way shall we go?” they wondered. “Toward the barking dog or toward the light?”

They turned to Jirtdan, whose size they often laughed at but whose opinion they now wanted.

“If we go where the dog is barking,” he said, “it may bite us. Let us go toward the light. Perhaps there we shall find the road.”

They followed the gleam through the trees until they reached a house. It belonged to a div, a monstrous giant of the kind told of in old Azerbaijani tales. The children did not know that. They were grateful simply to find a roof beneath which they might spend the night.

The div was delighted when he saw them. He had no intention of helping them home. Instead, he thought of eating the children one after another while they slept. He gave them bread and showed them a place to lie down.

The tired boys stretched themselves out and closed their eyes. Jirtdan lay among them, but he understood that their host was dangerous. However still he appeared, he kept watch.

After a while the div came to listen at the place where the children slept.

“Who is sleeping, and who is awake?” he asked.

Jirtdan promptly raised his head.

“Everyone is sleeping,” he replied, “but Jirtdan is awake.”

“Why is Jirtdan awake?” asked the div. “What does he need?”

“My grandmother always cooked me eggs before I went to sleep,” said Jirtdan.

The div wanted the boy to fall asleep as quickly as possible. He went away, cooked some eggs, and brought them to him. Jirtdan ate, and the giant waited once more.

When the house had grown quiet, the div returned to the sleeping place.

“Who is sleeping, and who is awake?”

“Everyone is sleeping,” said the little voice, “but Jirtdan is awake.”

“Still awake? What is it you need now?”

“Every night,” answered Jirtdan, “my grandmother brings me water from the river in a sieve. Without that, I cannot go to sleep.”

A sieve is full of tiny holes, but the div gave no thought to how water could be carried in one. He wanted only to quiet his smallest guest. Taking a sieve, he hurried down to the river.

He dipped it into the stream. He lifted it. All the water poured straight through. He tried again, then again, and each time the sieve was empty before he could take a step.

While the div struggled beside the river, Jirtdan sprang up and shook his companions awake.

“Get up! Quickly! The div means to eat us. This is our chance to escape!”

The boys rose at once. Leaving the house behind, they ran softly toward the river. There they saw the giant busy with his impossible errand. He filled the sieve, watched the water disappear, and filled it yet again, never thinking to look around him.

The children slipped past and crossed to the opposite bank. Only when they were safely over did the div look up and notice them going away.

“Wait!” he called. “How did you cross the river? Tell me how to get over to you!”

Jirtdan answered from the far bank.

“Find a great millstone, the sort used for grinding grain. Put its hole over your head, so the stone hangs around your neck. Then step into the river, and you will cross.”

The div believed him. He found a heavy millstone, slipped it over his head, and walked into the water. But the weight of the stone dragged him down. The river closed over him, and the monster never came up again.

Now there was nothing to prevent the children from making their way home. Jirtdan, the smallest among them, had seen the danger, kept the div occupied, and shown his friends how to escape.

And that is how the boy whom everyone called Tiny outwitted a terrible giant and brought the other children safely back to their village.

Source: Traditional Azerbaijani folk tale “Cırtdan” (Jirtdan). Adapted from the Azerbaijani text in Azerbaijani Wikisource (oral folk literature), cross-checked against the English telling “Jirtdan — The Little Boy Who Fought the Monsters” on mehriban-aliyeva.az. Original English literary adaptation.

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Once, a man went into the forest to gather firewood. He had not gone far among the fallen branches when something stirred in the brush. There, where no stream ran and no pond could be seen, was a crayfish. The man was so startled that he pushed the strange creature aside with a twig.

Then, to his still greater amazement, the crayfish spoke.

“Good man,” it pleaded, “take me home with you.”

“What would I do with a crayfish in my house?” the man cried. “Leave me alone!”

But the little creature begged so earnestly, and would not stop begging, that at last the man took pity on it. He carried the crayfish home, though he could make no sense of how it had come to be in the forest or how it had learned to speak.

In his house was a great warm stove, the sort that held its heat through the coldest nights. The crayfish settled there, and before long it seemed as comfortable as though it had always belonged beside the hearth. Yet its thoughts were not on warmth alone.

Not far from the village stood the palace of a king who had three daughters, each celebrated for her beauty. When the crayfish heard of them, it began to speak to the man again.

“Go to the king,” it said, “and tell him you have a son, a little crayfish, who wishes to marry one of his daughters.”

The man stared. “Have you lost your senses? How could I go before a king with such a message? He would think I had come to mock him!”

“Please go,” said the crayfish. “Ask him for me.”

Day after day it begged. At last the man, who had already given way once to the creature’s pleas, agreed to go. He made his way to the palace, asked for an audience, and told the king, as steadily as he could, what the little crayfish wanted.

The king listened in disbelief. A crayfish wished to become his son-in-law! He might have driven the messenger away, but instead he decided to set an impossible test.

“If your son is so clever,” said the king, “let him build, before tomorrow morning, a bridge made of diamonds all the way from your house to my palace.”

The man went home trembling. “There! I warned you,” he said. “The king demands a diamond bridge by morning. What have you brought upon us?”

“There is no cause to worry,” replied the crayfish. “Only carry me into the yard and set me on a post.”

The man did as he was told. Then he went inside and waited for morning, expecting nothing but trouble. At dawn, however, he looked toward the palace and could hardly believe his eyes. Between his humble house and the king’s great gates stretched a bridge that glittered like a trail of captured stars. Every part of it shone with diamonds.

The king himself came to look. He saw the bridge, and though he could not understand how it had appeared, he would not yet give his daughter to a crayfish.

“Tell your son this,” he said. “By tomorrow morning I want the whole way from his house to my palace covered with poppies in bloom.”

The man returned, shaking his head. “A bridge was one thing,” he said to the crayfish. “But where will you find flowering poppies in a single night?”

“Bring me a handful of poppy seeds,” answered the crayfish, “and take me outside once more.”

The man brought the seeds. In the morning, when the king rose and looked from his window, the road below was a wonder to behold: poppies had blossomed all along the way, from the little house to the palace. Their flowers turned the path into a bright ribbon of color. The king had asked for a field of blossoms, and there they were.

He was astonished, but still he was not satisfied. He called the man for a third time.

“Now let your son make a dress for whichever of my daughters he chooses,” said the king. “He must make it without taking a single measurement. If it fits her, we shall speak of the wedding.”

The man carried this last command home. Once again the crayfish gave him no reason to be afraid. By the following day the dress was ready, beautiful enough for a princess. The man brought it to the palace with the little crayfish.

The king summoned all three daughters and stood them side by side. Which one, he wondered, would this curious suitor choose? The crayfish crept forward, climbed onto the foot of the middle princess, and stayed there. She was the one he had chosen.

The dress was placed upon her. It fitted as though the finest tailor in the kingdom had measured her a hundred times. There was nothing to lengthen, nothing to take in, not a fold out of place. The king could invent no further excuse. His word had been given, and a wedding was prepared.

The bridegroom was carried to the ceremony on a fine plate, surrounded by precious diamonds. The middle princess wept, for the husband she had been promised appeared to be nothing more than a little crayfish. Yet the wedding took place, just as the king had agreed.

That night a marvelous thing happened. When the newlyweds were alone, the crayfish shook itself. Its hard shell slipped away, and before the princess stood a handsome young prince. He laid the empty shell beneath his pillow. The princess, who had gone to her wedding in tears, could scarcely believe her happiness.

Then the prince told her the truth. A witch had put him under a spell and turned him into a crayfish. He could take off the shell for a time, but the enchantment had not yet run its course. Only a little longer remained before he could be free.

The next day, while he was away, the princess noticed the discarded shell beneath the pillow. To her it was an ugly reminder of the creature she had feared. Without understanding what it meant, she picked it up and threw it into the fire. The shell burned to ashes.

When the prince returned, he looked for it at once.

“Have you seen what I left under the pillow?” he asked.

“That dreadful old shell?” she replied. “I burned it.”

At her words the prince was overcome with grief.

“You have brought new suffering upon me,” he said. “I had only one more month to endure. Now I cannot tell when my enchantment will end.”

He gave her a pair of iron shoes.

“If you wear these shoes until they are worn through,” he told her, “perhaps my suffering will at last be over.”

Then, before she could hold him back, he changed into a dove and flew away. The princess watched him vanish into the sky, and the palace that had seemed so joyful only a day before became a place of sorrow.

She put on the iron shoes and went in search of him. She walked through fields and forests, over roots and stones, by day and by night. She wept as she traveled, but she kept going, hoping that each rough stretch of road would wear the iron a little thinner. She did not know where the dove had flown, or how many miles might still lie before her.

One day she came upon a little house. There lived the very witch who had placed enchantments upon princes. The princess asked whether she might enter her service, but the witch would not take her in.

“I have workers enough,” she said. “There is another lady not far from here. Go to her. She may need someone to watch over her doves.”

The princess followed these directions and came to a second house. The woman who lived there was also a witch, though the traveler did not at first understand what strange creatures she kept. The woman agreed to hire her as a keeper of doves, but made a terrible threat.

“Every dove must be here when I count them,” she warned. “If even one is missing, you shall lose your head.”

The princess was given the whole flock. As she watched the birds, she discovered that they were no ordinary doves. They were princes held under enchantment. And among them was one she knew at once: the husband she had lost.

He recognized her, too. Whenever the flock scattered, he helped her gather the birds together, so that not a single dove was missing when the witch counted them. Thus a whole year went by. The princess tended the flock faithfully, and all the while she kept her iron shoes upon her feet.

When the year of service was almost over, the enchanted prince perched upon the branch of an oak tree and spoke to her in secret.

“Tomorrow she will offer to pay you,” he said. “Do not take money. Ask only for one of the doves. You will know which one to choose, for I shall give you a little nod.”

The next day the witch counted her birds. Every dove was there. Pleased with the good care they had received, she turned to the princess.

“You have served well,” she said. “Tell me what payment you wish. Or would you rather stay and tend my doves for another year?”

“I cannot stay,” answered the princess, “and I ask for no money. Give me just one dove from your flock.”

“Very well,” said the witch. “Choose whichever you please.”

The birds stood before her. The princess searched among them, and then one dove made a small movement of its head. She knew the signal. She reached out and took that bird into her hands.

“This is the one I want,” she said.

With the dove she set out for home. They traveled back along the road toward her father’s palace, and the iron shoes struck the earth at every step. At last, while they were still on the journey, the hard soles gave way. The iron had worn through.

In that same moment the dove changed back into the handsome prince. The spell that had held him was broken at last. After all their wandering and sorrow, the princess had found her husband and brought him home.

When the king saw them, his joy was so great that he ordered a splendid feast. Guests came from far and near; kings were invited, and the palace rang with celebration. Wine flowed as freely as water, and the people rejoiced to see the prince and princess together again.

And, as the old storytellers say, I was at that feast myself. I tasted the honey and the wine—though it ran down my beard and not a drop reached my mouth!

Source: “Ab Rachku” (Аб рачку; “About the Little Crayfish”), a traditional Belarusian tale collected by Michał Federowski, Lud białoruski na Rusi Litewskiej, vol. II, part I (Kraków, 1902), tale no. 156, pp. 181–183. Story sequence cross-checked with the complete Belarusian text reproduced in Belaruski folklor: Khrestamatyya (1995), and the catalogued academic anthology Charadzeinyia kazki (2003), vol. II, tale 15. Original English literary retelling; not a translation of the later Belarusian editorial text. References: https://books.yandex.ru/books/lFJkmqSz/read-online ; https://ethnoby.org/vydanni/1126316927 ; https://pbc.biaman.pl/dlibra/publication/22440/edition/21421?language=pl

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Long ago, on the ground where the Causeway and the Giant’s Mount would one day be known in Brussels, there stood a castle high above the surrounding land. Its walls looked out across the valley, and from its tallest tower one could see the roads and paths stretching into the distance.

The lord of that castle was a giant. People said he stood more than nine feet tall. His voice could make travelers turn their heads, and his strength was greater than that of any ordinary man. Yet, unlike the cruel giants who haunt so many old tales, this one used his great power to defend those who could not defend themselves.

He was not always gentle in speech. His moods could change quickly, and when he grew angry, few dared stand before him. But he could not bear to see the weak mistreated. If highwaymen troubled the roads, he pursued them. If brigands robbed the people traveling through the countryside, he seized them and brought them to justice. Those who preyed upon others learned to keep far from the giant’s lands.

In the castle he had one great treasure, dearer to him than all its halls and towers: his daughter, Helen. His beloved wife had died when Helen was born, and from that day onward the giant had raised the girl himself. He loved her so deeply that he could scarcely bear the thought of any harm coming near her.

Helen grew up within the castle grounds. She knew every stair, every window, and every corner of the garden, but she had never wandered beyond the walls. In summer she liked to sit high upon the tower with her sewing, looking down at the fields and the winding path through the Valley of the Brook. Often she wondered what the world beyond her father’s gate might hold.

One day the giant went out to search the countryside for evildoers. Helen watched him leave, and then, drawn by the brightness of the afternoon, she ventured outside the castle grounds for a little walk. The narrow path led her into the valley, where she had never set foot before.

She had gone only a short way when a knight came around a bend in the path. He wore armor that shone in the daylight. When he saw Helen, he stopped as if he had forgotten where he was going. He had never met anyone so lovely, and there was such wonder in his face that Helen stood motionless too.

The knight knelt before her and declared that he loved her. Helen had never heard such words addressed to her. She was startled and shy, but she felt that her own heart had turned toward the stranger.

Before either could say much more, the ground seemed to tremble beneath heavy footsteps. Helen’s father had returned. He came up the path leading four captured robbers by a cord, and he stopped the moment he saw the knight kneeling before his daughter.

“What are you doing at Helen’s feet?” the giant demanded.

The knight rose, but he did not hide his purpose. He begged the giant’s pardon and explained that he had fallen in love with Helen and wished to marry her.

“And who are you,” asked the giant, “to speak so boldly?”

“I am Harry of Housestone,” the young man replied. “I received my knighthood from Lothario. I ask only that you hear me honestly.”

The giant examined him closely. He questioned Harry, and the young knight answered without turning away. Beside them Helen blushed and took her father’s enormous hand. The giant saw at once that the feeling between the two young people was not one-sided.

At last he said, “You are a worthy knight, Harry of Housestone. But long ago I swore that my daughter would marry only the man who could accomplish one task.”

Harry listened eagerly.

“From this castle to the town, across the valley, you must build a paved causeway, bordered with columns. It must be finished in a single night. At dawn tomorrow, you must be able to ride with Helen along that road to the Chapel of St. George.”

The giant looked at Harry with a smile that gave little hope. Then he took Helen back toward the castle. As she went, she turned and gave the knight one last sorrowful look.

Harry remained where he was, trying to imagine how any human being could do what the giant had demanded. He walked the land, measuring the long distance with his eyes. A deep hollow lay between the castle and the town; stone after stone would have to be brought and laid, and columns would have to rise on both sides of the way. One night could not possibly be enough.

Still, Harry would not abandon his hope without trying. His uncle owned copper mines in a place called the Sunny Wood. There were many workers there, skilled in hard labor, and Harry hurried to ask their overseers whether they could build the road before morning.

They listened to his request in astonishment. Even if a thousand men were employed every day, they told him, the work might take a year. No miners, however willing, could finish it before dawn.

Harry left them with a heavy heart. Evening had come. The road back seemed longer than ever, and the future that had appeared so bright in the valley was slipping away.

As he passed among the trees, he noticed a small man leaning against a trunk. The stranger was no more than three feet tall. His hair was black, his beard white and pointed, and on his head he wore a tall green hat. There was a strange, fiery brightness in his eyes.

“You seem troubled, Knight of Housestone,” said the little man. “I know what you need, and I know that ordinary men cannot give it to you. But I can.”

Harry stared at him. “Who are you? And how could you possibly help me?”

“I belong to the world beneath these woods,” replied the stranger. “I am a spirit of the copper mines. Your uncle’s workers have dug shafts and galleries through the places where I and my companions dwell. Their hammers disturb our peace.”

He paused, watching Harry carefully.

“Promise that the digging will cease and that the passages will be filled in. In return, before the sun rises, we shall make the paved road and all its columns. You may go to the castle at dawn and claim your bride.”

Harry wished with all his heart to agree, but he could not promise what was not his to give.

“My uncle still owns the mines,” he said. “And he has a son who will inherit them. How can I pledge to close them?”

The spirit answered with sad news. That very day, he said, the uncle’s son had been killed by a man-at-arms whom he had ordered flogged the day before. Harry was now his uncle’s only heir.

Harry stood silent for a moment, thinking of his cousin’s death. He offered a prayer for him. Then, with his left hand resting upon the hilt of his sword, he extended his right hand to the little stranger and made his promise: when the mines became his, he would stop the work and have the shafts and galleries filled.

“That is enough,” said the spirit. “Go to the beginning of the causeway when dawn comes. Bring no builders. There will be nothing for you to do but fetch Helen.”

Then the strange little man departed, leaving Harry alone beneath the trees.

That night, around midnight, a furious storm rose over the land. The wind bent the great trees; thunder rolled from one end of the sky to the other. In her chamber Helen woke with a start, frightened by the noise. She hurried to her father, who tried to comfort her.

“It is only the devil chasing some wild creature through the forest,” he told her.

But Helen listened again. Beneath the roar of the wind she thought she could hear hammers striking stone, wheels rumbling, and the confused sounds of many laborers at work.

“Father, listen! It sounds as though someone is building outside.”

The giant looked out through the window. Darkness covered the valley, and the storm made it hard to see anything. He shook his head. If Harry of Housestone was foolish enough to attempt the task, he thought, then the young man must have lost his senses.

As the giant closed the window, a sudden gust put out the lamp. Almost at once the storm fell quiet. The valley was still again.

Helen could not rest. She waited anxiously for the night to pass, remembering the little hope she had seen in Harry’s face when he left the valley.

At the first light of dawn she climbed the castle tower and looked out. What she saw made her cry aloud with joy.

Before the castle stood a splendid archway, and beyond it a broad, paved road stretched across the valley. The causeway was lined with beautiful columns, just as her father had commanded. Where there had been no road at sunset, there was now a magnificent way leading toward the town.

And at its far end waited Harry of Housestone.

He sat upon a black horse. Behind him two pages led a gentle white horse for Helen. Everything was ready for the journey her father had demanded.

The giant came up when he heard his daughter’s happy cries. He saw the new road, the archway, the columns, and the young knight waiting in the morning light. Every part of the seemingly impossible task had been accomplished. The giant could no longer deny the promise he had made.

That very day Harry and Helen were married.

Harry did not forget the small figure in the green hat or the bargain made among the trees. When his uncle died and the copper mines passed into his hands, he ordered the digging stopped. The workers filled in the shafts and galleries, and the spirits beneath the Sunny Wood were left in peace.

So thoroughly were the passages hidden that, according to the old tale, no one has ever been able to discover them again.

And the causeway? The people of Brussels remembered its story: a road raised in one night, not by the might of a giant, but through a promise made between a young knight and a spirit of the earth.

Source: “The Giant of the Causeway,” a Brussels-region legend, in Christmas Tales of Flanders (New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1917), compiled by André de Ridder, translated by M. C. O. Morris. The collection draws on Flemish and Brabant folk-tale sources, including the work of Pol de Mont, Alfons de Cock and Isidoor Teirlinck. This edition is in the US public domain. The story here is an independently written English literary retelling that preserves the recorded events and characters. https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/64134/pg64134-images.html (The Giant of the Causeway, pp. 126–133).

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Long ago, a man lived with his wife in a house where good fortune seemed reluctant to settle. They had no children. Their mare had never borne a foal, and their hound had never had puppies. At last the man grew so discouraged that he decided to leave home and seek his fortune in the wide world.

He walked from place to place, as a bee travels from flower to flower. One day, near midday, he came to a spring. He sat beside the clear water, opened his knapsack, and took out his bread. While he was eating, another traveler arrived. The man invited the stranger to share his meal, and the two sat together by the spring.

As they talked, the stranger asked why he was wandering so far from home.

“Nothing prospers in my household,” the man answered. “My wife has no children, my hound no puppies, and my mare no foal. So I have gone out into the world to look for better luck.”

When they had finished eating, the stranger thanked him for his hospitality and placed an apple in his hand.

“Take this home,” he said. “Peel it, and give the peel to your mare and hound. Divide the fruit into two parts: one for your wife and one for yourself. You will find two seeds inside. Plant them on the roof of your house. Then wait and see what comes.”

The man thanked him and returned home. He did exactly as he had been told.

In time his wife gave birth to twin sons; the mare had two foals, and the hound two puppies. From the two seeds on the roof sprang two apple trees. The boys grew strong, the young horses became swift, and the hounds learned to follow a trail through forest and field.

Years passed, and the father and mother died. The brothers were left together in their childhood home, but they longed to see the world. Each chose one horse and one hound. From the trees that had grown upon the roof, they cut wood to make themselves each a spear. Then they mounted their horses and rode away.

They journeyed side by side until they reached a fork in the road. A sign stood there. One branch, it warned, would lead a traveler away from the familiar world for five years; the other would keep him awa for three.

The brothers decided to part. One took the upper road, the other the lower, and each rode onward with his horse, his hound, and his wooden spear.

The brother on the lower road traveled for three years. At last he reached a lake, beside which stood another strange sign: “If you cross, you will regret it. If you do not cross, you will regret it.”

“Well,” he said, “I cannot do both. I shall cross, and accept whatever follows.”

He urged his horse into the water, and his faithful hound swam beside them. When they emerged on the other bank, a wonderful change had come over all three. The young man, his horse, and his hound shone with gold, as though the lake had gilded them from head to foot.

Not long afterward, they reached a splendid city. The golden traveler stopped at a tall tower and asked where he might find lodging. The servants welcomed him and brought him into a courtyard, where a richly dressed gentleman received him with great courtesy. Only later did he discover that his host was the king himself.

From a window the king’s daughter caught sight of the stranger and his golden horse. She had never seen anyone like him. All night she thought of the traveler, and in the morning, when she heard he was preparing to leave, she hurried to her father.

“Please do not let him go,” she begged. “I wish to marry him.”

The king loved his daughter and listened to her request. He offered the young traveler her hand, and the young man gladly accepted. They exchanged a ring and a handkerchief as tokens of their promise. Soon the palace was full of music and guests, and a splendid wedding was celebrated.

For a while the new husband was happy. But one morning he stood at a window, gazing across the countryside, and his wife asked why he looked so thoughtful.

“I have not been hunting for a long time,” he replied.

“Then go,” she said. “Take some of our servants with you, and enjoy the morning.”

He wished to ride alone. He mounted his golden horse, called his golden hound, and set off before the dew had dried.

Before long the hound scented a stag with golden antlers. The creature raced across the fields toward a tower, with the hound and hunter close behind. In the courtyard the young man was about to strike the stag when a woman called down from a window.

“Spare my stag! Come upstairs instead, and play a game of checkers with me. If you win, the stag is yours. If I win, you must give me your hound.”

The hunter accepted. He climbed to the room where the woman waited, and they set out the pieces. Just as he was about to win, voices began singing behind him. He glanced around. In that instant his opponent shifted the pieces, won the game, and claimed the hound.

She offered to play again, this time wagering the hound against his horse. Again the singing distracted him, and again she cheated. The horse became hers.

For their third game she staked the horse, and he staked his own freedom. Once more the hidden singers caught his attention. The woman moved the pieces and declared herself the winner. She bound the young man and shut him in a dungeon beneath the tower.

Meanwhile, the brother who had taken the upper road completed his five years of wandering. He came to the same lake, crossed it, and emerged as golden as his twin, with a golden horse and golden hound. Soon he arrived in the same city and was welcomed at the royal tower.

The king and the princess took him for the husband who had gone hunting. The princess embraced him, but the newcomer held back in confusion. When he heard the things they said, he understood that his twin brother had reached this place before him and had married the king’s daughter. He did not wish to deceive her, yet he needed to discover what had happened to his brother.

The next morning he asked to go hunting. Everyone urged him to rest, but he refused even the company of the servants and rode out with his hound.

As before, a stag with golden antlers appeared. As before, it fled to the courtyard of a lonely tower. And again a woman called from above, asking the hunter to come in and play for the stag.

This brother noticed a golden horse and hound held below the tower. They recognized his own companions at once, and he guessed that his lost twin had been taken prisoner here.

He went upstairs and sat down at the board. The woman proposed the same wagers. When the hidden voices began to sing, he kept his eyes firmly on the checkers. She tried to distract him with smiles and gestures, but he would not look away. This time the pieces could not be shifted without his noticing. He won the first game and recovered the hound.

They played again, and he won the horse. At last they played for their own freedom. The woman tried once more to trick him, but the young man remained watchful and won the third game too.

He demanded that his brother be released from the dungeon. Soon the twins stood together, each with his horse and hound. The defeated woman accompanied them back to the king’s city.

Yet as they approached the palace, a dark thought troubled the brother who had been imprisoned. His twin looked exactly like him, and had spent a night under the same roof as his wife. Jealousy rose in him. He drew his sword, ready to strike the brother who had just rescued him.

But the woman who had played checkers stepped between them and stopped the blow. Before the jealous brother could act again, they entered the courtyard.

The princess hurried forward and threw her arms around her husband’s neck. She scolded him tenderly for having been so cold to her the night before. In that moment he understood what had happened. His brother had been mistaken for him, but had not taken advantage of the mistake.

Ashamed of his suspicion, he turned to his twin and asked forgiveness. His brother forgave him, and the two embraced.

So the first brother returned to his wife and shared her kingdom. The second married the woman from the tower, whose freedom he had won at the checkerboard, and received her kingdom as well. And the two brothers, who had ridden away from home with little more than their horses, hounds, and wooden spears, found far greater fortune than either had imagined.

Source: Traditional tale recorded in Bosnia by Ivan Franjo Jukić in Bosanski prijatelj (vol. I, p. 171); published as “The Two Brothers” in A. H. Wratislaw, Sixty Folk-Tales from Exclusively Slavonic Sources (1889/1890), no. XLVI. Independently written English literary adaptation of that recorded version.

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Once there was a woman who lived with her three sons. In the garden beside their house stood an apple tree unlike any other. It bore just one apple each year, and that apple was made of gold.

Yet the family had never been able to keep the marvelous fruit. Whenever it ripened, a hala came in the night and carried it away. In the old stories of Bulgaria, a hala is a terrible being of storm and whirlwind, a creature that can descend like a dark cloud and leave destruction behind. Year after year the tree gave its golden gift, and year after year the hala stole it.

One autumn, when the apple was nearly ripe, the eldest son said, “Mother, this time I shall guard the tree.”

His mother shook her head. “My son, we have tried for so many years. What makes you think we shall succeed now?”

“I will keep my eyes open,” he promised.

He took a bag of walnuts out into the garden. He meant to crack them one by one throughout the night, so that the work would keep him awake. He settled beneath the branches and began.

Crack. Crack. Crack.

He watched the walnuts more closely than he watched the tree. While he was busy with his hands, the hala swept in through the darkness, seized the golden apple, and vanished. By the time he looked up, there was nothing left on the branch.

The following year, the middle brother asked to stand guard. He too carried a bag of walnuts into the garden. He too sat beneath the tree and cracked them through the night. And he too became so absorbed in his task that he missed the moment when the hala arrived and stole the apple.

When the third year came, the youngest brother stepped forward.

“Mother,” he said, “give me the knife. I shall guard the apple tonight.”

“Go, my son,” she answered.

But the youngest did not sit upon the ground. He climbed into the apple tree and concealed himself among its leaves, close to the gleaming fruit. There he waited, as still as a branch, while the hours passed.

At midnight the air changed. A thick mist gathered around the garden. Wind howled; something crashed and thundered in the dark. Out of the turmoil came the hala, reaching for the golden apple.

The youngest brother sprang from his hiding place. Before the creature could take the fruit, he drove his knife into it. The hala recoiled and fled into the night, leaving a trail of blood behind.

The youngest son plucked the golden apple from the branch and carried it to his mother.

Yet his work, he felt, was not finished. “Brothers,” he said, “we have wounded the hala. Come with me. Let us find where it hides.”

The three followed its bloodstained trail over the land until they reached the mouth of a deep cave. The marks disappeared into the darkness below.

“We must go down,” said the youngest.

The eldest insisted on being lowered first. His brothers tied a rope around him and let him descend. He had gone only halfway when fear overcame him. He shook the rope with all his strength until the others pulled him back into the daylight.

The middle brother tried next. But when the darkness closed about him, he too lost his courage and begged to be drawn up.

At last the youngest took the rope.

“Lower me while I signal,” he told them, “and pause when the rope is still.”

Down he went, farther than either of his brothers had dared. The entrance dwindled above his head, and the daylight became no more than a pale circle. Still he continued until at last his feet touched the bottom.

There, in the strange depths beneath the earth, he found a house.

He approached a window and looked inside. Three young maidens sat in a room together. The eldest played with a golden apple, and the middle sister had a golden apple too. The youngest, however, held a golden rat upon a golden tray.

The brother called through the window, “Open the door, young maiden, and let me come in!”

One of the sisters drew back in alarm. “Go away! Our mother has brought us golden apples in past years, but now she has come home wounded. If she finds you here, she will swallow you!”

The young man understood: the hala was inside that very house.

“Open the door,” he said again, “or I shall break the window and come through it.”

Then the youngest maiden rose and admitted him. He entered, found the wounded hala, and struck it down. The creature that had stolen the golden fruit would never trouble the garden again.

He led the three maidens to the rope. First he fastened it around the eldest and signaled to his brothers above. They hauled her out. Then he sent up the middle sister in the same way.

Only the youngest maiden remained beside him.

“If my brothers see you,” he told her, “I fear they will quarrel over you and forget me down here. But I cannot leave you alone below while I go first. So you must go before me, and I shall trust them to bring me up afterward.”

The youngest maiden gave him a ring.

“Keep this,” she said. “If your brothers quarrel over me, I shall ask for self-making clothes—garments that come into being without anyone spinning, weaving, or sewing them. I shall say that I will marry whoever can provide them.”

Then she gave him a warning.

“If they refuse to pull you up, you may fall still farther into the earth. Below there are two rams, one white and one black. If you land upon the white ram, it will carry you back to the world of daylight. If you land upon the black one, it will bear you down to the Lower World.”

He slipped the ring into his keeping and tied the rope securely around her. Above, his brothers drew up the youngest maiden.

The moment they saw her, they began to argue. Each wished to claim her for himself. In the midst of their quarrel, neither thought of the brother waiting at the bottom of the cave.

The youngest waited and waited. No rope came down. At last the ground beneath him gave way, and he fell into a deeper darkness.

There were the two rams, just as the maiden had said. He fell upon the black one.

Down it carried him, down beyond the cave and the lightless spaces beneath it, until he reached the Lower World.

He was alone in a country he did not know, with no path home. So he walked until he came to a city, and there he sought shelter in the small house of an old woman.

She was kneading dough when he entered, but she had no water to mix with the flour. Instead she was moistening it with her own spittle.

“Grandmother,” he asked gently, “why must you make your bread this way?”

The old woman turned to him with sorrow in her face.

“Son, what else can I do? A hala guards our water. It will let us draw from the spring only if we give it a human being to devour. I have six children, and I have given and given until I can give no more. For a whole year now the hala has refused us water. Today the king is sending his daughter to it, so that the people of the city may drink again.”

The youngest brother heard her out. Then he asked where he might find the king’s palace.

The old woman showed him the way, and he went there at once. He found the king’s daughter preparing for the terrible journey. The young man climbed into the carriage beside her and rode with her toward the place where the hala waited.

He was exhausted from all that had happened underground. As they traveled, he laid his head in the princess’s lap and fell asleep.

At the spring, the hala emerged from its pit and rushed toward the princess. She cried out. Tears ran down her cheeks, and one fell onto the sleeping young man’s face.

He awoke at once.

There stood the creature that had held the water of an entire city captive. The youngest brother seized his knife and struck the hala. The creature fell—and the water was free.

At once the spring began to flow. Clear water rushed along the dry channels and returned to the thirsty city.

When the king heard what the stranger had done, he called for him.

“You have saved my daughter and my people,” he said. “Tell me what gift you desire.”

“I desire no treasure,” answered the young man. “I want only to return to my own land, the land beneath the open sky.”

“If you can find someone able to carry you there,” said the king, “I shall provide whatever is needed.”

So the young man went through the city asking how a traveler might reach the Upper World. At last someone told him of a great tree standing beyond the city. In its branches a pair of eagles tried every year to raise their young, but never succeeded.

“Go to that tree,” the stranger said. “Perhaps you will find your way home there.”

The young man found the tree and lay down beneath it to rest. After a while he was awakened by the desperate cries of eaglets high among the branches.

He looked up. A three-headed snake was climbing toward their nest.

The youngest brother sprang to his feet, drew his weapon, and cut off the snake’s three heads before it could reach the eaglets.

At that moment the great parent eagles returned. Seeing a stranger beneath their tree and hearing their chicks cry out, they swooped toward him in fury. But the eaglets called to them from the nest:

“Do not harm him, Mother! Do not harm him, Father! This man has saved our lives!”

The eagles drew back. Then they spoke to him as a friend.

“Brother, you have done us a great kindness. Tell us what we can do for you.”

“I ask for only one thing,” he replied. “Carry me up from this Lower World to my own land.”

“We shall carry you,” said the eagles, “but the journey is long. Find nine cows, each of which has gone nine years without bearing a calf. Feed us for a month, so that we grow strong. Then make a stout chest fitted with iron chains. Fill it with the meat that remains, and sit beside it. Fill a skin with water as well. We shall take hold of the chains and bear you upward. Whenever we cry ‘Gah!’ give us meat. Whenever we cry ‘Pee-yoo!’ give us water.”

The young man returned to the king, who kept his promise and supplied what was required. For a month the eagles ate their fill. Then the iron chains were fastened to the chest, the remaining meat was packed inside it, and the water skin was made ready.

The young man took his place. The eagles lifted the chains and rose into the air.

Higher and higher they flew. Beneath them the Lower World dwindled until its roads and rivers were no longer visible. Above them lay a great distance still to cross.

“Gah!” called the eagles.

The traveler handed them meat.

“Pee-yoo!” they called.

He gave them water.

Again came the cry for meat, and again he fed them. But the flight was longer than anyone had hoped. Before they reached the Upper World, the last of the meat was gone.

“Gah!” cried the eagles once more.

The young man opened the chest. It was empty.

He could not bear to fail so near the end. He took his knife and cut pieces of flesh from his own palms and from the soles of his feet, and he gave them to the eagles so that they could continue flying.

At last the birds carried him into the daylight of the Upper World. They set him down upon the earth and folded their powerful wings.

“Brother,” they asked him, “what was that last meat you gave us? Its taste was unlike all the rest.”

The young man answered truthfully. “I was ashamed to tell you, but there was no meat left. I cut it from my own hands and feet so that we might reach the end of our journey.”

The eagles looked at him in astonishment.

“Brother,” they said, “had we known you tasted so good, we would have eaten you beneath the tree!”

With that strange farewell, they went their way, and the youngest brother set off toward home.

When he arrived, he found his two older brothers still quarreling over the youngest maiden. Neither had brought the impossible gift she had demanded.

“I shall marry only the man who can give me self-making clothes,” she said again, “clothes made without human hands.”

The youngest brother took out the ring she had given him in the depths of the cave. He looked upon it, and at once the marvelous clothes appeared, fashioned by no spinner, weaver, or tailor.

The maiden knew whose ring it was and who had kept his word to her.

So the youngest brother, who had guarded the golden apple, traveled through the Lower World, and found his way home again, married the youngest maiden.

And there the tale comes to its end.

Source: Folk-tale variant published by Elin Pelin in 1917, with additional comparison to later literary retellings. This is a newly written English retelling in English, not a translation of a single modern protected version.

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Once, in a village of long ago, a woman was returning from church when the time came for her child to be born. She could go no farther. Finding shelter beneath a bridge, she gave birth there to a son.

No sooner had the child entered the world than three Rojenice came to the bridge. These were the mysterious women who determined the fate of newborn children, even the manner in which each would one day die.

The first Rojenica looked at the baby and said, “Let us end his life now.”

“No,” said the second. “Let him grow up first. Then, when he dies, his mother will grieve for him all the more.”

But the third spoke differently. “Let him live. When he is grown, he must marry the daughter of the king of the Vilas. If he fails to do so, only then shall he die.”

And so the three agreed. Their words settled the boy’s fate.

His mother carried him home and raised him as best she could. The years passed, and the child became a young man. One day he told her, “Mother, I would like to marry.”

At this she was troubled. “My son,” she replied, “you speak of marriage, but there is only one bride you may take.”

“Why should there be only one?” he asked.

Then his mother told him what had happened beneath the bridge: how the three Rojenice had stood above him, and how the third had declared that he must marry the daughter of the king of the Vilas or lose his life.

The young man listened. Then he said, “In that case, I shall go and find her. First I will visit the old blacksmith. Perhaps he knows the way.”

The blacksmith heard the young man’s question and shook his head. “My son, she will be difficult to find. Go to the Mother of the Moon. If she cannot help you, I hardly know who can.”

He gave the traveler three pairs of iron shoes, for the road ahead would be long. Before he left, the blacksmith added one more piece of advice: “When you reach the Mother of the Moon, take her by the arm. She will ask what you want, and you must tell her at once.”

So the young man put on the first pair of iron shoes and set off. He walked over roads and through lonely places, farther and farther from everything he knew. By the time his shoes were almost worn through, he came to the Mother of the Moon.

He took her by the arm, just as the blacksmith had instructed. “What do you want, my son?” she asked.

“I am searching for the daughter of the king of the Vilas,” he answered.

“I do not know where she is,” said the old woman, “but perhaps my son does. Wait here until the Moon returns. You must be careful, though. If he discovers you before the proper moment, he may tear you to pieces. I shall hide you beneath a trough. He will know a human being is here and ask three times. Only at the third question must you answer, ‘Here I am.’ Then he will be unable to harm you.”

She concealed the young man beneath the trough. Presently the Moon returned.

“Mother,” he said, “there is a human soul here.”

He asked again, and still the visitor kept silent. At the third question, the young man called out, “Here I am!”

The Moon could no longer do him harm. Instead he asked, “What brings you here?”

“I seek the daughter of the king of the Vilas.”

“I do not know where she dwells,” said the Moon. “Go to the Mother of the Sun. If she cannot tell you, I do not know who will.” And he showed the traveler the road.

The young man thanked him and left. He put on his second pair of iron shoes and journeyed on, until those shoes too were nearly worn away. At last he found the Mother of the Sun and took her by the arm.

“What do you want?” she asked.

“I seek the castles of the Vilas, and the king’s daughter whom I must marry.”

“Perhaps my son can tell you,” she said. “Stay until he comes home. But I must hide you, and you must not reveal yourself until he has asked for you three times.”

Again the young man was hidden beneath a trough. When the Sun came home, he sensed the visitor and asked his mother about the human soul in her house. Once he asked, then twice. At the third question the young man answered, “Here I am!”

The Sun could not harm him then, and listened to his request.

“I cannot tell you where the Vila castles stand,” the Sun admitted. “But the Storm Mare may know. She is the wind and storm themselves. Follow this road until you reach a meadow where the grass rises to your knees. She comes there to graze. If she is absent, wait. Hide behind a tree or in a hollow, and when she comes near, catch her by the bridle at once. Do not approach her openly.”

The traveler thanked the Sun, put on his third pair of iron shoes, and made his way toward the meadow. He walked until he reached the place the Sun had described. The Storm Mare was nowhere to be seen. He waited through the darkness, hiding beneath a bridge, and toward dawn she came to drink.

The young man sprang forward and seized her bridle.

“What do you want?” demanded the mare.

“I must find the daughter of the king of the Vilas.”

“Then climb onto my back,” she said. “But whatever happens, you must not fall.”

He mounted. At once the mare reared, and he nearly lost his seat, holding fast only with his foot. She reared a second time, and he scarcely managed to remain. The third time he slipped dangerously again and kept his place only by gripping with his knee.

“You have done me harm by almost falling,” said the Storm Mare.

Then she raced away as swiftly as a bird, with the force of a storm behind her. Ahead stood two great steps that opened apart at the rushing wind and closed again almost at once. The mare sped between them, but as they came together they caught and tore away part of her tail.

“See what your slipping has cost me,” she told the young man.

Still she carried him onward until they reached the castles of the Vilas.

Before he went inside, the mare warned him, “They will offer you food and drink. Do not drink so much that you forget me. Whatever happens, come back to me at night.”

The young man promised. He entered the castle, where he was welcomed and entertained. He asked for the king’s daughter as his bride, and those within told him that she would be given to him. Food and drink were brought, and the feasting continued until evening.

When darkness fell, he excused himself and went out to the Storm Mare. The household had supplied her with an enormous quantity of hay. She hid the young man within her tail.

During the night the Vilas searched for him, but they could not discover his hiding place. Near dawn they almost found him; just then a rooster crowed, and the danger passed. By daylight he returned to the castle.

“Where did you sleep?” they asked him.

“I went outside, fell beneath a hedge, and fell asleep there,” he replied.

Once more they feasted through the day, and once more the young man slipped away at evening. This time the Storm Mare concealed him within her mane.

Again the search lasted all night. As dawn approached, an old witch revealed where he was hidden. The searchers were just about to seize him when the roosters began to crow. With daybreak they could do nothing to him.

Angry at being thwarted, they killed every rooster in the village.

On the third day the young man was served food and drink again, while the mare received hay and oats. His hosts insisted that he remain indoors that night; they would prepare everything he needed. But when evening came and the household withdrew, he returned to his faithful mare.

This time she hid him beneath her hoof, inside her great horseshoe. During the day the young man had obtained two eggs. The Storm Mare kept them warm in her throat, and by evening two young cockerels had hatched and grown enough to crow.

The search began anew. The Vilas looked everywhere and found nothing. Near dawn they consulted the old witch, who told them, “He is beneath the mare’s hoof.”

They hurried to seize him. But before they could reach him, the two cockerels crowed from within the mare’s throat. Once again the crowing saved the young man. The searchers, unable to take him, killed the two birds instead.

The young man returned to the king and demanded the bride who had been promised to him. “Let me take your daughter and depart,” he said.

But the king refused. “You did not sleep in the bed we prepared for you.”

“I had drunk too much,” answered the young man. “I went outside, fell down, and slept where I lay.”

The king would not believe him. Seeing that he would not win his bride by argument, the young man asked for one last kindness. “If you will not let her come with me, at least allow me to kiss your daughter before I leave.”

Before the princess appeared, he went to the Storm Mare for advice. She told him exactly what to do. He must have ready a horse brush, a comb, and a glass of water. When the princess came close enough to kiss him, he must draw her onto the mare’s back, and they would flee together.

The king consented to the farewell. The daughter approached the young man as he sat mounted. She placed her foot upon his foot in the stirrup and leaned toward him for the kiss. In that instant the Storm Mare sprang forward, carrying them both through the gate and away from the castle.

The king saw them escaping and called for his own horse. He galloped after them with all his strength.

“Look behind us,” the Storm Mare told the young man. “Is anyone coming?”

He looked back. “Yes! The king is nearly close enough to catch your tail!”

“Throw the brush!” she cried.

He cast the horse brush behind them. Immediately a great forest rose in the king’s path, thick with thorn bushes. While the king struggled through its branches, the Storm Mare carried her riders far away.

Yet the king forced his way out of the forest and chased them again. Before long he was nearly upon them.

“Look back,” said the mare. “How close is he?”

“He is almost at your tail!”

“Throw the comb!”

The young man threw the comb. At once a vast chain of mountains sprang up between the fugitives and their pursuer, peak after peak barring the road. The king struggled across them, but he would not turn back. Soon he was galloping after the mare once more.

A third time the Storm Mare asked the young man to look behind. A third time he saw the king close upon them.

“Throw the glass of water!” she commanded.

He flung it behind them. Where the water fell, a great flood rose, spreading across the king’s path. The king made his way through it with enormous difficulty, while the travelers gained distance. Even so, as soon as he reached dry ground, he pressed on again.

Now the Storm Mare was nearing the two great steps. The wind of her approach forced them apart, and she dashed through with the young man and the princess upon her back. The steps closed behind them. The king arrived too late: he could not pass.

“Son-in-law!” he shouted from the other side. “Do not ride away yet! I cannot follow you, but let my daughter not say that I gave her nothing!”

He had nothing with him to offer except the girdle around his waist. Somehow he tossed it across the steps to them. This was no ordinary girdle: whoever owned it could obtain whatever they wished.

At last the king turned homeward. The young man thanked the Storm Mare courteously for all she had done, and wished to return to his own home. With the help of the magic girdle, he and his bride were there at once.

They prepared a magnificent feast, for now they had all they needed. And so the young man who had been given an impossible fate found the daughter of the king of the Vilas, brought her home, and lived happily with her.

And I, so the old storyteller says, was at their feast and ate my fill.

Source: Croatian folk tale “The Daughter of the King of the Vilas,” recorded by Matija Valjavec; English source: A. H. Wratislaw, Sixty Folk-Tales from Exclusively Slavonic Sources (1890), tale LIII. Faithful literary adaptation.

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Once, in a village in Cyprus, a young man and a young woman were married. They loved one another dearly, but they were poor. They had inherited neither land nor money, and however carefully they counted their little earnings, there was never enough to provide for the life they hoped to build together.

At last the husband decided that he must go away to seek work. It was a sorrowful decision, for he could not bear the thought of leaving his wife. Yet he believed that, if he worked hard and saved what he could, he might one day come home with enough to make their future secure.

He said farewell and set out along the road. After traveling far from his village, he reached a town where a carpenter named Panikos took him into his service. The young man worked faithfully, day after day. He learned to handle the tools, to measure and cut the wood, and to carry out whatever tasks his master gave him.

The years passed. In those days, ordinary working people could not always read or write, and the young husband had no way of sending news of himself to the wife he had left behind. He thought of her often, but distance and silence lay between them. Still, he continued to work, hoping that the time would come when he could return.

At length he resolved to go home. He approached Panikos and told him of his decision.

“Go with my good wishes, my son,” said the carpenter. “I wish I had money to give you for your journey and your years of labor. I have none to spare. But I can give you three pieces of advice, and I ask you to remember them.”

The young man listened. He had hoped for money, not counsel; but he respected his master and would not turn away from his parting words.

“First,” said Panikos, “if you come upon people stealing, do not join them, however tempting it may seem.”

“Second, if you find people quarreling or fighting, do not rush into their struggle.”

“Third, if something angers you, hold back your anger. Do not act while rage has the better of you.”

The young man thanked the carpenter. He repeated the three instructions to himself so that he would not forget them, and then he began the long journey home.

After he had been traveling for some time, hunger overtook him. As he went along the road, he noticed two or three men in an orchard, helping themselves to apples that did not belong to them. The fruit was within reach, and he was hungry enough to wish for a few apples of his own. For a moment he thought of following their example.

Then he remembered the carpenter’s first instruction: if others steal, do not steal with them. He left the orchard untouched and continued on his way.

Before he had gone far, the men who had taken the apples were caught by the authorities. The young traveler was thankful that he had resisted the temptation. His master’s first piece of advice had already kept him out of trouble.

Farther along the road, he came upon two strangers who were quarreling fiercely. Their voices rose, and their anger seemed about to turn into blows. The young man was troubled by the sight. He wanted to step between them and separate them before they hurt each other.

But just as he was about to approach, he recalled the second instruction: do not rush into a fight between strangers. He held back. Almost at once, the two men drew knives and attacked one another. Had he placed himself between them, he might have been wounded in their struggle.

Twice now, Panikos’s words had served him well. As he went onward, he thought again of the third instruction, the one that warned him against acting in anger. He wondered when he might need it.

By the time he reached his own village, darkness had fallen. After so many years away, he could hardly believe that he was once more standing at his own door. He entered the house and saw his wife within.

But in the dim light she did not recognize him. He, too, had changed during the long years of their separation. Before he could make himself known, a tall young man came into the house.

The husband stared at the stranger. Who was this young fellow, so much at home beside his wife? Jealous thoughts rose in his mind, followed by a fierce anger. He had traveled so far, dreaming of this reunion, only to find someone he had never seen before under his own roof.

Then the carpenter’s third instruction returned to him: when anger takes hold of you, be still and restrain it. The traveler said nothing of his suspicions. Instead, he asked the woman, as though he were a stranger passing through, whether he might sleep there that night.

“You may rest on the bench outside,” she told him. “I will not send you away.”

He lay down, exhausted by his journey. Yet his mind was troubled, and sleep did not come easily. He kept thinking of the young man he had seen and of all the years during which he had been away. At last fatigue overcame him.

In the morning, he awoke to see the door open. His wife was saying goodbye to the tall young man. She kissed him gently on the cheek as he prepared to leave.

The husband could bear his doubts no longer.

“Who is this young man whom you kiss?” he demanded. “I am your husband! Have you not recognized me?”

His wife looked at him in astonishment. Then she understood who stood before her.

“How could I have known you in the darkness last night,” she answered, “when so many years have passed since I last saw your face? And the young man you saw is our son. I named him Panikos.”

The husband stood silent. The stranger whom he had feared was his own child, grown tall during the long years of his absence. His anger had nearly led him to a terrible mistake. Only the carpenter’s warning had prevented him from acting rashly.

Now he understood the true worth of his master’s parting gift. The first piece of advice had saved him from being caught among thieves. The second had kept him out of a dangerous fight. And the third had protected his own family from the harm that anger and suspicion might have caused.

He had set out hoping to return with wealth. Instead, he came home carrying three wise instructions, and he discovered that their value was greater than he had imagined. From that day onward, he never forgot Panikos the carpenter or the counsel that had guided him safely home.

Source: Traditional Cypriot folktale “The Three Instructions of Banikos the Carpenter” (Οι τρεις συμβουλές του Πανίκου ο ξυλουργός), as recorded in Evgeniya Theodorou, “Language, Folklore and Cypriot Literature,” Your Cyprus Guide (2020). Original English literary adaptation.

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Once upon a time, in a village not far from a forest, there lived three brothers. The two eldest were lazy, and they were thieves as well. They had little kindness for their youngest brother, Jura, whom they were forever calling foolish.

One day the brothers were expected to give a feast. But there was a difficulty: they had scarcely anything to put on the table.

“What shall we serve our guests?” the eldest asked.

“I know where to find something,” said the second brother. “The shepherd has fine fat rams. I shall bring one home.”

“And our neighbor has a tree laden with apples,” said the eldest. “I shall pick enough to feed us all.”

They turned on Jura. “And you, Silly Jura? You will bring nothing, I suppose, but you will be ready enough to eat what we steal.”

Jura considered this. “Then I shall go to the burgomaster’s and bring back some nuts.”

That evening each brother went his own way. Jura gathered the nuts and, looking for somewhere quiet to crack them, settled in the charnel house behind the church. There, alone among the old stones, he began opening his harvest. Crack! Crack! Crack! The sound carried into the night.

The village watchmen heard it as they passed the churchyard. They stopped and listened. From the charnel house came another sharp crack, and then another. The men were certain that something unearthly was stirring inside.

There was no priest in the village; the priest lived in the neighboring one. So the watchmen hurried instead to the burgomaster and begged him to accompany them.

“I cannot go anywhere,” the burgomaster replied. “I am terribly ill. I cannot even stand on my feet, and no doctor has been able to help me.”

But the watchmen would not be satisfied. At last the burgomaster told his servant to carry him on his back. The watchmen stopped at the churchwarden’s house to ask for holy water, and then the strange procession went toward the churchyard.

Meanwhile Jura was still cracking nuts. Hearing footsteps, he supposed one of his brothers was arriving with the stolen ram.

“Are you bringing him?” Jura called into the darkness.

The servant heard the voice coming from the charnel house and thought some dreadful spirit was demanding the burgomaster himself. With a cry he let his master fall and fled as fast as his legs could carry him.

The burgomaster was no less frightened. Forgetting all about his illness, he sprang up and ran after the servant. He cleared a wooden fence in a single leap and reached home in astonishing haste. His family stared in wonder. The man who had been unable to stand was running about without a doctor’s help.

The next morning the burgomaster made a proclamation. He promised a pound to whoever had taken his nuts, provided the culprit came forward and spoke to him.

Jura went to see him at once.

“I ought to punish you for stealing from me,” the burgomaster said. “Yet what happened last night cured an illness that no physician could cure. Here is the reward I promised. But you must give me your word that you will never steal again.”

Jura promised. He accepted the money and returned to his brothers.

The two eldest, who had always mocked him, suddenly found him much more agreeable now that he had a pound in his pocket. They borrowed his money and spent it on fine new clothes.

“We are going out into the world to find wives,” they announced. “You had better stay at home, Silly Jura. You would never find a good wife for yourself.”

Off they went. But Jura had no intention of being left behind, so he set out too, taking a different road through the forest.

Deep among the trees lay the ruins of an enchanted castle, a place Jura had heard people speak of many times. When he came upon it, night was falling. He could make out scarcely anything among the broken walls, except a light shining from a cellar below. Hoping to find shelter until morning, he went down toward it.

In the cellar he found no person at all. There was only a cat.

“Welcome, dear Jura,” said the cat. “How did you come here?”

Jura nearly ran back up the steps. A cat that knew his name and spoke like a human being was more than he had expected to meet that night.

“Do not be afraid,” the cat said. “Come back. I mean you no harm. If you are hungry, go to the storeroom and take whatever you wish to eat. Stay here and serve me.”

Her words were gentle, and Jura stayed.

A year went by in the enchanted ruins. He never saw a cook, yet whenever he went into the storeroom, he found food ready for him. His work was simple: he had to gather firewood. Otherwise he was comfortable and wanted for nothing.

At the end of the year the cat gave him a different task.

“Build a great pile of the wood you have gathered,” she told him. “Light it today. Then you must throw me into the fire. Whatever I say, however I beg you to save me, you must not let me escape. The fire must consume me.”

Jura recoiled in horror.

“How could I do that? You have been good to me all this time. Why should I repay you with such cruelty?”

“If you refuse,” replied the cat, “you will be very unhappy. If you do as I ask, you will be happy.”

Jura did not understand, but she insisted. At last he built the pile and set it alight. When the flames were burning strongly, he lifted the cat and threw her into them. She struggled and tried to escape, pleading to be released, but Jura remembered her command and would not let her out.

The ordeal exhausted him. At last he lay down beside the place where the fire had burned and fell asleep.

When he opened his eyes, the ruins had vanished.

Before him stood a splendid palace. Music floated through its halls, and servants moved everywhere. Jura gazed around, unable to understand how the broken castle had changed into such magnificence.

A beautifully dressed lady came toward him.

“Do you know me?” she asked.

“How could I know you, my lady?” Jura answered. “I have never seen you before.”

“I am the cat,” she said. “Witches laid an enchantment upon me and made me live in that shape. You have freed me.”

The lady wished Jura to be her husband. She ordered her servants to dress him in splendid clothing, and a fine carriage was brought to take them to his village. They would find out what had become of the brothers who had treated him so scornfully.

As they drew near the village, the lady asked Jura to put on his old clothes once more. Then she found an elderly beggarwoman dressed in rags and sent her to walk beside Jura into the village. The lady herself remained outside with the carriage.

The elder brothers saw Jura approaching in his worn clothes with the ragged woman at his side. Both had married, but neither had prospered.

“Look at Silly Jura!” they cried. “He has come home in rags and brought a ragged old bride with him!”

They laughed at him and refused to let him stay in their cottage.

Jura went back out of the village. There he changed again into his fine clothing and joined the lady in the carriage. Together they drove straight to his brothers’ door.

The carriage stopped, and the two brothers came out to stare.

“Who is this grand gentleman?” they wondered aloud. “And who is the beautiful lady with him?”

They had no idea that the splendidly dressed gentleman was Jura.

Then the lady spoke to them.

“You were always cruel to your brother. You mocked him and drove him away. Now you yourselves have little, while the brother you despised has prospered. If you change your ways, you too may find better fortune.”

And instead of punishing them, she gave the brothers some money.

Then she and Jura departed together, leaving the two elder brothers to consider her words. The young man they had called Silly Jura had proved to be the most fortunate of them all.

Source: Moravian folk tale collected by Beneš Method Kulda; adapted from “Silly Jura,” translated by Josef Baudiš in Czech Folk Tales (1917).

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Long ago, an old soldier was released from the army after many years of faithful service. For all his years of marching, standing guard, and enduring hardship, he was given a small loaf of rye bread and three pennies. With these in his pockets, he was told that he might go wherever he pleased.

So he set out along the high road. He had no grand plans, and little enough to live on, but the road was open before him.

After he had walked some distance, he met three men coming toward him. One carried a shovel, another a pickaxe, and the third a spade. Their tools and determined faces made the soldier curious.

“Where are you going with all those things?” he asked.

One of the men answered, “A man was buried today who owed each of us a penny. We mean to dig him up. We shall have what is owed to us.”

The soldier stared at them. “Leave the dead man in peace,” he said. “He cannot pay you now, however deeply you dig.”

But the men would not listen. They insisted that they would disturb the grave unless someone paid the debt.

At last the soldier drew two pennies from his pocket. “Take these,” he said, “and let the poor man rest.”

The men examined the coins. “Two pennies will satisfy two of us,” they replied. “What about the third?”

The soldier looked at his one remaining penny. It was all the money he had in the world. Still, he could not bear to think of the grave being opened for so small a sum.

“Then take the last one too,” he said.

The three men pocketed the pennies and went on their way. The soldier continued along the road with nothing but his loaf of rye bread, and he thought no more of the coins he had given away.

Before long a stranger came up beside him. He was rather pale, but he greeted the soldier courteously and walked along with him. For a long while he said nothing at all.

Night fell. When the two travelers reached a church, the stranger stopped.

“Let us go inside,” he said.

“Inside a church at midnight?” the soldier exclaimed. “What business could we have there?”

“Come with me,” said the stranger firmly.

The soldier followed him. They went up to the altar, where an old woman sat holding a burning light. The stranger pointed toward her.

“Take a hair from her head and smell it,” he instructed.

The soldier did as he was told, but nothing happened. He pulled out a second hair and smelled it. Still the woman did not stir.

“Try again,” said the stranger.

This time the soldier caught hold of a whole tuft of hair and pulled. At once the old woman sprang up in a fury. She flew out above the church, carrying the great leaden roof of its vault away with her.

The soldier could scarcely believe what he had seen. Yet the stranger seemed to know exactly what to do next. He led the way out of the church and down to the seashore, where they found the leaden vault lying beside the water.

“Climb aboard,” said the stranger. “We are going to sea.”

The soldier looked from the lead to the waves. “But where is the ship?”

“Trust me,” replied his companion. “Sit here beside me. Across the sea lives a princess. It has been foretold that she will marry no one except a man who arrives in a ship made of lead. This is your chance to find good fortune.”

So the soldier sat on the leaden vault beside the stranger. To his astonishment, it floated out onto the water like a proper vessel. They sailed across the open sea and came safely to the distant shore.

When word spread that a man had crossed the sea in a leaden ship, the people rejoiced. The prophecy had been fulfilled. The old soldier was welcomed, and soon he and the princess were married in a celebration more splendid than anyone could remember.

After the wedding, a carriage stood waiting outside the church. The princess and her new husband stepped inside, and the pale stranger joined them.

“Where shall I drive?” asked the coachman.

“Toward the place where the sun rises,” the stranger answered, “and as fast as you can.”

Away they went. After a time they passed a great herd of cattle. The soldier called to the man tending them.

“Who are you?” he asked.

“I am the Count of Ravensburg,” the herdsman replied, pointing toward a castle in the distance. “That is my castle.”

The stranger urged the coachman onward, and soon the carriage reached the gates of Ravensburg Castle. The travelers were about to enter when someone began knocking hard at the gate. It was the herdsman they had passed.

The stranger went to speak with him. “What do you want?” he asked.

“I want to come in,” the man demanded. “This castle belongs to me. I have every right to enter it.”

The stranger knew that the supposed count was really a powerful sorcerer—a troll. After a moment’s thought, he answered, “You may enter, but first you must undergo everything that happens to rye.”

“Everything that happens to rye?” repeated the troll. “What does that mean?”

“First you must be sown deep in the earth in autumn. In spring you must rise from the soil, grow in the rain, and ripen beneath the sun. When harvest comes, you must be cut down and dried. Then you will be carried into the barn and threshed.”

“Threshed?” cried the troll. “Must I be threshed?”

“Certainly,” said the stranger. “And after that you must go to the mill.”

“To the mill?”

“Yes. You must be ground into flour and sifted.”

“Ground and sifted!” roared the troll. Such was his rage that he burst apart and became a heap of flint stones.

Then the stranger turned to the soldier and the princess. He smiled and told them that the troll of Ravensburg was gone. The castle, with all the treasures it held, now belonged to them.

“My work is finished,” he said. “I have seen you married to the princess, and I have given you this home. I have treated you as kindly as you treated me when you gave away your three pennies.”

The soldier gazed at him in amazement. “Those three pennies? But I never thought of them again!”

“I know,” replied the stranger. “If you had given them with the hope of a reward, I could not have helped you as I have.”

He took leave of the soldier and his bride, for it was time for him to return to the place where he belonged.

Only then did the soldier understand that the stranger had come because of the kindness he had shown to a dead man he had never known. With an empty pocket, he had set out on the road; without asking for anything in return, he had given away his last three pennies. And those pennies had led him farther than all the riches in the world could have carried him.

Source: Traditional Danish folktale, “The Three Pennies,” in Danish Fairy and Folk Tales, translated by J. Christian Bay (Harper & Brothers, 1899). Adapted from the published tale.

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Long ago, when the creatures of the forests still spoke with a wisdom that human beings could understand, a lame old woman lived with three lovely girls in a cottage hidden deep among the trees. The girls were as fresh as flowers growing beside a withered stalk. The youngest was especially beautiful, but almost no one ever saw them. By day the sun looked down upon their bright ribbons; by night the moon and stars shone through the branches above their home.

The old woman called herself their mother, but she treated them more like servants. From morning until evening they sat beside their spinning wheels, drawing long, shining threads from golden flax. Whenever a distaff was emptied, the woman filled it again. The thread must be even, she insisted, and fine as the finest hair. Then she gathered the finished spools and locked them in a secret chamber. The girls were forbidden to enter it. They did not know where the golden flax came from, or why so much of it was needed, and the old woman never answered their questions.

Two or three times each summer, the woman went away on journeys that lasted several days. She always departed with a fresh supply of flax laid out for the girls, and always returned after dark. Before leaving, she repeated the same warning: “Keep your thoughts on your work. Do not let the thread break, or its golden brightness will vanish, and your happiness with it.”

The girls had heard this so often that they no longer believed it. One summer, when the woman set off for six days, the sisters laughed softly once she was beyond the door. They had spun so many miles of thread that they knew its strength well. How could a moment’s distraction take away its shine?

On the third day, a prince of Kalev’s line became lost while hunting in that forest. He had ridden far from his companions, and when he stopped to listen he could hear neither the hunters’ horns nor the barking of their dogs. His own calls came back to him as echoes. Exhausted, he rested beneath a bush and slept while his horse grazed nearby. When he woke, the sun was sinking. He searched again until he came upon a narrow path leading to a little cottage.

The three sisters had never seen a stranger like him. At first they were frightened, but their work for the day was finished, and soon they welcomed him to rest. Evening became night. The two elder sisters finally went to bed, but the youngest remained on the doorstep talking with the prince beneath the moon and stars. Before morning had come, their hearts had turned toward one another.

Meanwhile, the prince’s attendants searched the forest in vain. News of his disappearance reached his father, the king, who sent both horsemen and foot soldiers into the trees. On the third day they found hoofprints and followed them to the cottage. The prince was safe, though he had little wish to leave. Before he rode away, he promised the youngest girl that he would return and make her his bride.

After he had gone, she hurried to her spinning wheel, anxious to finish the work neglected during his visit. But the thread on her spool was broken. She tied the ends together and turned the wheel again, only to see that the golden thread had lost its radiance. What had seemed an empty warning was now terribly real. No tears and no careful work could restore the gleam.

When the old woman returned, she understood at once that something was wrong. She questioned the sisters until she learned of the prince’s visit. Her anger filled the cottage. She cursed the young man and threatened to kill him if he ever returned. The youngest girl trembled, not for herself but for the prince. Night after night she lay awake, afraid he would come back without knowing the danger.

As a child she had learned from the old woman how to understand the speech of birds. One morning she slipped outside and saw a raven perched on a pine, arranging his dark feathers. “Wise raven,” she called, “will you help me?” When the bird asked what she needed, she told him about the broken thread and the old woman’s curse. She begged him to fly to the great city, find the prince, and warn him never to return to the cottage. The raven agreed, although he did not know whether anyone at the palace would understand his words.

That evening he returned. In the royal garden he had met a young man, the son of a magician, who knew the language of birds. Through him the raven had delivered the warning. The prince had sent this answer: “Tell her not to sleep on the ninth night. A rescuer will come to free the little bird from the hawk’s claws.” The raven had been given meat to strengthen him for the journey home. Gratefully the girl heard his message and kept it secret.

On the ninth night, after everyone else was asleep, she crept outside and waited beneath a tree. Once a cock crowed; then a second time. Still no one came. At last, before the third crow, she heard hoofbeats. The prince had followed secret marks he had made on the trees when the soldiers first led him away. Now he rode at the head of a troop. He lifted the maiden onto his horse, seated himself in front of her, and hurried toward home. Moonlight showed the way until the birds began to stir in the dawn.

The birds were calling warnings, but the girl listened only to the prince’s loving words. He told her that the soldiers would protect them. At length they left the forest behind. The old woman, meanwhile, had discovered the escape. She gathered nine kinds of magical herbs, sprinkled them with enchanted salt, and bound them into a bundle. Muttering terrible words, she threw it to the wind and commanded it to overtake the fugitives.

Near midday, the prince and his soldiers reached a broad river crossed by a bridge so narrow that riders could pass only one at a time. Just as the prince reached its middle, the witch’s bundle flew against his horse. The animal reared in fright. Before anyone could catch her, the maiden slipped from the saddle and fell into the deep water. The prince tried to follow her, but his men held him back. The river was too deep and swift for them to help.

They brought him home in despair. For weeks he could scarcely eat or sleep, and his father summoned wise men and magicians, but no one could ease his sorrow. At last the young magician’s son advised the king to call the oldest and wisest sorcerer in Finland. That sorcerer came borne by the wind and declared that a wicked spell carried by the air had taken half the prince’s heart. He told the king to send his son often into the open wind, that it might gradually carry away his grief. The prince slowly regained his strength, but he would not hear of choosing another bride.

A whole year passed. One day the prince came again to the bridge where he had lost his beloved. As he looked into the river, a sweet and sorrowful song rose from the water, telling of a young maiden carried away by her mother’s curse and held in the depths of the river. He searched the banks and peered under the bridge, but saw no singer. Only a yellow water-lily swayed among its broad floating leaves. He listened again. The same song returned, though no living face appeared.

He remembered the sisters in the forest and wondered whether they could explain the mystery. After a long search through the grown and tangled woodland, he found their cottage once more. The old woman was away. The elder sisters received him kindly and listened as he told of the fall from the bridge and the voice on the river. When he mentioned the lonely water-lily, they exchanged startled glances. They knew their supposed mother’s powers. Perhaps their sister had not drowned at all, but had been changed into a flower.

They did not dare raise the prince’s hopes without knowing how the spell might be broken. Instead, the eldest gathered magical plants, ground them into a dough with flour, and baked a small pie for their guest. That night he dreamed he was in the forest, understanding every word spoken by the birds. In the morning she told him that the herbs had given him this gift in waking life. He must listen carefully, she said, for birds knew many truths hidden from human ears. She also reminded him of the two sisters still imprisoned at their wheels. The prince promised not to forget them.

Riding through the trees, he soon heard birds speaking clearly all around him. Their chatter was full of news and secrets he had never imagined. At last a thrush and a magpie settled in a pine above him and began talking of the very prince below. For an entire year, said the thrush, the lame old woman’s foster daughter had sat by the bridge in the form of a water-lily, singing of her fate. Her lover had heard her but had not understood. The magpie said that without help she might remain a flower forever. Yet the thrush knew that the old Finnish sorcerer could explain how to free her.

Just then two swallows flew overhead, talking of a journey to Finland. The prince called out in the language of birds and asked them to carry his question to the ancient sorcerer. The swallows agreed and flew on. At the bridge the prince waited in the hope of hearing the lily sing, but the waters were silent. He went home and told no one what he had learned.

A week later, while he sat in the palace garden, a great eagle circled above and descended to a lime tree. It brought greetings from the Finnish sorcerer, who had been delayed while seeking a messenger. The eagle explained the way to break the enchantment. The prince must go to the river, remove his clothes, cover himself completely with mud, grasp the end of his nose, and say, “Let the man become a crayfish.” In that form he could go safely beneath the water. He must loosen every root of the lily from the riverbed, seize one root with his claws, and let the current carry him and the flower downstream. When he saw a rowan tree beside a great rock on the left bank, he must say, “Let the water-lily become a maiden and the crayfish a man.”

The eagle departed, but the prince hesitated. To surrender his human shape and descend into the dark river seemed a fearful thing. Another week went by. Then a crow reproached him for wasting time and assured him that the Finnish sorcerer’s counsel was true. The prince realized that a life spent grieving was no life at all. He saddled his horse and rode to the bridge.

There he heard the flower singing again of the curse and the cold riverbed. He tied his horse where it could graze, took off his clothes, and covered himself in mud until no pale skin could be seen. Holding his nose, he called out the words the eagle had taught him and plunged into the water. In an instant he was a crayfish, able to move and breathe beneath the surface.

He found the lily’s roots, but they were deeply tangled in sand and mud. For seven entire days he worked with his small claws, freeing one root after another until none remained fastened. Then he grasped a root, and the water lifted both crayfish and flower to the surface. They drifted along the river, past banks lined with trees, until he saw a rowan heavy with red berries and, a little farther on, the great rock. At once he spoke the second charm. The flower became the lost maiden, and the crayfish became the prince.

The two rose from the water unharmed, but neither had any clothing. The maiden was too shy to step onto the bank, so the prince turned away while she sheltered beneath the rowan tree. He went back to fetch his horse and clothes, only to find them gone. He had not known that seven days had passed while he labored beneath the water. At that moment a splendid carriage drawn by six horses approached. Within were attendants and beautiful garments for them both. The prince sent the carriage and a maid to dress the maiden, then put on his own wedding clothes.

Together they rode to the city and stopped at the church. Inside, the king and queen sat dressed in mourning, for their son’s horse and abandoned clothes had been found beside the river and they believed he had drowned. Imagine their joy when he entered the church alive, with his beloved beside him! The king led them to the altar, and they were married. Their wedding feast lasted six weeks.

Autumn and winter came and went. In the first warmth of spring, the prince and his wife walked together in the palace garden. From a tree above them a magpie cried that happiness had made the prince forget his friends. The two sisters were still spinning gold in the forest. The bird revealed something more: the lame old woman was no mother to them. She was a witch who had stolen the three girls as infants from a distant royal house.

The prince remembered his promise. He told his wife how her sisters had welcomed him, given him the power to understand birds, and asked him to free them. Tears filled her eyes. That night she dreamed that the witch was away and the sisters were alone in their cottage. In the morning she urged the prince to go at once.

He set out with soldiers and reached the cottage the next day. Just as the dream had foretold, the old woman was absent. The two sisters came running out to greet their rescuers. The prince ordered a poisonous meal prepared from hemlock roots and left it at the house for the witch’s return. After staying the night, he took the sisters away at dawn. By evening they were reunited with the youngest, whom they had not seen for two years.

When the old woman came home, she greedily ate the food left on the table. She went to bed and never woke. A week later the prince sent a trusted captain to learn what had happened and recover the treasure locked in the secret chamber. The soldiers found the witch dead and discovered fifty great loads of golden thread. They carried it away to divide among the sisters, and the captain ordered the cottage burned.

As the fire rose, a great cat with fiery eyes climbed down from the roof. The soldiers caught it, and a bird called from a tree that they should hold the cat by its tail if they wished to learn the truth. The cat cried out that it was a human being, changed into animal shape as punishment for its crimes. Long ago, it had been housekeeper to a mighty king, while the lame old woman served the queen. The two had conspired to steal the king’s three young daughters and a great store of golden vessels. The witch had changed the gold into flax so it might be carried away and spun. Distrusting her accomplice, she had then transformed the housekeeper into a cat. The witch’s death had restored the cat’s speech, but not its human shape.

The captain understood at last how the three girls had come to the hidden cottage, and why they had spent their childhood spinning golden flax. He ordered the guilty cat thrown into the flames of the burning house.

In time the two elder sisters also married princes, and the golden thread from the secret chamber provided rich dowries for all three. Yet one mystery remained. They never discovered which distant king and queen had lost them, or the country where they had been born. Some said the witch had buried still more gold beneath the forest floor, but no one ever found it. The three sisters were free at last, and their years of sorrow were behind them.

Source: Estonian folktale “Kullaketrajad,” collected by Friedrich Reinhold Kreutzwald in Eestirahwa Ennemuistesed jutud (1866); compared with W. F. Kirby’s English version, “The Gold-Spinners,” in The Hero of Esthonia (1895). Literary adaptation in English.

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Once upon a time, in a quiet corner of Finland, there lived a farmer with three grown sons. The elder two were confident young men, quick to praise themselves and quicker still to laugh at their youngest brother, Veikko. Yet Veikko had a gentle heart, and it seldom occurred to him to answer their mockery with unkindness.

One day their father called the brothers together. “It is time you thought of marriage,” he told them. “Tomorrow each of you must go and seek a sweetheart.”

“Where shall we look?” asked the eldest.

“That is easily settled,” their father replied. “Go out and fell a tree apiece. Wherever each tree falls, follow the direction in which its top points. Walk far enough, and perhaps you will find the bride meant for you.”

The next morning the brothers went into the fields with their axes. The eldest felled a tree that fell toward the north, where he already knew a farmer’s pretty daughter. The second brother’s tree pointed south, toward the home of a girl with whom he had often danced. Both were delighted.

But when Veikko’s tree crashed down, its crown pointed straight into the deep forest.

The older brothers burst into laughter. “There are no girls in that direction,” they said. “Perhaps you can marry a wolf or a fox!”

Veikko did not quarrel with them. His tree had fallen where it had fallen, and he meant to follow it. So while his brothers set off for familiar farmhouses, he made his way under the tall forest trees.

At first he walked bravely. Then, as the path grew lonelier, his courage began to fail. There were no cottages, no farms, no people to be seen. How could he bring home a sweetheart from such a place?

At last he came upon a small hut among the trees. He opened its door and looked inside. The room seemed empty, except for a tiny mouse seated on the table, carefully smoothing her whiskers.

“There is nobody here,” Veikko said sadly.

“Indeed there is!” answered a small clear voice. “I am here.”

Veikko stared at the mouse. “But you are only a mouse.”

“And why should a mouse not count?” she asked. “Tell me, Veikko, whom are you looking for?”

He was amazed that she knew his name, but her manner was so friendly that he told her about his father, his brothers, and the three fallen trees. He confessed that he was ashamed to return alone when the others would surely have found sweethearts.

“Then take me for your sweetheart,” suggested the little mouse.

Veikko laughed, not cruelly but in astonishment. “Who ever heard of a young man courting a mouse?”

“I may be small,” she replied, “but I can care for you faithfully. That is worth something, surely.”

She looked up at him with shining eyes. Her coat was soft as velvet, and when she sang him a sweet little song, the loneliness seemed to lift from the hut. Veikko found himself smiling. Before he left, he promised that she should be his sweetheart. The mouse was overjoyed and vowed to wait for him, however long he might be away.

At home the elder brothers could scarcely stop boasting. The eldest praised his beloved’s rosy cheeks, while the second praised his sweetheart’s golden hair.

“And what of yours, Veikko?” they demanded. “Does she have a fox’s pointed ears?”

“My sweetheart is small and gentle,” he answered. “She wears a velvet coat, and she sings beautifully.”

“Velvet!” they exclaimed. “You speak as though she were a princess!”

“Then perhaps she is one,” Veikko said quietly. He cared more for her kindness than for their laughter.

A few days later their father announced a test. “Ask each sweetheart to bake me a loaf of bread,” he said. “I should like to see what sort of housekeeping they know.”

The two elder sons were delighted; they were certain their sweethearts could bake. Veikko, however, walked back to the forest with a heavy heart. He had never heard of a mouse making bread.

When he entered the hut, his little sweetheart greeted him with a joyful dance on the tabletop. But she soon noticed his troubled face.

“What worries you, Veikko?” she asked.

“My father wants a loaf of bread from each of our sweethearts. I feared I might have to return without one.”

“Why should you?” said the mouse. “I can bake bread as well as anyone.”

She took up a tiny silver bell and rang it. At once the floor filled with the patter of many small feet. Mice came hurrying from every direction, hundreds of them, and waited for her orders.

“Each of you,” she commanded, “bring me one grain of the very finest wheat.”

Away they scampered. Soon they returned, each carrying its precious grain. The mouse gathered their offering and baked a handsome loaf of fine white wheat bread for Veikko to carry home.

The next day the three loaves were placed before the farmer. The eldest son’s sweetheart had baked rye bread, and the farmer said it was good, wholesome food. The second son’s sweetheart had baked barley bread, and he approved of that as well.

Then Veikko uncovered his loaf of white wheat bread. His father looked at it in surprise. Such fine bread seemed fit for a wealthy household.

“How did your sweetheart obtain the wheat?” asked the brothers suspiciously.

“She rang a silver bell,” said Veikko, “and her servants brought her the finest grains, one by one.”

The brothers were irritated by this strange success, but their father reproved them. Each girl, he said, had made good bread in her own way. Still, he wished to set one further task before meeting them.

“Let your sweethearts each send me a piece of their weaving,” he said.

Once again Veikko traveled into the forest, wondering how a creature so small could ever work a loom. Once again the little mouse welcomed him with delight.

“My father wishes to see a sample of your weaving,” he explained. “I hope I am not asking the impossible.”

“The impossible?” she cried. “Not at all!”

She rang her silver bell, and her mouse servants came running. This time she sent them to collect the finest fibers of flax. Every mouse returned with a slender fiber, until there was enough to prepare and spin into thread. From it the little mouse wove a length of linen so fine and delicate that, after folding it carefully, she could tuck the whole piece into an empty nutshell.

“Take this to your father,” she told Veikko. “I hope he will be pleased.”

When the brothers presented their samples, the eldest produced a square of coarse cotton cloth. The second offered cloth woven from cotton mixed with linen. Their father examined both with approval.

“And what have you brought, Veikko?” he asked.

Veikko drew a nutshell from his pocket. At once his brothers began to roar with laughter. But their laughter ended when their father opened the little shell and unfolded its contents. Out came a wondrous piece of linen, finer than any he had seen before.

“How could anyone weave such work?” the astonished farmer asked.

Veikko explained about the silver bell, the mouse servants, and the finest flax fibers. His father declared that a sweetheart capable of such weaving might indeed be a princess.

“Tomorrow,” he said, “bring all three young women here. I want to meet them at last.”

Veikko knew that his brothers would laugh when they saw his sweetheart. Yet he had grown truly fond of the mouse. She had been kind and loyal to him, and he would not deny her merely to escape their jokes.

In the little hut, the mouse was thrilled to hear the invitation. “If I am to meet your father,” she said, “I must travel properly.”

She rang her silver bell and called for her carriage and five horses. Veikko watched as her servants arrived with a coach made from an empty nutshell. Five black mice drew it, while a mouse coachman sat in front and a mouse footman rode behind. The little mouse seated herself grandly inside.

Veikko thought helplessly of how his brothers might laugh at such a procession. But he did not laugh. Instead, he walked beside the tiny carriage, assuring his sweetheart that his father was a good man and that he would see she came to no harm.

Their path led them from the forest to a narrow bridge over a river. When they were halfway across, a man approached from the opposite side. He stopped and stared at the extraordinary little carriage.

“What is this?” he cried. Then, thinking the sight a ridiculous joke, he thrust out his foot and pushed the nutshell coach straight off the bridge.

The carriage, its five little horses, the servants, and the mouse herself tumbled into the rushing water below.

“What have you done?” Veikko shouted. “You have drowned my sweetheart!”

The man took fright at Veikko’s grief and hurried away. Veikko remained by the bridge, staring down into the river. Tears filled his eyes.

“Poor little mouse,” he whispered. “You were always faithful to me. Now that I have lost you, I know how dearly I loved you.”

Just then he heard the sound of a carriage on the far bank. He looked up and saw a magnificent coach of gold drawn by five shining horses. A coachman in splendid livery held the reins, and a footman rode behind. Within the carriage sat a beautiful young woman with golden hair and a velvet gown, who smiled and beckoned to him.

“Will you come and sit beside me, Veikko?” she asked.

He could scarcely speak. “You wish me to come?”

“Why not?” she answered. “You were willing to love me when I was only a mouse. Surely you will not turn away from me now that I am a princess.”

“The little mouse?” Veikko breathed. “Was that truly you?”

“Yes,” said the princess. “An evil enchantment bound me to that shape. The spell could only be broken if someone first accepted me as his sweetheart, and then another human being caused me to be drowned. You gave me your affection without knowing who I was, and now the enchantment is ended forever.”

She invited him into the golden carriage. Together they went to seek his father’s blessing before returning to her kingdom to be married.

When the carriage stopped at the farmhouse, the farmer, his sons, and their sweethearts came out to bow to the magnificent visitors. None imagined that the young man inside was Veikko.

“Father,” he called, “do you not recognize me?”

The farmer looked up in amazement. “Why, it is Veikko!”

“And this,” Veikko said, “is the princess I am going to marry.”

His father could scarcely believe his eyes. When he asked where Veikko had met such a bride, his youngest son answered simply, “In the forest, where my tree pointed.”

The older brothers grew gloomy with envy. They wished now that their own trees had fallen toward the forest. But a fallen tree was not what had won Veikko his bride. He had found her because he treated even a tiny mouse with tenderness, and kept his word when others would have laughed.

With the farmer’s blessing, Veikko and the princess traveled to her kingdom and were married. There they lived happily together, loving one another as faithfully as when their friendship began in a quiet hut among the trees.

Source: Traditional Finnish folk tale, adapted from “The Forest Bride: The Story of a Little Mouse Who Was a Princess,” in Parker Fillmore, Mighty Mikko: A Book of Finnish Fairy Tales and Folk Tales (1922), pp. 121–139. Folktale type ATU 402 (The Animal Bride).

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Long ago, in the countryside of Picardy, there were three fairies who delighted in dancing together. When they gathered in a circle, they took one another by the hands and went round and round, singing the same little song:

“Sunday, Monday! Sunday, Monday!”

They sang nothing else, yet they never tired of it. Their steps kept time with the words, and the words kept time with their steps.

One day, a young man with a hump on his back happened upon the fairies while they were dancing. He was not frightened by the strange sight. Instead of running away or hiding, he came forward, took their hands, and joined the circle.

“Sunday, Monday! Sunday, Monday!” he sang with them.

He followed their steps so gracefully and entered into their merriment so wholeheartedly that the three fairies were charmed. When the dance was finished, they decided to reward him. By their magic, they took the hump from his back.

The young man could scarcely contain his happiness. He set off for home, light of step and full of wonder, singing as he went:

“Sunday, Monday! Sunday, Monday!”

Before he reached home, he met another young man who, like himself until that very day, had a hump on his back. The two knew one another, and the second young man stared in astonishment at his friend.

“What has happened to you?” he cried. “Your hump is gone! How did you manage that?”

“It was easy enough,” said the first. “Go to a certain wood, and there you will find three fairies. Dance with them and sing their song: ‘Sunday, Monday! Sunday, Monday!’ They will take your hump away.”

“Then I shall go this very moment!” exclaimed the other.

Without waiting another instant, he hurried toward the wood his friend had described. And there, just as he had been told, he found the three fairies dancing in a circle.

He did not hesitate. He went straight to them, took their hands, and began to dance. At first he sang the very words that had brought his friend such good fortune:

“Sunday, Monday! Sunday, Monday!”

But he did not stop there. Thinking to add something to the little song, he called out:

“Tuesday, Wednesday!”

The fairies were indignant. Those were not the words of their song, and they had not asked him to change it. Far from rewarding him, they punished him. They took the hump they had removed from the first young man and placed it upon the back of the second, beside the one he already had.

Thus he left the wood carrying two humps instead of one. The old tale says that the change made his appearance so startling that anyone who saw him would have fled.

And what happened after that?

Why, the cock crowed, and morning came. And there the story ends.

Source: Traditional tale of Picardy, told by Auguste Gourdin of Warloy-Baillon (Somme), collected by Henri Carnoy; published in French Fairy Tales, translated by Martha Ward Carey (originally 1887; edition copyright 1903).

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Long ago, three brothers lived together and decided that the time had come for each of them to marry. They agreed to let chance choose their brides. Each brother would shoot an arrow, and wherever his arrow fell, there he would seek a wife.

The eldest brother’s arrow landed at the house of a nobleman, and so did the second brother’s. Both returned with young noblewomen as their brides. But the youngest brother’s arrow flew far away and fell into a lake. He went down to the water’s edge, wondering what sort of bride he could possibly find there.

As he stood beside the lake, a frog climbed out of the water and settled on a stone. The youngest brother picked it up and carried it home. So the three brothers returned, two with noble brides and one with a frog.

For a long while they lived together peacefully. The brothers went out to work, while the two noblewomen prepared meals and looked after the house. The frog stayed near the hearth, croaking softly and looking about with shining eyes.

Eventually the two sisters-in-law grew tired of it. Whenever they swept the floor, they tossed the frog out with the dust. Sometimes the youngest brother found it and carried it indoors again; sometimes the frog hopped back by itself, settled beside the fire, and resumed its croaking.

The noblewomen complained to their husbands. Why should their brother keep a frog when he might marry a proper woman? The elder brothers repeated these complaints so often that the youngest had little peace.

But he answered, “The frog was given to me by fate. Perhaps I deserve no better bride. Whatever others may think, I must remain faithful to the one that came to me.”

Still the complaints continued, until at last the brothers separated their households. The youngest brother was left alone with his frog. There was no one to cook his dinner or keep the house in order. A neighbor helped him for a short while, but she had work of her own, and soon he had to manage by himself. His days became lonely and sorrowful.

One evening, after he had spent the day working, he came home and found a wonderful surprise. A cloth had been laid out, the cupboard was well supplied, and a delicious meal waited for him. The frog sat in its usual place by the fire and croaked as before.

He supposed that his sisters-in-law must have taken pity on him. Yet the next evening the same thing happened, and the evening after that. Each day, while he was away, an unseen helper prepared his food and made his home comfortable.

At last curiosity overcame him. “I shall discover who is doing all this kindness for me,” he said.

Instead of going to work the following day, he hid himself on the roof, where he could watch without being seen. Before long the frog jumped out from the fireplace and hopped about the room, peering into every corner. When it was satisfied that no one was there, it returned to the hearth, slipped off its frogskin, and laid it close to the fire.

In place of the frog stood a maiden as radiant as the sun. Swiftly she put the room in order, prepared the food, and cooked a fine meal. When everything was ready, she slipped back into the frogskin and sat croaking by the hearth.

The young man could scarcely believe his eyes. He came down from the roof and entered the house. He treated the frog with special tenderness, though he said nothing about what he had seen. Then he sat down to enjoy his supper.

The next day he hid on the roof again. As before, the frog took off its skin and became a lovely young woman. This time the husband slipped quietly into the house, seized the skin, and flung it into the flames.

The maiden cried out and begged him not to burn it. “If you destroy that skin,” she warned, “you will bring ruin upon yourself!” But the fire had already consumed it.

“Now,” she said sadly, “if your happiness turns to misery, you cannot say I did not warn you.”

News soon spread through the countryside. People told one another that the youngest brother, who had taken a frog for his bride, now had a wife of astonishing beauty. At last the lord of the land heard of her. He wished to take the beautiful woman for himself, and began to devise impossible tasks for her husband.

He summoned the young man and ordered him to plow and sow an entire barnful of wheat in a single day. “If you fail,” declared the lord, “your wife shall be mine.”

The young man went home in despair and told his wife what had happened.

“Did I not warn you about the skin?” she said. “But I will help you. Tomorrow go to the lake from which I came. Stand at the shore and call, ‘Mother and Father, lend me your swift bullocks today!’ Lead the animals away, and they will plow and sow the field before the day is over.”

At dawn the husband went to the lake and called as she had instructed. Out of the water came a team of magnificent oxen, unlike any he had ever seen. He led them to the lord’s fields, and in a single day they plowed the earth and sowed all the grain.

The lord was astonished. Rather than abandon his wicked plan, he set another task. The husband must gather up every grain of the wheat he had just sown, and the barn must be filled without a single seed missing. Otherwise, the lord would take his wife.

Again the young man went home with a heavy heart. His wife told him to return to the lake and ask her mother and father for their jackdaws.

He did so, and a great flock of black birds rose from the water. They flew over the newly sown field, picking up the seeds one by one and carrying them to the barn. When the lord inspected the work, he shouted that one seed was missing. He claimed to know every grain.

Just then a jackdaw came flying in with the final seed in its beak. It had been delayed because one of its feet was lame. The last grain was placed with all the others, and the task was complete.

The lord was furious. He thought and thought until he invented a task that he believed no living man could accomplish.

“My mother died here,” he told the husband, “and she took a ring with her into the other world. Go there and bring me that ring. If you do not return with it, I shall take your wife.”

The young man returned home in misery. Once more his wife reminded him of her warning, but she did not abandon him.

“Go to the lake,” she said, “and ask my mother and father to lend you their ram.”

At the shore he called for the ram, and a remarkable creature rose from the water. Its horns were twisted, and flames issued from its mouth. “Climb onto my back,” said the ram.

The young man obeyed. In an instant the ram plunged downward, carrying him through the earth with the speed of an arrow, far into the regions below.

They traveled on until they came upon a man and a woman sitting together on an oxhide. Though the hide was broad, they could scarcely remain upon it, and it seemed that at any moment one or both would fall off.

“How is it,” the traveler called, “that such a hide is too small for two people?”

“Many have passed this way,” the pair answered, “but none has come back. If you return, we shall tell you.”

Farther on the traveler saw another man and woman sitting together, this time on the narrow handle of an axe. Yet they sat securely and showed no fear of falling.

“How can you both sit on so narrow a place?” he asked.

They too replied, “Many have passed this way, but none has come back. If you return, we shall tell you.”

Next they came to a priest tending cattle. His beard had grown so long that it spread upon the earth, and the animals ate it as though it were grass. However hard he tried, the priest could not keep them away.

“What has happened to you?” the young man asked.

The priest gave the same answer: “Many have passed this way, but none has returned. If you come back, I shall explain.”

Still the ram carried him deeper into the earth, until they reached a place filled with boiling pitch and blazing fire. This was hell, and the fire stretched across their path.

“Hold tightly,” the ram told him. “We must leap through the flames.”

The man clung to its back. With one mighty bound the ram carried him through the fire, and they emerged unharmed on the other side.

There sat a sorrowful woman on a golden throne. She asked the traveler gently why he had come so far and what trouble had brought him into the world below. He told her about his wife, the lord’s cruel demands, and the ring that he had been sent to fetch.

When she heard the story, she knew that her own son was the wicked lord who had threatened him.

“My son must be punished for his evil,” she said. “Take this little casket to him. But whatever happens, do not open it yourself. Give it into his hands and run away as fast as you can.”

The young man received the casket and began the long journey back upon the ram.

On their return they passed the priest whose beard was being eaten by cattle. Now the priest kept his promise and explained his strange punishment. While he lived, he had cared for no one but himself. He had fed his own flocks on other people’s pastures, leaving their cattle to starve. Here he suffered the consequences of his greed.

Next the ram carried its rider past the couple seated safely together on the handle of the axe. They explained that on earth they had loved each other deeply, and their love remained just as strong in the other world. That was why even so narrow a seat was spacious enough for them.

Finally they came to the man and woman who could hardly fit together upon the broad oxhide. They too fulfilled their promise. During their lives they had despised one another, they said, and their bitterness had followed them beyond death. No space, however large, could make them comfortable side by side.

At last the ram reached the surface of the earth. The young man climbed down and hurried to his lord. He placed the casket in the lord’s hands and, remembering the warning, ran away.

The lord opened the box. Fire burst from within and consumed him. His cruel schemes had come to an end, and he could never again threaten the young man’s marriage.

So the youngest brother and his beloved wife were free at last. They lived together in peace and love, thankful to have escaped the danger that had hung over them.

Source: Traditional Georgian folk tale, from Khalkhuri Zghaprebi (Georgian Folklore Society, Tiflis, 1891), translated by Marjory Wardrop in Georgian Folk Tales (London: David Nutt, 1894), “The Frog’s Skin.” Adapted into modern English.

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Once upon a time, a king went hunting in a forest so vast that its paths seemed to vanish beneath the trees. He pursued a wild animal with such eagerness that his attendants were left far behind. As evening fell, he stopped and looked about him. He was lost. He rode this way and that, searching for a road, but every turning led him deeper into the wilderness.

At last he saw an old woman approaching, her head nodding as she walked. She was a witch, though the king did not know it. He asked whether she could show him the way out of the forest.

“I can,” she replied, “but only if you grant me one wish. Refuse me, and you will never leave these woods alive.”

“What do you wish?” asked the king.

“I have a daughter,” said the woman, “as beautiful as any maiden in the world. Take her as your wife and make her your queen, and I will lead you safely home.”

Fearing that he would otherwise perish in the forest, the king agreed. The old woman brought him to a little house where her daughter sat beside the fire. She was beautiful indeed, yet the king felt a strange dread whenever he looked at her. Nevertheless, he lifted her onto his horse, and her mother showed them the road. They returned to the palace, and the wedding was celebrated.

The king had been married before. His first wife had left him seven children: six sons and one daughter. He loved them dearly, and he feared that his new wife might harm them. Therefore he placed them in a hidden castle deep within the forest, where no stranger could easily find them.

Even the king himself could scarcely have reached the castle without a wonderful ball of yarn given to him by a wise woman. Whenever he cast it before him, it rolled onward, unwinding a thread that showed him the way. Following that thread, he often visited his children.

The new queen noticed how frequently he disappeared into the woods. She questioned his servants and bribed them until they told her about the secret castle and the enchanted ball of yarn. Then she searched until she found where the king kept it.

The queen made six little shirts from white silk. Having learned witchcraft from her mother, she sewed a spell into each one. One day, while the king was away hunting, she took the shirts and the ball of yarn and followed its thread through the forest.

From the castle, the six boys saw someone approaching. Believing it to be their father, they hurried joyfully outside. The queen threw a white shirt over each boy. The moment the silk touched them, all six were changed into swans. They rose into the air and flew away over the treetops.

Satisfied that she had rid herself of the children, the queen returned to the palace. She did not know that the little princess had remained inside the castle and had escaped the enchantment.

The next day, when the king arrived, he found only his daughter. He asked where her brothers had gone, and she told him how six swans had flown away from the courtyard. She showed him the feathers she had gathered after their departure.

The king grieved deeply. Still, he did not suspect his wife. Fearing that his daughter too might be taken from him, he wished to bring her home. But the girl was afraid of her stepmother and begged him to allow her to stay one more night. At last he agreed.

When darkness fell, the princess slipped away. She would not abandon her brothers. Through the night she walked, and through the following day, until her feet could carry her no farther. She came upon a small hut in the forest and entered. Inside stood six little beds. Rather than lie on any of them, she crept beneath one and rested on the hard floor.

Just before sunset she heard wings beating against the air. Six swans flew in through the window and settled on the floor. They shook and blew away their feathers, and their swan skins slipped from them like garments. In their place stood six young men. The princess recognized her brothers at once and hurried from beneath the bed.

Their joy at seeing one another was great, but the brothers soon grew anxious. They told her that the hut was a hiding place used by robbers, who would kill her if they returned and found her there.

“Then will you not protect me?” she asked.

“We cannot,” they answered. “Each evening we may take human form for only a quarter of an hour. When that time ends, we must become swans again.”

She asked whether there was any way to free them. The brothers told her that there was, but the task was almost beyond human strength. For six whole years she must neither speak nor laugh, and during those years she must make six little shirts from starwort flowers. If a single word escaped her lips before the work was done, all her labor would be lost.

Before she could say more, the quarter of an hour passed. Her brothers became swans again and flew from the hut.

The princess resolved to save them, whatever the cost. She left the robbers’ shelter and found a tree in the heart of the forest where she could sit safely. In the morning she gathered starwort and began to work. Day after day, she stitched the flowers into little shirts. She spoke to no one and never laughed. Her eyes were fixed upon the task she had chosen.

A long time passed. One day another king came hunting in the forest, and his huntsmen discovered the silent maiden seated in her tree. They called up to her and asked who she was, but she gave no answer. They promised they would not hurt her and asked her to come down. She only shook her head.

Hoping they might leave her in peace, she dropped her golden necklace to them. When that did not satisfy them, she let down her girdle, then her garters, and at last everything she could spare until she wore only her simple undergarment. But the huntsmen climbed the tree, brought her down, and led her before their king.

The king questioned her kindly. He asked her name and why she had been alone in the forest. She did not reply. He tried every language he knew, but the maiden remained silent. Her beauty and gentle bearing touched his heart. He wrapped his cloak around her, seated her before him on his horse, and took her to his castle.

There she was given fine clothes and treated with honor. At the king’s table she sat quietly, still sewing whenever she could. The king grew so fond of her that he decided he wished to marry no one else. Although she could not answer him in words, they were married, and she became queen.

But the king’s mother was cruel and resentful. She disliked the young wife, who had appeared from nowhere and would not speak. She said that such a mysterious woman was unworthy of the throne.

After a year, the young queen gave birth to a child. While she slept, the king’s mother stole the baby away and smeared blood around the queen’s mouth. Then she accused the young mother of having devoured her own child.

The king refused to believe such a dreadful accusation and ordered that no harm should come to his wife. The queen could say nothing in her own defense. She continued her silent work on the six shirts.

In time, she gave birth to a second child, a fine little boy. The old woman repeated her wicked trick and again accused the queen. Still the king would not believe her. He knew his wife to be gentle and good, and he wished that she could speak to prove her innocence.

When the third child was born, the old woman stole that baby too and made the same accusation. The queen remained silent, for the six years were not yet finished. This time the accusations were brought before the court, and the king could no longer prevent a judgment. The young queen was condemned to die by fire.

The day appointed for the sentence was also the very last day of her six years of silence. She had completed five shirts and nearly finished the sixth; only its left sleeve was missing. When she was led to the place of execution, she carried all six shirts over her arm.

She stood upon the pile of wood as the fire was about to be lit. Then she looked upward and saw six white swans flying swiftly toward her. Her heart leapt, for she knew the moment of deliverance had come.

The birds swept down close beside her. She threw a shirt over each one, and as the garments touched them, their swan skins fell away. Her six brothers stood before her once more, restored to human form. Only the youngest bore a swan’s wing in place of his left arm, because the final shirt had no sleeve.

The brothers embraced their sister. The six years had ended, and at last she was free to speak. She went to her husband and told him that she was innocent. She explained how his mother had taken away their three children and hidden them, and how the accusations against her had been false.

The children were found and brought back, to their father’s overwhelming joy. The king’s wicked mother was punished for her crimes: she was bound to the very stake prepared for the innocent queen and burned. The king and queen were reunited with their children, and the six brothers remained with them. For many years they lived together in happiness and peace.

Source: Traditional German folk tale “Die sechs Schwäne,” collected by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, Children’s and Household Tales (Kinder- und Hausmärchen), no. 49. Adapted from the complete published tale.

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Once upon a time, an old man and his wife lived in a little house beside a vineyard. They had no children, and they had never possessed much beyond the roof over their heads and the vines that the old man tended with his own hands. Yet they managed as best they could, and every morning the old man took up his hoe and went to work among the rows of grapes.

One morning, on his way to the vineyard, he witnessed something he had never expected to see. High above the road, the Sun and the Moon were quarreling. They argued so fiercely that neither would give way to the other. When they noticed the old man passing beneath them, they stopped and called down to him.

“Good morning, grandfather! Will you settle a disagreement for us?”

“If I can,” answered the old man. “Tell me what troubles you.”

“Which of us does more good in the world?” they demanded. “Which is the better of us?”

The old man thought a moment before replying. “You are both good, each in your own way. The Sun gives light to the day, and the Moon shines through the night. Why should one be better than the other?”

The Sun and the Moon were delighted by this answer. “You have judged fairly,” they said. “Tell us what you would like in return.”

“I ask for nothing,” said the old man. “But if you wish to give me something, I shall be grateful for whatever you choose.”

“Then take this hen,” they told him. “When you are halfway home, put her on the ground and ask her to lay gold coins. She will do so, and whenever you are in need she will give you more.”

The old man accepted the hen with many thanks. Halfway home, he set her down by the roadside and made his request. At once the hen laid a handful of shining gold coins. Astonished and joyful, he gathered them up and hurried to tell his wife about the wonderful gift.

“Keep this secret carefully,” he warned her. “If others learn what the hen can do, someone may try to steal her.”

The next morning he arranged for a carpenter to come and build a fine henhouse. While the carpenter worked, the old man went to his vineyard as usual. His wife watched the work for a while, filled with pride over their new good fortune. At last she could keep her secret no longer.

“Would you like to see something astonishing?” she asked the carpenter.

She brought out the hen and commanded her to lay gold coins. Before the carpenter’s eyes, the hen produced a glittering heap of them. The carpenter said little, but he was a cunning man, and he had already decided what he would do. He returned to his own house, found a hen of the same size and coloring, and hid it in a sack. Then he came back to finish the henhouse.

While the old woman was busy preparing the meal, he exchanged his ordinary hen for the enchanted one. By evening the henhouse was finished, and the carpenter went away carrying the precious bird unseen in his sack.

The old man and his wife looked after the hen with great care, never dreaming that it was not the same bird. Some time later, they needed money to buy a garden plot. They set the hen on the ground and asked for gold. Instead of coins, however, she left only an ordinary hen’s dropping in the old man’s hand.

Then he understood what had happened. He hurried to the carpenter’s house and demanded the return of his hen. But the carpenter denied knowing anything about it and drove him away with angry threats.

“I have never seen you before!” he shouted. “Come here again and I shall beat you!”

There was nothing the old man could do. He went home unhappy, and the next morning took up his hoe once more. As he walked toward his vineyard, he met the Sun and the Moon again. Once more they were quarreling over which of them was better.

“Grandfather,” they called, “were you speaking the truth when you said that we are equally good?”

“Of course,” he replied. “The Sun brightens the day, and the Moon brightens the night. Each has its place.”

His answer pleased them as much as before. They offered him another gift, and when he said he would gladly accept whatever they wished to give, they handed him a tablecloth.

“Whenever you are hungry, unfold this cloth and ask for whatever food you desire. The food will appear at once. But guard it well. Do not let the same thing happen as happened with your hen.”

“I shall be more careful this time,” promised the old man.

Halfway home, he spread the tablecloth and found upon it all the dishes his heart desired. He ate his fill, folded the cloth, and carried it home to his wife. He explained its power and reminded her to tell no one. She promised to be cautious.

For some time all went well. The old man no longer needed to toil in the vineyard, for whenever the couple were hungry they spread the tablecloth, and a plentiful meal appeared. They lived in comfort, with nothing to trouble them. Yet one day the old woman suggested that they invite the king himself to dinner.

“Very well,” her husband agreed, and the invitation was sent.

The king wondered why a poor old couple would dare invite him to dine, but curiosity overcame him and he came. His surprise was immense when he saw the tablecloth furnish every dish that anyone requested. He ate splendidly, but when the meal was finished he did not thank his hosts and depart.

“Such a tablecloth does not belong in a little house like this,” he announced. “Fold it up. I shall take it to my palace, where it properly belongs.”

“But, Your Majesty—” the old man began.

“Silence!” roared the king. “Say another word and I shall have you imprisoned.”

And so the king carried off the tablecloth, leaving the old man and his wife with neither of the marvelous gifts they had received.

Early the next morning, the old man took up his hoe again and set out for his vineyard. On the road, just as before, he met the Sun and the Moon. They were still disputing the same question, and once again asked him to decide between them.

“The Sun belongs to the day,” he said, “and the Moon to the night. Both are good and both are needed.”

This time the Sun and the Moon gave him a plain wooden stick. But their warning was strange.

“Whatever you do,” they told him, “do not say to this stick, ‘Do not strike, stick!’ If you do, you will discover what happens.”

The old man took the stick and went on his way. When he had reached the middle of the road home, curiosity overcame him. What possible power could such an ordinary piece of wood possess? He decided to try the forbidden words.

“Do not strike, stick!” he said.

At once the stick sprang into action and began beating him. It struck his shoulders, his back, his arms, and his legs. The astonished old man struggled to escape the blows and at last managed to make the stick stop. Bruised and sore though he was, he was not discouraged. Indeed, an idea had come to him.

He went straight to the carpenter’s house.

“Give me back my hen,” he said, “or you will be sorry.”

“I told you never to show your face here again!” the carpenter shouted. He rushed toward the old man, ready to strike him.

“Do not strike, stick!” cried the old man.

The wooden stick flew at the carpenter and beat him without mercy. The carpenter shouted and begged for it to stop.

“Take your hen!” he cried. “Take her and leave me in peace!”

The old man stopped the stick, recovered the enchanted hen, and placed her safely in her henhouse. But he was not finished. He took the stick and went to the palace.

“Your Majesty,” he said to the king, “you have kept my tablecloth long enough. I have come to take it home.”

“Guards! Seize this insolent fellow!” ordered the king.

Before the guards could reach him, the old man spoke his command again.

“Do not strike, stick!”

The stick leapt upon the king and struck him again and again. His guards were so astonished that they stood rooted to the spot. The king, who had been so eager to threaten a poor man with prison, now pleaded for mercy.

“Stop it!” he cried. “Take your tablecloth and go!”

The old man called off the stick, gathered up his rightful possession, and went happily home. There he asked the hen for gold coins, and she laid them as readily as ever. Then he spread the enchanted tablecloth, and he and his wife sat down to all the delicious food they wished.

From that day onward, the old couple never went hungry and never lacked for anything they needed. They lived well and contentedly for the rest of their days—and may we all be so fortunate.

Source: Greek folk tale “Ήλιος και Φεγγάρι” (The Sun and the Moon), published by Οι Παραμυθάδες (Oi Paramythades), 16 June 2013. Adapted from the Greek text: paramythades.org/2013/06/16/ήλιος-και-φεγγάρι/.

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Once upon a time there lived two kings who were such close friends that they trusted one another as brothers. One king had three sons; the other had a daughter. They made a solemn agreement: if either father should die, the surviving king would care for the children left behind. And if, in time, the princess married one of the three princes, she would inherit her father’s possessions.

Not long afterward, the princess’s father died. The other king kept his promise and welcomed the orphaned girl into his household, where she grew up beside his three sons.

Years passed. The eldest prince came to his father and confessed that he wished to marry the princess. He was so determined that he declared he could not bear to live if he were refused. The king, troubled by his son’s words, promised an answer in three weeks.

One week later, the middle prince made the same request. He too declared himself unable to bear a refusal. His father asked him to wait a fortnight. Then, at the end of the second week, the youngest prince also asked for the princess’s hand. To him the king promised an answer in one week.

Thus all three brothers came before their father on the very same day.

“My sons,” the king told them, “I know that each of you loves this young woman. But you know equally well that she cannot marry all three. I must find a fair way to decide who is most worthy of her.”

He considered the matter and then announced his judgment.

“Go into the world, each of you by a different road. Return exactly one year from today, bringing the most valuable thing you can discover. The one who brings back the greatest treasure shall marry the princess.”

The three brothers accepted the challenge. They made ready for their travels and rode together until they came to a towering oak tree in a wood. There the road divided into three. The eldest chose the western path, the middle brother the southern, and the youngest the road leading east.

“Let us meet beneath this same oak exactly one year from now,” they agreed, “and go home together.”

Then they parted.

The eldest prince journeyed through many places, examining everything that seemed rare or wonderful. He spared neither effort nor expense, for he wished to bring home a treasure no one could rival. At last he found a telescope of extraordinary power: whoever looked through it could see as far as the very ends of the world.

“This is a treasure indeed,” he thought. “What could be more valuable than a glass that reveals things beyond any ordinary sight?”

He bought the telescope and began to prepare for his return.

Meanwhile the second prince searched just as eagerly. After long travels, he discovered a marvelous cloak. Whoever put it on and thought of a particular place would be carried there in an instant, however far away it might be.

“No journey need ever be long for the owner of this cloak,” he said. “Surely my father will judge it the finest of all gifts.”

So he acquired the cloak and continued enjoying the sights of distant lands. He knew that, with its help, even the last moment would be soon enough to reach the meeting place.

The youngest brother wandered far before finding the treasure that he chose. It was no crown, jewel, or golden cup, but an orange with a miraculous power. If the fruit were held beneath the nose of a person who had died less than twenty-four hours earlier, that person would return to life.

The young prince understood what a precious gift this was. He bought the orange and guarded it carefully as he traveled back toward the oak.

As the year drew to its close, the eldest and youngest brothers reached the meeting place. They waited beneath the great tree. Before long the middle brother appeared too, having used his magical cloak to reach the wood in a moment.

Delighted to be together again, the three princes showed one another what they had found. The eldest demonstrated his wondrous telescope, the second displayed his traveling cloak, and the youngest told them of the life-restoring orange.

Then the eldest raised his telescope and looked toward their distant home.

All at once his face grew pale.

“What is it?” his brothers cried.

He lowered the glass with trembling hands. Through its powerful lens he had seen the princess lying dead.

There was not a moment to lose. The three princes gathered beneath the magical cloak, and the middle brother thought of their father’s palace. In an instant, they stood at home.

Their father met them in deep grief.

“My sons,” he said, “you have returned too late. The princess is dead, and none of you can now marry her.”

“How long has she been dead?” asked the youngest urgently.

“Not yet a full day,” answered the king.

The youngest prince rushed to the princess, took out his precious orange, and held it beneath her nose. Immediately the wonderful fruit worked its magic. The princess returned to life.

Joy filled the palace, but the brothers soon began to dispute whose treasure deserved the prize.

“If I had not looked through my telescope,” said the eldest, “we would never have known that she was in danger. We might have remained beneath the oak until it was too late. Therefore my gift is the most valuable.”

“But without my cloak,” replied the middle brother, “we could never have reached her in time. Your telescope could only show us what had happened. My cloak brought us there at once.”

“And without my orange,” said the youngest, “she could not have been restored to life at all. Neither the telescope nor the cloak could have saved her by itself.”

Each brother believed his reasoning was sound. The matter was so difficult that the king summoned the wisest and oldest people of his realm to judge between them.

The wise people listened carefully to all three claims. They considered the telescope that had revealed the princess’s fate, the cloak that had brought the brothers home, and the orange that had given her life again. Then they announced their decision: the youngest prince, who had restored the princess to life, should be her husband.

The three brothers accepted the judgment, and their quarrel came to an end. The two elder princes abandoned their earlier desperate declarations and turned their thoughts to new hopes.

The eldest used his telescope to seek throughout the world until he discovered a royal princess whose beauty surpassed all others. He went to her and married her.

The middle brother heard of a princess celebrated both for her goodness and for her beauty. He wrapped himself in his magic cloak and traveled to her, and in time they were married as well.

So all three brothers found brides, and all three were satisfied. Their marvelous treasures had brought them safely to the end of their journeys, and they lived as happily as anyone could wish.

Source: The Three Valuable Things,” in The Folk-Tales of the Magyars (1889), collected from János Erdélyi, translated and edited by W. Henry Jones and Lewis L. Kropf. Literary adaptation in English.

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Long ago, on the eastern coast of Mýrdalur in Iceland, a man went walking among the rocks beside the sea. It was early in the morning. The water stretched out beyond the cliffs, and the shore lay quiet beneath the pale sky.

As he passed the mouth of a cave, he heard something extraordinary. From deep within the rock came the sounds of merriment and dancing, as though a celebration were taking place where only waves and seabirds ought to be heard.

The man stopped to listen. Near the entrance to the cave lay several sealskins. He looked at them, took one, and carried it away. At home he placed it inside a chest and locked the chest securely.

Later that day, he returned to the cave. The dancing had ceased. Instead, he found a young woman sitting outside the entrance, weeping bitterly. She had no clothes, and she seemed utterly alone.

The man understood that she belonged to the mysterious company he had heard in the cave. She was one of the seal people, who could cast off their skins and walk upon the land in human form. The skin he had taken was hers. Without it, she could not return to the sea.

He gave her clothing and tried to comfort her. Then he brought her to his home.

In time the young woman grew fond of him, although she never felt entirely at ease among other people. Often she sat by herself, gazing far out across the water. Whatever her life on shore might offer, her eyes continually returned to the sea.

After some time, the man married her. They lived together for years and had children. Yet all the while her sealskin remained hidden in the locked chest, and the man guarded the key carefully. Wherever he went, he usually took it with him.

One day, after many years had passed, he forgot the key at home. Some tellers say that he went out to fish and left it beneath his pillow. Others say that he dressed to go to church at Christmas, leaving the key in the pocket of the ordinary clothes he had taken off while his wife remained at home because she was ill.

Whichever way it happened, when the man returned, the chest stood open. The sealskin was gone. So was his wife.

She had found the key and opened the chest. There, after all those years, lay the skin that had once allowed her to swim freely beneath the waves. At the sight of it she could no longer resist the call of the sea.

Before leaving, she said farewell to her children. Then she put on the sealskin and made her way to the water.

As she prepared to plunge into the waves, she is said to have spoken of her divided heart: seven children waited for her in the sea, and seven children remained behind upon the land.

Then she disappeared beneath the surface.

The man was filled with grief when he learned what had happened. Though he went on with his life, he could not forget her.

Afterward, whenever he rowed out to fish, a seal would often swim around his boat. Sometimes it seemed that tears were running down the creature’s face. From that time onward, the man was unusually fortunate with his fishing, and valuable things were sometimes washed ashore near his home.

The children, too, continued to see a seal. When they walked along the beach, it would appear in the water nearby and swim beside them as they followed the shore. Sometimes it tossed them beautiful shells and strange, brightly colored treasures from the sea.

The people who witnessed these things believed that the seal was their mother, watching over them from the world to which she had returned.

But she never came back to live on land.

Source: Traditional Icelandic folktale “Selshamurinn,” collected by Jón Árnason in Íslenzkar þjóðsögur og æfintýri (1862–1864), vol. I, pp. 632–634. Literary adaptation based on the recorded Icelandic tale.

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On a bright harvest day, when the fields lay warm in the sunshine, Tom Fitzpatrick went wandering along the sheltered side of a hedge. It was a holiday, and the air was still enough for him to hear the smallest rustle among the leaves.

Presently a curious clacking sound reached his ears. Tom stopped and listened. He thought it must be a stonechat calling somewhere in the hedge, though it seemed late in the season for such a song. Eager to discover what was making the noise, he crept forward on tiptoe.

The clacking ceased. Tom peered between the branches, and there, in a nook among the leaves, stood a brown pitcher large enough to hold a generous supply of drink. Beside it was a man so small that Tom could scarcely believe his eyes. The little fellow wore a cocked hat perched on his head and a leather apron before him. He drew out a tiny wooden stool, stood on it to scoop a cup of drink from the pitcher, set the cup nearby, and then sat down to work. In his hands was a little shoe, and he was fixing a heel to it.

Tom knew what he had found. He had heard countless stories of leprechauns, the secretive little shoemakers of Ireland, but had never been sure that such creatures truly existed. Now one was sitting before him, as busy at his work as any village cobbler.

And Tom remembered something else from the old stories: a man who caught a leprechaun and kept his eyes fixed on him might make the little fellow reveal where his treasure was hidden. But the moment the watcher looked away, the captive would escape.

Tom moved closer, watching the shoemaker as carefully as a cat watches a mouse.

“Blessings on your work, neighbor,” he said.

The little man looked up. “And thank you kindly.”

“Isn’t it a strange thing to be working on a holiday?” Tom asked.

“Whether I work is my own affair,” answered the shoemaker.

Tom nodded toward the brown pitcher. “Then perhaps you will tell me what you have there.”

“Good beer,” the little man replied.

“Beer! And where did you come by it?”

“I made it myself.”

“And what did you make it from?”

“From heather.”

Tom laughed. Beer made from heather sounded like a fine tale to fool a stranger.

“You may laugh if you please,” said the little man, untroubled. “But it is true. Long ago, when the Danes were in Ireland, they taught us how to brew it. The secret has remained in my family ever since.”

“Will you let me taste it?” Tom asked.

Instead of handing him a cup, the shoemaker gave him a sharp look.

“You would do better to mind your father’s fields than to stand here asking questions. Look! While you waste your time, the cows have broken into the oats and are trampling them down.”

Tom almost turned his head. His father’s crop was no small matter, and for an instant he could picture the damage. But just in time he remembered the warning in the old stories. If he looked away, the little shoemaker would vanish.

With one swift movement Tom reached into the hedge and seized the leprechaun. In his haste he knocked over the pitcher. The heather beer poured into the ground, and Tom never learned what it tasted like.

He held the little fellow tightly and demanded to know where his money was hidden. Tom’s face had grown so fierce that the captive appeared thoroughly frightened.

“Come with me,” the leprechaun said at last. “A couple of fields away I will show you a great pot of gold.”

Tom agreed, but he did not loosen his grip or take his eyes from his prisoner.

They went over hedges and ditches and across a crooked stretch of bog. At length they came to a broad field crowded with boliauns, the tall plants that grew there in such numbers that one looked much like another. The leprechaun pointed to a particularly large plant.

“Dig beneath that boliaun,” he said, “and you will find a pot filled with gold guineas.”

Tom looked at the plant and then at the empty ground around it. He was certain he could dig up the treasure—if only he had brought a spade. But in his excitement he had left home without one.

He could run back for a spade, of course. The difficulty was finding exactly the same plant when he returned. All around him, the field was full of boliauns.

Then Tom thought of a way to mark the spot. He untied a bright red garter from his leg and fastened it securely around the stalk the leprechaun had shown him.

“There,” said Tom. “Now swear to me that you will not touch this garter while I am gone.”

The leprechaun gave his solemn promise that he would not touch it.

“You have no further need of me, I suppose?” he asked politely.

“None at all,” said Tom, certain that his fortune was as good as won. “You may go, and good luck to you.”

“Goodbye, Tom Fitzpatrick,” said the little man. “May you enjoy what you find!”

Tom ran home as fast as his legs could carry him. He fetched a spade and hurried back again, hardly able to think of anything but the shining gold that would soon be his.

At last he reached the field. He stopped at the edge and stared.

Every single boliaun wore a red garter.

There were hundreds upon hundreds of them, each marked with a ribbon just like the one Tom had tied around his chosen plant. He hurried from one to another, searching for some small difference, but every garter looked exactly the same. The leprechaun had kept his promise not to touch Tom’s marker—and still had managed to make it useless.

The field stretched across more than forty Irish acres. To dig beneath every plant would be hopeless.

At length Tom turned homeward, the spade resting on his shoulder. He had gone out dreaming of a pot of gold and returned with nothing but a lesson in the cleverness of leprechauns.

And whenever he remembered that small shoemaker beneath the hedge and the field full of red garters, Tom Fitzpatrick had plenty to say about the trick that had been played on him.

Source: Traditional Irish folktale, after “The Field of Boliauns” in Joseph Jacobs, Celtic Fairy Tales (1892), adapted from T. Crofton Croker, Fairy Legends of the South of Ireland.

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Once upon a time, seven women lived near a garden where a witch grew delicious jujube fruits. The women longed to taste them. Yet the garden belonged to the witch, and her donkey kept watch over it, ready to warn his mistress of intruders.

One day the women offered the donkey a bundle of tender grass. While he ate, they slipped into the garden, gathered the fruit in their aprons, and hurried away. They returned more than once, until the witch noticed that her trees had been robbed. The donkey knew nothing; he had been too busy eating. So the witch hid herself in a hole beneath leaves and branches, with only one long ear showing.

When the seven women crept into the garden again, one of them saw the ear among the leaves and mistook it for a mushroom. She reached down to pick it. At once the witch sprang from hiding. Six women escaped, but the seventh fell into her hands.

The frightened woman begged for mercy. At last the witch agreed to let her go, but only if she promised to give up the child she was expecting when that child reached the age of seven. With no other way to escape, the woman promised.

In time she gave birth to a lovely daughter named Angiola. When the girl was six, her mother sent her to school to learn sewing and knitting. The road passed the witch’s garden. One day the witch called Angiola to her, offered her some fruit, and said that she was the girl’s aunt. She sent a message to Angiola’s mother: she must remember her promise.

The mother was overcome with sorrow. She told Angiola to say that she had forgotten the message. Day after day the witch asked, and day after day Angiola answered as her mother had instructed. At last the witch grew angry. She bit the girl’s little finger so that Angiola would not forget again.

Angiola returned home weeping. Seeing what had happened, her mother knew she could delay no longer. The next morning she told the child to say that her aunt might do as she wished. The witch took Angiola away.

She brought the girl to a tall tower with no door and only a small window high above the ground. Strange as it was, the witch cared for Angiola there and treated her kindly, loving her almost as a daughter. As Angiola grew, her hair became wonderfully long. Whenever the witch returned from her travels, she stood below the window and called, “Angiola, fair Angiola, let down your beautiful hair and draw me up!” Angiola lowered her tresses, and the witch climbed to the window.

Years passed. One day a prince hunting in the neighborhood noticed the tower and wondered how anyone entered it. While he watched from hiding, the witch came home, called to Angiola, and climbed up by her hair. When she had left again, the prince stood beneath the window and repeated the call.

Thinking the witch had returned, Angiola let down her hair and pulled him up. She was startled to see a young stranger instead, but the prince spoke gently to her. He asked her to escape with him and become his wife, and at last she agreed.

Angiola knew that the furniture could speak and might betray them to the witch. She gave food to the tables, chairs, and cupboards, hoping to win their silence. But she overlooked the broom standing behind the door. Then she took three enchanted balls of yarn from the witch’s chamber and fled with the prince. The witch’s little dog, who loved Angiola dearly, ran after them.

When the witch returned, no hair descended from the window, however loudly she called. She fetched a long ladder and climbed into the tower. Angiola was gone. The tables, chairs, and cupboards claimed to know nothing, but from behind the door the neglected broom cried out that Angiola had fled with the prince who meant to marry her.

The witch hurried after them. When she was close enough to catch them, Angiola flung down the first ball of yarn. Instantly a towering mountain of soap rose between the witch and the fugitives. The witch struggled to climb it, slipping again and again, but eventually she crossed and renewed her pursuit.

Angiola dropped the second ball. A steep mountain bristling with nails appeared. The witch fought her way across, suffering terrible scratches, and once more came near. Then Angiola threw the third and final ball. Between them and the witch surged a broad, rushing river. The witch tried to swim it, but the torrent swelled until she had to turn back.

Unable to seize Angiola, she shouted a curse across the water: “May your beautiful face become the face of a dog!” At once Angiola’s face changed.

The prince was distressed. He feared that his parents would refuse to welcome a bride under such an enchantment. He placed Angiola in a small house and returned to the royal palace, but whenever he went hunting, he came to visit her. Angiola grieved over her fate.

At last the little dog who had followed her from the tower spoke. “Do not cry, fair Angiola,” he said. “I will go back and ask the witch to undo the spell.”

The dog ran to the witch and greeted her affectionately. At first she pushed him away, angry that he had followed Angiola. But he rubbed against her and begged for attention until she took him onto her lap.

Then the dog told her how unhappy Angiola was and pleaded with her to lift the curse. The witch protested: Angiola had deceived her, and this was her punishment. Yet the little dog continued to beg, saying that Angiola had suffered enough. Finally the witch relented. She gave him a small flask of water and said that Angiola would be restored if she washed her face with it.

The faithful dog carried the flask safely back. Angiola washed in the water, and immediately her face became her own again, lovelier than before. When the prince saw her, he rejoiced and brought her to the palace. The king and queen welcomed her, and a splendid wedding was held.

And Angiola, the prince, and the little dog who had never abandoned her lived in happiness and peace.

Source: Sicilian folk tale “The Fair Angiola,” collected by Laura Gonzenbach (Sicilianische Märchen, no. 53); published in Thomas Frederick Crane, Italian Popular Tales (1885), tale V. Literary adaptation in English.

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In the old days, when songs of mighty warriors traveled from one mountain pasture to another, there lived two brothers named Mujo and Halili. They were renowned for their courage and strength, and their deeds had become the talk of the countryside. No road seemed too dangerous for them, and no challenge made them turn away. Yet the boldness of the brothers brought them enemies as well as fame.

At last, complaints about Mujo and Halili reached the court of the Sultan in Istanbul. People came before the ruler and begged him to put an end to the brothers’ unruly ways. They said that Mujo and Halili had grown so powerful that no one dared stand against them.

The Sultan listened. Then he had a letter written and entrusted it to a messenger, with orders to deliver it to the two brothers. The message summoned Mujo and Halili to the imperial court.

When the letter arrived, Mujo opened it and read. His face darkened, and tears dropped onto the page. Halili, who had seen his brother face many perils without trembling, was astonished.

“Brother,” he asked, “I have watched you read many letters, but never have I seen you weep over one. Has a friend died? Has some enemy challenged you to a duel?”

“Neither,” answered Mujo. “The people have complained about us, and now the Sultan calls us to Istanbul. I do not know what awaits us there. Perhaps we shall be put to death. Where can we go? Should we disappear into the mountains, throw ourselves into the river, or hide inside our tower?”

Halili listened and then replied, “Let us ask our mother. Whatever she advises, we shall do.”

So they went to their mother and showed her the Sultan’s summons. She heard their fears but would not allow her sons to run away.

“Do not flee to the mountains,” she told them. “Do not leap into the river, and do not hide in the tower. Saddle your horses and go. The Sultan has summoned you, and you must answer.”

The brothers obeyed. At first light they saddled their fine horses, covered their heads with their cloaks, and turned down the tips of their long moustaches so they would not be readily recognized. Then they set out for Istanbul.

As they rode, they came upon some of the very people who had complained about them. Halili noticed them and spoke to Mujo. Their disguises now seemed pointless. If they were truly riding toward their deaths, what good would it do to hide their faces?

Mujo cast aside his cloak, and Halili did the same. They twisted their moustaches proudly upwards and rode openly on their way.

Their horses thundered along with such force that dust and smoke rose around them. Sparks flew from the hooves, and the mountain oaks seemed to blaze in their wake. Across the pastures rolled a sound like a great storm.

Far away, at the Sultan’s palace, men heard the tremendous noise and wondered what could be approaching. Was it thunder? Was an enemy firing cannon?

But the Sultan knew the answer. “Neither thunder nor cannon,” he declared. “It is Mujo and Halili who are coming.”

Soon the two brothers reached the palace gates. Mujo went forward to enter the Sultan’s grand hall. Yet the palace, splendid though it was, had not been built for someone of his tremendous size.

When Mujo stepped onto the staircase, the stairs could not bear him. The Sultan called for his builder, who hurried to strengthen the steps so that the great warrior might climb safely. Mujo climbed again, only to find another difficulty: the doorway was too narrow for him to pass through.

The builder was summoned once more. He enlarged the doorway, and at last Mujo entered the hall. There, in the presence of the Sultan, he was given a seat beside the ruler himself.

Mujo had come a long way under the shadow of fear. He could not remain silent about the question that had troubled him throughout the journey.

“My Sultan,” he asked, “have your guards brought us here to be imprisoned? Are you going to have our heads cut off?”

The Sultan stared at the mighty visitor in amazement. “No, Mujo, no, Halili,” he replied. “I have no wish to execute you. I have heard so much of your strength and fame that I wanted to see you with my own eyes.”

The explanation surprised Mujo. The fearful summons had been nothing more than the Sultan’s desire to meet the famous brothers. Mujo considered this for a moment, then decided that his business at court was done.

“Then, my Sultan,” he said, “allow me to take my leave.”

He rose from his seat. But there was one last thing that no one in the palace could have expected. A hook on Mujo’s trousers caught fast on the Sultan’s throne. Mujo, not noticing, strode toward the doorway—and dragged the throne, with the Sultan upon it, all the way across the hall!

And that is how the mighty Mujo’s visit to the Sultan came to an end: not with a battle or a punishment, but with a palace doorway widened for his shoulders and the astonished ruler carried along behind him.

Source: Traditional Albanian-language heroic song recorded in Kosovo; published in Visaret e Kombit, vol. II (1937), pp. 20–22, edited by Bernardin Palaj and Donat Kurti. Adapted from the traditional narrative as translated by Robert Elsie and Janice Mathie-Heck in Songs of the Frontier Warriors (2004).

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In a Latvian village, there lived three neighbors whose houses stood not far apart. Two of the householders had plenty of everything. Their barns were full, their stores never seemed to run low, and their fortunes grew year after year. The third neighbor, though he worked and worried, remained as poor as a church mouse.

The two prosperous men kept mysterious creatures known as dragons. In Latvian tales, such dragons carry riches to their masters, even when those riches belong to someone else. The poor neighbor saw only the wealth they brought, and he began to wish that he too might share in such good fortune.

At last he spoke to the two rich men. How, he asked, had they managed to become so well-to-do while he had scarcely enough to live on?

His neighbors told him that the matter was simple. They served a master who could grant prosperity, and they could take him to that master if he wished. All he would need to do was obey whatever the master commanded. Then, they assured him, he would be as rich as they were.

The poor man agreed to accompany them.

One night, the three set out together. Their way led deep into a forest, far from the village and the lights of home. There, among the trees, stood a large house. The rich neighbors knew the place and led their companion inside.

No one came to welcome them. The great rooms were empty and silent. Only the coals in an enormous hearth glowed red, throwing their light across the hall.

The men sat down to wait. The poor neighbor grew sleepy after the long journey and stretched himself out on the floor. Yet in that strange and silent house, with the fire burning and no master in sight, he could not quite fall asleep.

At about midnight a door opened.

A finely dressed gentleman entered the hall. His shirt was white and neatly cuffed, a gold chain shone upon his chest, and he wore a handsome coat and gleaming high boots. He looked at the figure lying on the floor and turned to the other two men.

“What is this log doing on my floor?” he demanded.

The rich neighbors answered that the man was their fellow householder and neighbor. He had come with them, they explained, because he too wished to bargain for wealth.

Then the poor man learned what kind of master they served. The gentleman was no ordinary lord, but the velns, a devilish being of Latvian folklore.

The velns took up a vessel and approached the two prosperous men. He cut their tongues so that blood fell into the vessel, and then he poured the blood over the glowing coals of the hearth.

The poor neighbor was seized with terror. Whatever riches this master might promise, he wanted none of them at such a price. He sprang up and fled from the dreadful house, through the dark forest, and back to his own home.

He never returned to ask the master for wealth.

That same year, lightning struck the homes of the two rich neighbors. Their houses burned until nothing remained but ashes. The poor neighbor, meanwhile, came into better circumstances.

So the man who had gone into the forest hoping to gain his neighbors’ riches discovered that their prosperity was not a fortune worth having. He returned with empty hands, yet escaped the terrible bargain that had brought the others to ruin.

Source: Traditional Latvian folk tale “The Three Neighbours,” recorded in Garkalne; adapted from the English retelling published by Latvian Folk Tales (2022).

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High above the Rhine Valley, where the mountains rise in steep folds of rock, stand three remarkable peaks. The people of Liechtenstein call them the Three Sisters. And long ago, so the old legend says, they were not mountains at all, but three young women.

One summer morning, on the fifteenth day of August, the sisters set out from their village to gather berries on the heights of Gafadura, above Planken. It was a feast day, a day when the church bells rang and the villagers went to worship. But the berries were ripe, and the sisters had brought their baskets.

As they climbed the mountain path, the bells began to sound below them. Their clear notes carried up through the valley, reminding everyone that the day was holy.

One sister hesitated. She listened to the bells and wondered aloud whether they ought to turn back and go to church with the others.

Her two sisters would hear none of it. They had come for berries, they said, and it would be foolish to go home with their baskets empty. They could return to the village when the baskets were full.

And so they went on. All through the day they gathered berries on the mountainside. They bent among the bushes, picking and filling their baskets, until at last, late in the afternoon, they had as much as they could carry.

Then the three sisters started down the path toward home.

Before they had gone far, they met a beautiful woman. She stopped beside them and looked at the fruit they had collected. Would they give her a few berries, she asked?

The sisters refused. If she wanted berries, they answered, she could go and pick them for herself.

At that, a strange brightness shone from the woman. Her beauty seemed to blaze with light, and the three sisters saw that she was no ordinary traveler.

She spoke to them of the feast day they had disregarded and of the request they had refused. Their hearts, she declared, were as hard as stone. And because they had hearts of stone, stone they would become, standing there forever.

The three sisters could neither flee nor answer. In that very place they turned to rock, rising above the valley as three great peaks.

And there they remain, says the legend, high over the land where they once walked with their baskets. To this day, the mountains bear the name of the Three Sisters.

Source: Traditional Liechtenstein legend, “Die drei Schwestern,” as documented by the official tourism website of the Principality of Liechtenstein (tourismus.li). Literary adaptation in English.

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Once there were nine brothers and a sister named Elenytė. When their parents died, they left each son a young horse, and to Elenytė they left the mare that was mother to all nine horses. The brothers loved their sister, but when enemies invaded the land one spring, they had to ride away to war. Elenytė remained at home and waited.

One year passed, and then another. Nine years went by without a word from her brothers. At last Elenytė harnessed her mare to a little cart and set out to find them. She traveled through fields and forests, not knowing which road might lead to them. So she sang to the mare:

“Neigh, dear mother mare, neigh, my dark-brown one! Wherever your nine sons are, there my nine brothers must be!”

The mare lifted her head and neighed. From a hundred miles away came the answering voices of nine young horses. Elenytė turned toward the sound and drove on.

As she passed through a great forest, a little hare came running down the road. “Elenytė, give me a ride!” he cried. “A hunter and his hounds are chasing me!” She took him into the cart. The hounds rushed past, and the hare was safe.

Farther along the road she met a laumė, a dreadful fairy-witch. The creature traveled in a wooden trough, pulled by a pig with entrails for reins, and she wore filthy rags. The laumė followed Elenytė until they came to two rivers flowing side by side.

“Come and bathe, Elen, Elen!” called the laumė. “This river runs with milk, while the other boils with blood.”

But the hare whispered, “Do not listen to her, Elenytė. The river she points to is the one that boils with blood. The other runs with milk.”

Elenytė trusted the hare and would not bathe. In fury, the laumė twisted one of the hare’s little legs.

They traveled on until they came to another pair of rivers. Again the laumė invited Elenytė into what she called the river of milk. Again the hare warned her that it was blood, and Elenytė refused. The laumė twisted another of his legs.

A third time the same thing happened. The faithful hare warned Elenytė, and the laumė injured his remaining legs. At last, enraged by the little creature’s courage, the laumė wrung his neck, and the hare died.

Elenytė drove on in sorrow. When they reached yet another pair of rivers, the laumė invited her to bathe in the river of blood. There was no one left to warn the girl, and this time she went into the water.

The laumė scrambled out first. She put on Elenytė’s clothes, climbed into Elenytė’s cart, and took her place. With nothing else to wear, Elenytė was forced to dress in the laumė’s rags and follow in the wooden trough.

The laumė raised her coarse voice and sang the song she had heard:

“Neigh, dear mother mare, neigh, my dark-brown one! Wherever your nine sons are, there my nine brothers must be!”

But the mare did not answer. So the laumė ordered Elenytė to sing. At the sound of the true sister’s voice, the mare neighed, and the nine young horses answered from close by. The laumė drove toward them and made Elenytė follow.

Soon they reached the brothers’ home. Seeing their sister’s clothes, the brothers took the laumė for Elenytė, though they wondered how the lovely girl they remembered could have become so fearsome and rough. They noticed that the ragged girl behind her looked strangely familiar.

“And who is this?” they asked.

“My herdswoman,” replied the laumė, pointing at Elenytė.

The brothers wished to invite the quiet girl indoors, but the laumė would not allow it. Instead she ordered her to watch the horses through the night. The brothers brought the supposed sister to their table and served her mead and wine, while Elenytė went out to the pasture.

As the horses grazed beneath the moon, Elenytė wept and sang:

“The fairy-witch drinks mead and wine; the brothers’ sister tends their horses.”

Then she looked up at the full moon and asked in another song, “Dear moon, tell me what my father and mother are doing in heaven.”

The moon answered that her father was drinking mead and wine and her mother was spinning threads of silk. Hearing the songs from the porch, the laumė shouted a cruel reply, saying that the father was shoveling manure and the mother gathering splinters.

The brothers heard the beautiful singing and longed to hear it more closely. On the following night the eldest went to watch the horses with the herdswoman. But he fell asleep and heard nothing. Another brother tried the next night, and he too slept through the song. One by one the brothers went, yet none stayed awake.

At last the youngest brother took his turn. He lay down in the pasture and pretended to sleep. Then Elenytė began to weep and sang as she had on the other nights:

“The fairy-witch drinks mead and wine; the brothers’ sister tends their horses.”

When her song ended, the youngest brother asked her to look through his hair. As she bent over him, her tears fell on his head. In the moonlight something flashed on her hand. He saw a ring—the very ring their mother had left to Elenytė.

“Where did you get that ring?” he asked.

And Elenytė told him everything: the long search for her brothers, the brave hare, the false rivers, and the laumė who had stolen her clothing and her place.

When the youngest told his brothers what he had learned, they resolved to punish the impostor. The next day they smeared a mare with sticky tar and set her near the door. Then they invited the laumė outside.

“Come, sister,” they said. “Let us walk in the garden.”

The laumė saw the mare standing in the way. “Why is that horse here?” she demanded.

“Strike her with your hand,” said the brothers, “and she will move.”

The laumė struck the mare, but her hand stuck fast. “Strike her with your other hand,” the brothers told her, “and the first will come free.”

She did so, and now both hands were caught. She kicked with one foot, and then the other; each stuck as well. At last the brothers told her to push against the mare with her body. She obeyed, and she was caught completely.

Then the brothers spoke to the mare: “Carry this fairy-witch where the sun gives no warmth, where the wind does not blow, where no wild beast ever walks and no bird ever flies.”

The mare set off with the laumė. The brothers told her, before she returned, to wash herself in a river of wine and roll in a meadow of silk. And the mare did just as they had said.

Elenytė was restored to her brothers. Together the nine brothers and their sister lived long and happily. And, as the old storytellers say, perhaps they are living still—if they have not died.

Source: Lithuanian folk tale “Devyni broliai ir jų sesuo Elenytė” (“The Nine Brothers and Their Sister Elenytė”), Lithuanian text preserved in the Knygadvaris folklore archive (J. Basanavičius collection, BsTB 2, no. 228-104; AT 451A); compared with the Lithuanian telling published by Pasakorius.lt. English literary adaptation.

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Long ago, when the forests of Luxembourg stretched across hills and valleys and the river Alzette wound beneath steep and lonely cliffs, a count named Siegfried lived in his castle at Koerich. He was a keen hunter and often rode far from home, following winding paths beneath the trees.

One day, he pursued the hunt so eagerly that he lost his way. The forest grew dense around him, and before he knew it, he had come into a narrow valley where the rocks rose high above the river. The place was wild and beautiful. Siegfried stopped to look about him, wondering which road would lead him home.

Then he heard a voice singing.

It was unlike any singing he had ever heard. The melody seemed to drift through the trees and over the water, so lovely that he forgot for a moment both his horse and the road he had lost. He followed the sound toward a rocky height where the remains of an ancient Roman fortress stood above the Alzette.

There, among the weathered stones, sat a young woman of extraordinary beauty. Her name was Melusina.

Siegfried gazed at her in wonder. He wished to speak, but before he could learn anything about the mysterious singer, she vanished from his sight. He searched among the ruins, yet found no trace of her. At last he rested, and on the following day he made his way back to Koerich.

But he could not forget the woman on the rock. He remembered her song in the morning and her face in the evening. Again and again, he returned to the valley, hoping to see her. And at last Melusina appeared before him once more.

This time Siegfried told her how deeply he loved her and begged her to become his wife.

Melusina listened. She did not refuse him, but she placed two conditions upon their marriage.

“First,” she said, “I must always be allowed to remain upon this rock, in the place that I love. And second, you must promise never to seek me or look upon me on a Saturday.”

The count was so happy at the thought of marrying her that he agreed at once. He gave his word that he would keep both promises.

To make a home for them, Siegfried acquired the great rocky height above the Alzette, with the ruins of the old fortress and the land around it. Upon that height he established his castle, and there he and Melusina lived together. In time the stronghold became linked with the beginnings of Luxembourg itself.

For many years they were happy. Seven children were born to them, and the castle rang with the voices of their family. Melusina was a loving wife and mother, and Siegfried thought himself fortunate beyond measure.

Yet there was one thing in their life that he did not understand.

Every Saturday Melusina withdrew into her private chamber and shut the door. For the whole of that day she remained apart, and no one was permitted to enter. Siegfried had promised never to look upon her then, and for a long while he honored his word.

But the passing years did not put an end to his curiosity. Instead, questions began to trouble him. Why must his wife hide herself every Saturday? What secret could be so important that even he was forbidden to know it?

At last curiosity overcame his promise.

One Saturday, while Melusina was alone in her chamber, Siegfried approached the closed door. He knew that he ought to turn away. Nevertheless, he bent down and peered through the keyhole.

Inside, Melusina sat bathing and combing her long hair. Above the water she looked just as she always had: the beautiful woman whom he had met beside the ancient ruins. But below her waist there were no human legs. In their place shimmered the tail of a fish.

Siegfried gave a cry of astonishment.

Melusina heard him. In that instant she knew that he had broken his solemn promise. The secret she had guarded so carefully was revealed.

Suddenly the chamber seemed to open into the depths below the castle. Melusina vanished into the abyss, away from Siegfried forever. Some tellers say that she plunged into the waters of the Alzette, which flow beneath the rock. Whichever way the story is told, the count never saw his wife again.

His grief was great. He had gained the woman he loved by making a promise, and through breaking that promise he had lost her.

Yet the people of Luxembourg believed that Melusina had not entirely forsaken the place she loved. It was said that a pale, gentle figure sometimes came to the cradle of her youngest child, rocking it tenderly while the household slept.

And another part of the old legend was told beside the Alzette. Once every seven years, Melusina could appear again, hoping that someone might free her from her enchantment. Some versions describe a difficult trial in which a brave person must face her when she takes the form of a serpent and carry away a key. Few, however, would have the courage to do what was required.

Until the spell was broken, Melusina had to go on making a garment, adding only a single stitch every seven years. The people said that the day she completed it would be a fearful day for the city built above the river. Thus her fate and the fate of Luxembourg remained bound together in the telling of the legend.

And so, when the evening light catches the water of the Alzette beneath the Bock rock, some still remember the lovely singer who once sat above the river, the count who failed to keep his word, and the mysterious Melusina, waiting somewhere beyond mortal sight.

Source: Traditional Luxembourg legend of Melusina and Count Siegfried, recorded by Nicolas Gredt in Sagenschatz des Luxemburger Landes (1883); adapted from the Luxembourg version summarized by RTL Today and Visit Luxembourg.

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Once upon a time, in a kingdom where the roads were dry and dusty and the sea glittered beyond the hills, there lived a king who made a strange proclamation. Whoever could build a galley that would travel over land, he declared, would marry his daughter.

Many heard the king’s promise, but no one knew how a ship could move without water beneath its keel. Among those who heard it was a poor widow who lived with her three sons. The eldest was determined to try his fortune. His mother baked enough bread to feed him for a week, and he set off toward the forest to find the timber for his galley.

On the way he met an old woman. She asked him for a little of his bread, but he refused to share it. The woman looked at him and said that at his first stroke upon a tree he would break his arm.

He paid no heed to her words. Yet when he reached the forest and raised his tool to strike a tree, the prophecy came true. With a broken arm and his hopes at an end, he returned home.

The second son decided that he would succeed where his brother had failed. His mother prepared bread for him too, and he followed the road toward the forest. The same old woman asked him for food. He also refused her. She foretold that he would break his leg, and at the forest, before he could make a galley, her words came true. He too went home defeated.

At last the youngest son announced that he would try. The widow gave him such bread as she could make, and he set out. When he encountered the old woman and she asked for a share of his food, he gave it willingly.

The old woman blessed him. She told him that his first stroke would bring success, and the young man continued on his way with fresh courage.

Farther along the road he met an old man who offered to accompany him. The young man accepted his company, and the two went on together. The old man proved to be a wise guide, for he knew that the king’s challenge could not be won by strength alone. As they traveled, he advised the young man to welcome certain extraordinary travelers into their company.

First they encountered a man who had been drinking water for a whole year and was still thirsty. Then they met a man who had been cutting stone for a year and had not yet gathered enough to make a single load. The young man invited both of them to come along.

They next met someone moving upon his knees. He was so swift that, if he stood and ran in the ordinary way, he would outstrip the wind. Another man could discover what was happening anywhere in the world merely by laying his ear against the earth. Still another was a marksman who could strike precisely the thing he aimed at, however far away it might be.

Last of all they met a man with the strangest gift of all. When he lay with his face toward the ground, dark and stormy weather arose; when he turned upon his back, the skies grew fair. He too joined their company.

With his new companions beside him, the youngest son reached the trees and made his first stroke. Just as the old woman had promised, he succeeded: a galley was made that could travel across the land. What had seemed impossible was now before their eyes. They took the wondrous vessel to the king.

But the king was not willing to give his daughter in marriage merely because the young man had fulfilled the proclamation. He demanded another feat. Before the marriage could take place, the young man must drink all the wine the king possessed.

The young man had no hope of doing such a thing by himself. His old companion, however, told him not to despair. The man who had been thirsty for a year stepped forward and drank the king’s wine. No matter how much there was, his thirst was more than equal to it, and the first new challenge was overcome.

Still the king would not keep his promise. He set a second task: all his gold must be taken away in a single load.

Now it was the turn of the man who had spent a year cutting stone without collecting enough to make a load. The gold was gathered, and he carried it all at once. The king’s second demand had been met.

Yet the king found a third condition. The young man must send someone to the fountain to fill a jar with water, and that person must return before the king’s daughter could accomplish the same errand.

The companion who traveled on his knees was ready. He had only to run at his true speed to win the race easily. But the princess was cunning. She contrived to make the swift runner fall asleep before he completed his task.

Fortunately, the man who could hear the happenings of the world pressed his ear to the ground. He discovered that the runner was sleeping. He told the marksman where the sleeper lay, and the marksman took aim, not at the runner, but at the stone upon which he rested. His shot struck the stone and woke the swift man, who sprang up and finished the race ahead of the princess.

Three times the king had tried to place another obstacle between the young man and the reward he had promised. Three times the companions had overcome his demands. Now, instead of admitting defeat, the king grew angry. He commanded that the young man should be killed by the king’s own sailors.

The wise old man learned of this order. He arranged for the gathering of sailors and soldiers to take place outside the town, where the companions would be present. When the men had assembled, the last of the strange travelers used his power. He lay face downward, and the weather changed. A great darkness fell over the place, so dense that the men could no longer distinguish one person from another.

In the confusion, the king’s men killed the king himself instead of the young man they had been sent to destroy.

Thus the ruler who had broken his promises and plotted against the young man met his own end. The poor widow’s youngest son, who had shared his bread with a stranger and welcomed the help of others, became king in his place.

And the tale of the galley that traveled over dry land was remembered long afterward.

Source: Traditional Maltese folktale, recorded in the collections of Fr. Manwel Magri; plot preserved in R. N. Bradley, Malta and the Mediterranean Race (1912), Chapter XIV, “The Galley That Ran on Land.”

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Once, Păcală was sitting at the edge of a forest, wondering what mischief he might get up to next. He had scarcely settled himself when he saw a carriage coming along the road.

Quick as a wink, he rose, picked up a great tree trunk, and stood it upright. Then he held it there as though the most important thing in the world depended on keeping it from falling.

The carriage drew nearer. Inside sat a wealthy boyar and his wife, while a coachman drove the horses. When the boyar noticed the strange fellow standing beside the road with a tree trunk in his hands, he ordered the coachman to stop.

“Good day!” called the boyar.

“Thank you kindly!” replied Păcală.

“What are you doing there?” the boyar asked.

“Well, sir,” said Păcală, “I have put this log up for a little rest before I carry it home. And where might you be going?”

The boyar was quite pleased to have someone to tell. “I have heard of a fellow named Păcală,” he said, “who makes fools of people. I am on my way to find him, so that he may play a trick on me too.”

Păcală looked at him with great interest.

“There is no need to go any farther, sir,” he said. “I am Păcală himself.”

The boyar could hardly believe his good luck. Here was the very man he had been searching for, found right at the edge of the forest!

“But I am afraid,” Păcală continued, “that I cannot play a trick on you just now. You see, I have left my trick-making thing at home.”

“Your trick-making thing?” asked the boyar.

“Of course. If you wish me to trick you, I must fetch it from my house in the village. I shall not be gone long. And if you want me to return all the sooner, there is a way to help.”

The boyar leaned forward eagerly to hear what he must do.

“Let your wife and the coachman step down,” said Păcală. “Then you, sir, hold this trunk for me. Hold it firmly, mind you, so that it cannot tilt to either side. I shall take the carriage, ride home for my trick-making thing, and come straight back.”

That seemed reasonable enough to the boyar, who wanted more than anything to see Păcală at his famous work.

So the boyar’s wife climbed down from the carriage, and the coachman followed her. The boyar took the great trunk in his hands and held it upright with all his strength.

Păcală climbed into the carriage, gathered up the reins, and drove away with the horses.

And away he went—farther and farther down the road—until neither the carriage nor the horses could be seen.

The boyar waited. He held the trunk carefully, just as Păcală had instructed him. The hours passed, but Păcală did not return.

Evening came. Still the boyar waited.

Night fell, and there was no sign of the carriage. The boyar and his companions remained there all through the night. The next morning passed, and still Păcală did not appear. It was already afternoon when a traveler came along the road.

“Good day,” said the traveler.

“Good day,” replied the boyar.

The traveler stared at him in surprise. “Why are you standing there holding that tree?”

The boyar explained that he was keeping it upright until Păcală returned from the village with the thing he needed to play a trick.

“He said he would come back quickly,” the boyar added, “but he has taken my carriage and horses, and I have not seen him since.”

The traveler listened, then answered:

“But sir, have you not been tricked already? He has gone off with your carriage and your horses!”

Only then did the boyar understand.

He had set out in search of Păcală, hoping to discover what it felt like to be fooled. Now he knew—and his carriage and horses were gone.

And so the boyar was left thoroughly tricked, while Păcală had made his escape.

Source: Traditional Păcală trickster tale, “Boierul şi Păcală,” reproduced as folklore in the Moldovenii.md Moldovan cultural library. The Păcală tradition is shared across Moldova and Romania. Adapted from the Romanian-language version.

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Long ago, when the lands around the Mediterranean Sea were ruled by the Roman emperors, a young woman named Devota lived on the island of Corsica. She was a Christian, and her faith was dearer to her than anything she owned. In those days, however, the rulers of the empire were persecuting Christians, and many people lived in fear of being discovered.

Devota would not renounce what she believed. She was arrested and brought before the Roman authorities. They demanded that she abandon her faith, but she refused. No threats could make her change her answer. At last, she was put to death. According to the old legend, this happened in the early years of the fourth century, under the emperors Diocletian and Maximian.

The authorities intended that her body should be burned. But during the night, devoted Christians rescued it. They wished to carry her away from the place of her suffering and give her an honorable burial. Carefully, they placed her body in a small boat, intending to sail toward the Christian communities of North Africa.

The boat set out across the dark Mediterranean. Before long, a storm arose. The wind struck the water, the waves grew high, and the little vessel was driven from its course. The people aboard could no longer steer toward the place they had hoped to reach.

Then, the legend says, something marvelous happened. A white dove appeared from the mouth of Devota. As the frightened travelers watched, the bird rose into the stormy air and flew ahead of the boat. The wind quieted. The little vessel followed the dove, leaving its planned route behind.

All through the uncertain journey, the white bird showed the way. At last the boat approached a rocky shore. There, beneath the heights above the sea, lay a small valley called the Gaumates, near the place where the port of Monaco would grow. The vessel came to rest beside the shore, and the dove’s work was done.

The travelers carried Devota’s body from the boat and buried her in the valley. Tradition places her arrival on the twenty-seventh day of January. In time, a place of prayer stood near her resting place, and people came to remember the young woman whose final journey, they believed, had been guided by a dove.

As the years passed, more stories gathered around her grave. One tells of a man who stole her relics, hoping to carry them away by sea. Yet he did not escape. Fishermen pursued his boat, caught him, and brought the relics back to shore. The thief’s vessel was burned on the beach. In the telling of the legend, this burning became linked with a tradition that would long outlive the people who first told the story.

Centuries passed, and Monaco changed. The rocky shore became the home of a small principality, with its own princes, its own people, and its own customs. Devota became its patron saint, and the memory of the little boat remained part of the country’s life.

Each January, the people of Monaco remember the journey of Saint Devota. A boat is set alight in a ceremony beside the harbor, and the feast continues the following day. The flames recall the old tradition, while the story of the white dove recalls a voyage that, according to the legend, ended not where the sailors had intended, but where the sea and the mysterious bird had led them.

And so, beside the Mediterranean, the legend is still told: of a courageous young woman, a storm-tossed boat, and a white dove that found the shore of Monaco.

Source: Traditional Monegasque legend of Sainte Dévote, preserved in the medieval Passio Dei Vota manuscript tradition (earliest surviving copy, early 12th century); adapted from accounts published by the Journal de Monaco and the Consulate General of Monaco. The tale is presented as legend, not verified historical fact.

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Long ago, on the slopes of Bjelasica, two brothers worked together at a threshing floor. They had gathered their barley and now it was time to divide the grain between them. The elder brother could see, but the younger was blind. He could not watch the measuring, or tell with his eyes whether the two shares were equal. He had to trust his brother.

The elder brother took charge of the grain. He had a measuring vessel, but its two sides were not alike. One was deeper and could hold more barley; the other was shallower and held less. With this measure he began to divide their harvest.

First he filled the deeper side. He carried it to his younger brother and held it out for him to examine.

“Is it full, brother?” he asked.

The younger brother passed his hand across the grain. He could feel that it reached the rim.

“Yes,” he answered. “It is full.”

The elder brother emptied that larger measure into his own sack.

Then he turned the vessel and filled its shallow side. Again he brought it to the younger brother and asked him to feel the surface.

The younger brother touched the barley. As before, it came to the edge of the measure.

“Yes,” he said. “It is full.”

But this time there was less grain, though his fingers could not discover the difference. The elder brother poured the smaller measure into the younger man’s sack.

So the measuring went on. The deeper side was emptied into the elder brother’s sack, the shallower side into the younger brother’s. Each time the blind brother felt a level surface, and each time he answered in good faith that the vessel was full. He knew neither the trick of the measure nor the wrong being done to him.

At last there was no barley left to divide. The elder brother looked at the two portions he had made. Then he turned to his younger brother.

“Are you satisfied with the way we have shared the grain?” he asked.

The younger brother did not accuse him or question him. He answered simply:

“If you have divided it fairly, I am satisfied.”

At those words the elder brother swore an oath.

“If I have not shared it fairly, may the earth open beneath me!”

No sooner had he spoken than the sun disappeared. Darkness swept across the sky. A violent storm broke over Bjelasica, and thunder rolled among the mountains. Lightning flashed through the clouds, and the ground began to tremble beneath the brothers’ feet.

Then the earth split open and swallowed the elder brother who had sworn falsely.

Rain poured down on the threshing floor. It fell through the night, and still it fell the next day. For three days and three nights the rain did not cease. The hollow filled with water until the old ground could no longer be seen.

On the fourth day the storm ended.

Where the brothers had divided their barley, a lake now lay shining among the mountains. In the middle of its waters stood a rock, and on that rock, the legend says, was the elder brother, turned to stone.

The people called the lake Biogradsko Lake. And when its waters grow low enough for the little island to appear, they call that place Gumno—the threshing floor.

So the tale of the two brothers has remained beside the lake: a memory of a broken trust, an unjust measure, and an oath that the mountain itself seemed to hear.

Source: Traditional Montenegrin legend of Biogradsko Lake, recorded in “Legends,” Katun Roads / Untold Bjelasica (Regional Development Agency for Bjelasica, Komovi and Prokletije). https://www.katunroads.me/en/katun-road-untold-bjelasica/legends/

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Long ago, when the forests of Holland were gradually giving way to fields of wheat and rye, the people learned to keep cows close to their homes. The animals gave them milk, and from the milk they learned to make cheese. Soon there was scarcely a household that did not prize a good piece of cheese, whether fresh, cooked, or melted upon warm bread.

Even the wild creatures were tempted by its smell. Foxes crept near the cottages at night and sometimes stole into pantries. A morsel of toasted cheese could lure a fox into a trap when no other bait succeeded. And in the villages, families gathered around their fires for cheerful evenings, eating bread covered with melted cheese and talking late into the night.

But after such rich suppers, strange dreams sometimes came. A sleeper would imagine that a monstrous mare had climbed onto the bed and settled heavily upon the chest, making it impossible to breathe or speak. Just when the weight seemed unbearable, the dreamer would feel as though falling from a great height, and the dreadful creature would vanish.

The people called it a nightmare. Instead of blaming their heavy supper, many said the trouble had been caused by goblins.

In those days, so people told one another, small, sooty goblins lived beneath the ground. They were quick, mischievous creatures with large heads, green eyes, and feet split like those of cattle. They were kin to the little kabouters, but far less welcome in human houses. Since the goblins were forbidden to appear in daylight, they hid themselves until night; for should sunlight fall upon them, they would be changed into stone.

The goblins delighted in troubling human beings. They listened at doors and repeated people’s last words in mocking voices. Their tricks were blamed for echoes among the hills and fields. It was even said that some goblins stole healthy infants from cradles and left their own weak little ones in their place. When a child grew ill and thin, frightened parents sometimes whispered of a changeling.

People also believed that female goblins could become the heavy nightmare mares. They slipped into houses through cracks and holes in the walls. If someone could close the very opening through which such a creature had entered, the goblin could not escape. But if the opening were uncovered again, she would disappear forever.

Far below the earth, so the stories said, the goblin king ruled in a palace glittering with gold and precious stones. His subjects worked in mines and underground workshops, hammering out weapons, bells, and ornaments. For all their strange powers, the goblins depended upon one small object to travel unseen: a red cap. As long as a goblin wore his cap, mortal eyes could not perceive him. Without it he was plainly visible.

One night, in the region of Drenthe, an elderly woman lay gravely ill in her bed. Through a crack in the wall came a goblin wearing his red cap. He stood near the foot of her bed, then, wishing to frighten her, lifted off the cap and showed himself.

The old woman saw the ugly little fellow and cried out, telling him to go away. But the goblin only laughed, his green eyes gleaming.

The woman called softly for her daughter, Alida.

“Bring me my wooden shoes,” she whispered.

Alida brought the heavy klompen, and the old woman sat up enough to throw them, one after the other, at the intruder. Startled, the goblin darted toward the crack through which he had entered. Before he could squeeze away, Alida snatched the red cap from his head and pricked his cloven foot with a needle. The goblin howled and fled through the opening, leaving a trail of soot upon the wall.

Alida stood looking at the little cap. She turned it around on her finger, thinking of the creatures that had frightened so many people. Then she formed a plan and told it to the men of Drenthe. They agreed to help her.

If the goblins could be brought together on the open heath and deprived of their red caps, they would become visible. And if they remained there until sunrise, daylight would turn them to stone.

Knowing that the goblin would return in search of his cap, Alida left a message beside the sooty crack. It told him to bring several hundred of his companions to the great moor on the next moonlit night. At an appointed hour, he would find his cap hanging upon a bush, and he and his friends could celebrate its return. In exchange, Alida asked him to bring a golden necklace.

When the moonlit night arrived, hundreds of farmers and townsmen gathered on the heath. They carried horseshoes, branches of witch-hazel, written charms, and other things believed to trouble goblins. They spread out in a great ring, agreeing to move gradually inward toward the bush where Alida would hang the red cap.

At last Alida placed the cap upon the bush. That was the signal.

The great circle tightened. Men reached into the empty-looking air, grabbing and pulling at the height where a goblin’s head ought to be. There was shouting, jostling, and a confusion of hands in the moonlight. Suddenly red caps began to appear in the men’s fists. Wherever one was pulled away, an astonished goblin came into view.

Before long, scores of green-eyed creatures were visible upon the heath. But many others still wore their caps and could not be seen. They tried to run away, sometimes helping companions who had lost their caps. Whenever a visible goblin fled with an invisible group, the pursuers could tell where the group was going, and bands of men gave chase across the moor.

All through the night the strange struggle continued. Men scrambled after little figures they could see and others they could only guess were there. Caps were snatched, lost, and clutched again. Some goblins escaped into the darkness, still safely hidden under their red caps. Others stayed behind, desperate to recover their caps or rescue their fellows. They feared returning bareheaded to their king beneath the ground.

The eastern sky began to pale. Yet the goblins were so occupied with their struggle that they did not notice morning approaching.

Then the first ray of the rising sun touched the heath.

In an instant, every goblin still exposed to daylight was turned to stone.

The pushing and shouting stopped. Where the little creatures had stood were only rounded stones, large and small, scattered over the quiet moor. Those goblins who had escaped before dawn never came back to trouble the people there.

And so, according to the old tale, the stones remained through the seasons. In summer, flowers and grain grew around them; in autumn, wind whispered across the open fields; and in winter, snow lay upon their weathered surfaces. Some stood among farmers’ crops, while others lay near cottages or beneath ancient oaks. Cows grazed peacefully beside them, knowing nothing of their supposed history.

But the people of Drenthe remembered Alida, the little red caps, and the night when the goblins were turned to stone.

Source: Adapted from “The Goblins Turned to Stone,” in William Elliot Griffis, Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks (1918/1919), a Dutch legend set in Drenthe.

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A young shepherd once took his sheep to graze in a clearing among the trees, not far from a bright, clear river. One morning he saw three beautiful young women bathing in the water. He stopped and stared, astonished by their beauty. He wished that he might take one of them as his bride, but the river lay too far away. Before he could approach, the women dressed and disappeared from sight.

Before dawn the next day, the shepherd drove his flock to the same clearing and hid among the bushes. When the sun rose, the three women returned to bathe. Again he watched them, and again he could think of no way to reach them before they went away.

On the third morning he concealed himself much closer to the riverbank. The women came smiling through the trees, took off their white garments, and entered the water. As the shepherd watched, a plan occurred to him. He sprang from his hiding place, snatched up their garments, and ran off with them.

The three women stopped in the middle of the river. They begged him to return what belonged to them and promised to do him a great kindness if he would. But he demanded something else: one of them must agree to marry him. Otherwise, he said, he would burn the garments and leave them without their clothes.

“Listen, young man,” they answered. “We are sisters, and we are vilas, not ordinary women. People will laugh if you bring home a vila as your bride.”

“I do not care what people say,” replied the shepherd. “Even if you were wilder spirits still, I would choose one of you.”

The sisters understood that he would not yield. At last they told him to choose, and he chose the youngest. Before they parted, the two elder sisters drew him aside and gave him a warning.

“Never let our youngest sister put on her own garment again,” they said. “Her power lives in it. If she wears it, she will fly away from you. Give her other clothes instead.”

The shepherd remembered their words. He returned the garments of the two elder sisters, and they flew away toward their distant home. The youngest went with him. That evening he brought her bridal clothes, and in time they were married. Everyone who saw her declared that no bride could be more beautiful.

For almost a year the shepherd and the vila lived together. Then a relative of his held a wedding, and the couple went to join the celebration. The women there formed a circle to dance, as was the custom, but the shepherd’s wife stayed apart. They begged her to dance with them. She would not, for she did not have her vila garment.

The other women were curious to see how a vila danced. They pressed the shepherd until at last he gave way. He went home and brought back the garment he had kept hidden. Before handing it over, he shut the doors and every window and opening he could see, thinking that she would have no way to escape.

The vila put on her garment and stepped into the circle. At once she began a dance so wonderful that young and old alike gazed in amazement. As the dance ended, she came to her husband, took his hand, and said, “Farewell, husband. Remain in health!”

Then she rose from the floor and flew straight up through the smoke-hole in the roof. In his care to close the doors and windows, the shepherd had forgotten that opening.

He cried after her, “Wife, wife! Why do you leave me? Tell me where I can find you, if only to see you once more!”

From above she answered, “Seek me in the village of Kushkundalevo. There you shall see me.” And she flew away among the clouds.

A few days later the shepherd prepared for a long journey. He wandered from village to village and town to town, asking everyone where Kushkundalevo might be. People shook their heads in wonder at the strange name. None had ever heard of such a place. Still he searched, crossing mountains and empty lands where few travelers ventured.

One day, in a lonely forest, he met an old man leaning on a staff beside a beech tree. The old man asked why he had come to a wilderness where no cock crowed and few human feet had trodden. The shepherd told him about the three sisters, the stolen garments, his marriage, the wedding dance, and the village named by his wife when she flew away.

“I have lived in these parts for two hundred years,” said the old man, “but I have never heard of Kushkundalevo. Travel for another month and you will find my elder brother, who is about three hundred years old. He is king over all the beasts of the mountains. Perhaps he can help you.”

The shepherd thanked him and went on. After a month he found the second old man sitting beside a spring. He conveyed the greeting from the younger brother and told his story again.

“Wait here,” said the king of beasts. “I shall ask my subjects.”

He summoned the lions, bears, wolves, foxes, and all the other creatures of the mountains. When they stood before him, he asked whether any had heard of a village called Kushkundalevo. Not one had heard the name.

“Then you must travel another month,” the old man said. “There you will meet my eldest brother, king of all the birds that fly beneath the clouds. Perhaps his subjects have seen the place you seek.”

The shepherd set off once more. At the end of another month, he reached the third old man. He delivered the greetings of the two younger brothers and explained everything that had happened to him. The old man immediately called for the eagles, crows, and every other kind of bird. Within a day they had gathered before their king.

“Has any one of you heard of Kushkundalevo?” asked the king of birds.

The birds all answered that they had not. The old man was about to tell the shepherd that his search had failed when a lame magpie came fluttering in, much later than the rest.

“Why are you the last to come?” demanded the king.

“Because I am lame, Your Majesty,” answered the magpie, “and because I live far away, near Kushkundalevo, where the vilas dwell. I was being made to thresh an everlasting flower when your summons reached me. A cruel vila struck my leg, and I could not fly quickly.”

The shepherd could scarcely believe what he had heard. At last someone knew the village! The king of birds ordered one of his greatest eagles to carry the shepherd there, with the magpie flying ahead to show the way.

They traveled through the air until they came near Kushkundalevo. The shepherd dismounted and entered the very first courtyard he found. By extraordinary fortune, it was the house of the three vila sisters. The two elder sisters saw him, worn by his journey, and pitied him.

“Poor brother-in-law,” they said to each other. “See how far he has wandered to find our sister. We should help him take her home again.”

They welcomed him and asked how their youngest sister had escaped. He told them how he had given her the hidden garment at the wedding and how she had flown through the smoke-hole. He begged them to let him see her and take her back.

The sisters proposed a dangerous plan. While their youngest sister slept, they would fasten her to a flying saddle. The shepherd must ride it swiftly over three mountains. When she woke, they warned, she would cry out to her own horse, and that horse would race to free her. If it overtook the saddle before the three mountains were crossed, it would tear the shepherd to pieces and carry the vila away. Beyond the mountains, however, the horse’s power could reach no farther.

The shepherd agreed. The sisters bound the sleeping vila to the saddle, and the winds lifted it into the air with the shepherd beside her. They flew so swiftly that they passed the third mountain before the vila awoke.

When she opened her eyes and found herself being carried away, she cried for her horse. It came racing after them. But when it reached the three mountains, it could go no farther. Its strength ended there, and it turned back.

The shepherd returned home with the vila. At once he threw her old garment into the fire so that she could never use its power to fly away again. There, according to the tale, they remained together and had several daughters, each more beautiful than the last.

And the old storytellers said that from those daughters came some of the most beautiful women in the world.

Source: Traditional Macedonian tale “Овчарот и трите самовили” (“The Shepherd and the Three Vilas”), collected by Marko Cepenkov; adapted from the Macedonian text published by Krajbrezje (2020).

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Once upon a time, in a cottage standing against the wind on a lonely hillside, lived a poor farmer with his wife and their many children. The family had little to eat and even less to spare, though the children were dear to their parents. The youngest daughter was so beautiful that everyone who saw her remembered her face.

Late one autumn Thursday, rain lashed the little house and the wind shook its walls. While the family sat near the hearth, three heavy knocks sounded at the window. The farmer opened the door and discovered, standing in the darkness, an enormous white bear.

“Good evening,” said the bear, as politely as any traveler.

The astonished farmer returned his greeting.

“Give me your youngest daughter,” said the white bear, “and I shall make your family as rich as you are now poor.”

The farmer was tempted, but he went indoors to ask his daughter. She refused at once. The bear agreed to return the following Thursday, and during the week her father spoke often of the comfortable life all the family might enjoy. At last the girl consented. She washed and mended her few clothes, tied her small belongings into a bundle, and waited.

The following Thursday the white bear came. She climbed onto his broad back, clutched his thick fur, and rode away into the night.

“Are you afraid?” he asked after they had traveled far.

“No,” she replied.

“Then hold fast, and no harm shall come to you.”

They journeyed until they reached a steep mountain face. The bear struck the rock, a doorway opened, and they passed into a splendid castle. Its rooms shone with gold and silver, and a table stood ready with food. The bear gave her a little silver bell, telling her that whatever she needed would appear when she rang it.

When she grew tired, she rang. At once she found a beautiful bedchamber with silken pillows and curtains edged in gold. That night, after she had put out the light, someone came and lay beside her. She could tell that it was a man, but she never saw his face. Before morning he was always gone. By day the white bear returned, kind and gentle, yet he offered no explanation.

For a time the girl lived comfortably in the mysterious castle. But comfort could not silence her longing for home. At last the white bear noticed her sadness and asked what troubled her.

“I miss my father and mother,” she said, “and my brothers and sisters. I am lonely all day.”

“You may visit them,” said the bear, “but promise me this: do not let your mother draw you aside to speak with her alone. Whatever she wishes to say, let her say it in front of the others. If you forget, great misfortune will fall upon us both.”

She promised, and one Sunday the bear carried her over hills and valleys to a magnificent house, where her brothers and sisters played outside. This, he told her, was her family’s new home. He reminded her of the warning and left her at the door.

Her parents welcomed her with tears of joy, and everyone thanked her for the good fortune they enjoyed. They asked about her own life, and she told them of the beautiful castle and all its wonders. But her mother wished to know more. Several times she tried to lead her daughter into a private room. The girl resisted, remembering the bear’s words. In the end, however, she yielded and told her mother how a stranger visited her bed each night in darkness, and how she yearned to see his face.

“Then perhaps he is a troll,” said her mother anxiously. She gave the girl a little piece of candle. “Light this while he sleeps, and you shall discover who he is. Only be careful not to spill the hot wax.”

The girl hid the candle and returned that evening with the white bear. On their way he asked whether her mother’s visit had happened as he foretold. She admitted that it had, and he warned her again not to follow any advice that would bring sorrow upon them.

Yet curiosity overcame caution. That night she waited until the stranger was asleep, then rose quietly and lit the candle. Beside her lay the most handsome young prince she had ever seen. Overwhelmed by love, she leaned to kiss him. Three drops of hot tallow fell onto his shirt, and he woke.

“What have you done?” he cried in grief. “If you had endured only one more year without seeing me, the spell would have been broken. My stepmother made me a white bear by day and a man by night. Now I must leave you and go to her castle, east of the sun and west of the moon, and marry the troll princess whose nose is three yards long.”

She begged to accompany him, but he said it was impossible. She asked for the road so that she might seek him herself. There was no road, he answered; the castle lay east of the sun and west of the moon, beyond anywhere she could hope to travel.

When morning came, the prince and his castle had vanished. The girl lay alone in a forest clearing with the little bundle of clothes she had carried from her parents’ cottage. She wept until she had no tears left. Then she stood and set off to find him.

After walking for many days, she came to a great cliff. Beneath it sat an old woman tossing a golden apple into the air. The girl asked whether she knew the way to the castle east of the sun and west of the moon, where a prince was to marry a long-nosed troll princess.

“Are you the girl who ought to have married him?” the old woman asked.

“I am,” she answered.

The old woman knew of the castle but not the road. Still, she lent the girl her horse and sent her to a neighbor who might know more. She also gave her the golden apple. “When you arrive, tap the horse beneath its left ear,” she instructed, “and ask it to return home.”

The girl rode until she reached another cliff. There an old woman sat carding wool with a golden comb. She too knew of the distant castle, but not the path, and lent the girl another horse to carry her to a third neighbor. Before the girl departed, the woman gave her the golden carding comb.

The third old woman sat beside a cliff spinning on a golden spinning wheel. She recognized the girl from her tale and shook her head at the distance still to be crossed. She could not show her the road either. But she lent her horse to carry the traveler to the East Wind, and gave her the golden spinning wheel as a parting gift.

At last the girl reached the house of the East Wind and asked about the castle. He had heard of it, but had never blown so far. “My brother the West Wind is stronger than I,” he said. “Climb upon my back, and I shall carry you to him.”

The East Wind swept her through the air to the West Wind. But the West Wind had never reached that faraway castle either. He offered to carry her to the South Wind, who had traveled more widely than either of them.

The South Wind heard her story with wonder. He too knew of the castle, but could not find his way there. “Only our eldest brother may help you,” he said. “The North Wind is strongest of all. If he does not know the way, no one does.”

The girl climbed onto the South Wind’s back and traveled to the cold domain of the North Wind. They had scarcely approached his home when he sent an icy blast roaring toward them.

“What brings you here?” he thundered.

The South Wind explained, and the girl told of the prince she had lost.

“Yes, I know the place,” said the North Wind at last. “Once I carried an aspen leaf there, and afterward I was so exhausted that I could not blow for days. If you have the courage, I shall try to take you. But we must rest tonight and set out at dawn.”

“I will go,” she said, “however difficult the journey.”

The next morning the North Wind grew mighty and terrible, and the girl mounted his back. They soared over forests and mountains and out across the sea. The storm they raised toppled trees and shook ships upon the water. On and on they flew, until even the North Wind began to falter. His wings drooped; the waves splashed against him; scarcely any strength remained.

“Are you afraid?” he gasped.

“No,” the girl answered, holding tight.

With his final effort he carried her to shore beneath the windows of the castle east of the sun and west of the moon. There he left her, so weary that he had to rest for many days before he could return home.

The following morning the girl sat beneath the castle windows and played with her golden apple. The troll princess with the enormous nose looked out and coveted it.

“How much will you take for that apple?” she called.

“It cannot be bought with money,” said the girl. “But you may have it if I may spend tonight beside the prince.”

The troll princess agreed. That night the girl entered the prince’s room, only to find him sleeping so soundly that nothing would wake him. She called his name, shook him gently, and wept beside him, but he never stirred. At dawn the troll princess drove her away.

On the second day the girl sat beneath the window with the golden carding comb. The troll princess wanted this treasure too, and paid the same price: another night in the prince’s room. Again he slept through every call and tear, and again the girl was sent away at morning.

On the third day she set the golden spinning wheel turning beneath the window. When the troll princess offered to buy it, the girl asked only for a third night with the prince. The bargain was made.

Unknown to the girl, several Christian captives lived in rooms adjoining the prince’s chamber. They had heard her calling to him for two nights, and they told him. When the troll princess brought him his evening drink, the prince suspected a sleeping potion. He pretended to swallow it, but cast it away when she was not looking.

That night, when the girl came to him, he was awake. Their joy was great, but the wedding to the troll princess was planned for the very next morning. The prince told the girl what he would do.

“I shall declare that I will marry only the woman who can wash three drops of tallow from my shirt,” he said. “Those drops fell when you lit the candle. The trolls cannot cleanse them, but you can.”

The next day the prince brought out the stained shirt before the assembled household. He announced that his bride must wash it perfectly clean before he would marry her. The troll princess eagerly took it, certain that so small a task would be easy. Yet the harder she rubbed, the larger and darker the marks became.

Her mother, the old troll queen, snatched the shirt away and tried in turn. The stains spread still further. Then all the other trolls tried, one after another, until the garment was black as soot.

“You have all failed,” said the prince. “Perhaps the poor girl waiting outside knows more about washing than any of you.”

He called her in and handed her the shirt. She dipped it into water, and at once the cloth became white as fresh snow, without a trace of the three dark marks.

“This is the woman I shall marry,” the prince declared.

At those words the troll queen flew into such a furious rage that she burst; the long-nosed princess and the other trolls met the same fate, and none was seen again. The spell that had held the prince was broken at last.

The prince and the girl freed the captives who had been kept inside the castle. Taking the silver and gold the trolls had hoarded, they journeyed far away from that place, east of the sun and west of the moon. And this time, when they traveled together, nothing stood between them.

Source: Norwegian folktale “Østenfor sol og vestenfor måne,” collected by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe in Norske Folkeeventyr (1844). Adapted from the traditional story, cross-checked against the English translation in Popular Tales from the Norse (1859).

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High above the fields and forests of a distant kingdom rose a mountain unlike any other in the world. Its slopes were made entirely of smooth, shining glass. On the very summit stood a castle of gold, and before the castle grew an apple tree whose fruit gleamed like little suns.

The castle held an enchanted princess. She waited in a silver chamber, surrounded by treasures of gold and precious stones, for the person who would climb the mountain and pluck an apple from the tree. Only then could the castle be entered and its enchantment broken.

News of the princess and the golden apples had traveled far beyond the kingdom. Knights came on splendid horses, their armor glittering, determined to be the first to reach her. They fitted sharp nails to their horses’ shoes, hoping these would bite into the glass. But the mountain was steep and slippery. Again and again the riders climbed only halfway before their horses lost their footing. Some returned badly hurt; others never returned at all.

For seven long years the princess watched from her window as brave men tried and failed. At last only three days remained before the end of the enchanted time.

A knight in golden armor appeared at the foot of the mountain, mounted on a magnificent horse. He urged his steed upward and reached the halfway point. Then, to everyone’s astonishment, he turned it about and came safely down. On the following day he tried again. The horse stepped on the glass as steadily as if it were crossing a meadow, and sparks flashed beneath its hooves.

The watching knights held their breath. The golden rider was almost at the apple tree when a mighty eagle rose suddenly from the summit. Spreading its vast wings, it struck the horse in the eye. The frightened animal reared, slipped, and fell. Horse and rider tumbled down the glass mountain, and neither survived.

Now only one day remained.

Then a schoolboy came to the mountain. He was young and cheerful, but strong and determined. Ever since he had heard his parents tell of the princess in the golden castle, he had wished to attempt the climb. He had no horse and wore no shining armor. Instead, he had gone into the forest, caught a lynx, and taken its sharp claws, which he fastened to his hands and feet to help him cling to the glass.

The boy began his ascent on foot. Hour after hour he climbed, pressing the claws against the smooth slope. The sun sank lower, yet he had scarcely reached the mountain’s middle. His feet were injured, his strength was failing, and thirst burned in his throat.

A great black cloud drifted overhead. He lifted his face and begged it for a little rain, just a single drop to wet his dry lips. But the cloud sailed onward without shedding so much as a bead of water.

The boy kept climbing until darkness fell. Below him gaped the deep abyss into which so many riders had fallen. Above him, the glass seemed to stretch without end. At last he could go no farther. He held fast with his claws and, exhausted beyond all hope, fell asleep upon the mountainside.

On the summit, the great eagle guarded the golden apple tree. Each night it circled the mountain, searching for anything that might approach the enchanted castle. When moonlight broke through the clouds, it spotted the motionless boy clinging to the glass. Thinking him dead, the bird swooped down.

The boy awoke as the eagle seized him in its talons. Though its claws pierced his flesh, he did not cry out. Instead he grasped the eagle’s feet with both hands and held on with all his strength.

Startled, the eagle rose into the air, carrying the boy high above the slopes. Round and round the golden castle it flew. For the first time the boy could see the glittering towers close at hand. He glimpsed a balcony and the princess sitting there in sadness, unaware that her rescuer was flying past.

The eagle swept near the golden apple tree. The boy drew the small knife from his belt and cut off the bird’s feet. The wounded eagle flew upward into the clouds, while the boy dropped onto the broad branches of the apple tree.

He had reached the summit at last.

The eagle’s severed claws were still embedded in his flesh. Carefully he pulled them free. Then he laid the peel of a golden apple against his wounds, and to his wonder they healed immediately. He picked several apples and put them into his pockets before walking toward the castle doors.

A fearsome dragon stood guard at the entrance. The boy took one of the golden apples and threw it at the creature. At once the dragon vanished, and the great gate swung open.

Beyond it lay a beautiful courtyard filled with flowers and trees. Above, on a balcony, stood the princess with her attendants. When she saw the boy, she hurried to meet him, for the long enchantment was over. She welcomed him as the one who had freed her, and he became her husband and a powerful ruler of the golden castle. Its treasure was now theirs together.

Yet the boy never returned to the world below. The only creature strong enough to have carried the enormous riches down the mountain had been the great eagle. Without its feet the bird had died, and its body was found in a wood upon the mountain. The young ruler remained with the princess high above the land.

One day, as they walked together in the castle garden, he looked toward the valley and saw a vast crowd gathered at the foot of the Glass Mountain. Wondering what had happened, he blew a silver whistle. A swallow, the castle’s swift messenger, came flying to him.

“Go down and discover why so many people have gathered there,” he said.

The swallow darted away and soon returned with astonishing news.

“The blood of the great eagle has brought the fallen riders back to life,” the bird reported. “Those who died trying to climb the mountain are awakening as though from a long sleep. They are rising, mounting their horses, and returning to their homes. Everyone has come to see the wonder.”

And so the spell’s ending brought more than freedom to the princess. The golden castle stood radiant in the sky, its young rulers lived together upon the summit, and far below, families rejoiced as those they had mourned came home again.

Source: Traditional Polish folk tale, “The Glass Mountain,” in Andrew Lang, The Yellow Fairy Book (1894), credited there to Kletke. Adapted from the published narrative.

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There was once a king whose son loved hunting more than any other pastime. He would ride for hours through fields and woods, following whatever paths took his fancy, and often carried his midday meal with him so that he need not return to the palace before evening.

One day, as the prince traveled across the countryside with his servants, he came upon an old woman who was so hungry and weary that she could scarcely stand. She had nothing to eat and seemed near to fainting.

The prince had brought no money. But he had plenty of food, and he immediately called his servants and told them to give the old woman everything that had been prepared for his own meal. They did so, and she ate and drank until her strength returned.

When she had finished, she thanked the prince warmly. “I have no riches with which to repay you,” she said, “but I can give you these.” She placed three citrons in his hands. “Remember my instructions. Never open one unless you are beside a fountain, and always cut it lengthwise, never across.”

The prince thanked her, put the fruits carefully away, and continued his journey.

After he had gone some distance, curiosity overcame him. What could be so remarkable about three citrons? He took one out and cut it open lengthwise. He remembered how it was to be cut, but forgot the old woman’s warning about the fountain.

At once a beautiful maiden stepped from the fruit. She looked at him and pleaded, “Give me water to drink, or I shall die!”

There was not a drop of water nearby. Before he could help her, she died. The prince stood sorrowfully beside her, knowing that his forgetfulness had caused the loss.

He went on his way, troubled by what had happened. Yet he still had two citrons, and his wish to discover their secret was strong. Some distance farther on he opened the second one. Again he remembered to cut it lengthwise; again he forgot the fountain.

A second maiden appeared, as lovely as the first. “Water!” she begged. “Give me water, or I shall die!”

But there was no water there either, and she too died. The prince was overwhelmed with grief and resolved not to open the last citron so carelessly.

At length he found a fountain. This time he stood right beside its clear water and cut the third citron lengthwise. Out stepped a maiden more beautiful than either of the others. As soon as she appeared, she cried, “Give me water to drink, or I shall die!”

The prince had a shell with him. He filled it at the fountain and held it to her lips. She drank, and color and strength returned to her. Still, she was so delicate and frail that the prince feared the long journey to the palace would exhaust her.

A tree spread its branches above the fountain. The prince asked the maiden to climb into it and wait safely there while he went to fetch a carriage. She agreed, and he departed, promising to return for her.

Not long afterward, a woman came to the fountain carrying a copper pitcher. She was a servant sent to draw water for her master, but she was also a witch. When she bent over the pool, she saw the beautiful face of the maiden reflected in the water. Mistaking the reflection for her own, she wondered why someone so fine should have to carry water. She struck her pitcher against the ground, declaring that she would break it rather than continue her errand.

The copper pitcher did not break. She looked into the fountain again, saw the same fair face, and struck the vessel once more. High among the branches the maiden struggled to keep from laughing. At last she could contain herself no longer, and a clear laugh rang down from the tree.

The witch looked everywhere for its source. Finally she raised her eyes and saw the maiden sitting among the leaves.

She began speaking to her in the gentlest manner and begged her to come down. The maiden refused. She was waiting for the prince, she explained. But the witch kept coaxing her. “Then let me at least tidy your hair,” she said. “I can make it neat while you wait.”

After much persuasion, the maiden climbed down. The witch set to work on her hair and asked question after question about the prince. The maiden, suspecting no evil, answered truthfully. When the witch had learned everything she wished to know, she took a long pin and thrust it into the maiden’s head.

In that instant the maiden became a dove and flew away.

The witch climbed into the tree and waited in her place. Soon the prince returned with a carriage. He was astonished: the maiden he had left among the branches had vanished, and a stranger sat where she had been.

He demanded to know what had happened. The witch burst into tears. She claimed that an unhappy enchantment changed her appearance from time to time, so that one moment she looked as she had before and the next she looked entirely different.

Believing her tale, the prince felt pity. He helped her down and brought her back to the palace.

Early the following morning, the prince went walking in the garden. After a while a lovely dove flew down near the gardener and addressed him in a human voice.

“Gardener of my own garden,” she asked, “how does the prince fare with the woman he brought home?”

The gardener was so surprised that he made no answer. When the dove flew away, he hurried to tell the prince what he had heard. The prince told him that, should the dove return, he was to say that the prince was living happily and well.

The dove came again the next morning and put the same question. This time the gardener gave the answer he had been taught.

“Then poor me,” said the dove, “for I fly lost and without a home.” And away she went.

The gardener repeated her words to the prince. The prince was moved by the strange bird and longed to catch her. He instructed the gardener to make a snare from ribbon and set it where she came.

On her next visit the dove asked her question, listened to the gardener’s reply, and saw the ribbon snare. She laughed.

“A ribbon snare was never made for my leg!” she cried, and flew off.

When the gardener told the prince, he ordered a stronger, finer snare made of silver cords. But the dove returned, laughed at the silver, and escaped as before.

The prince next commanded that a snare be woven of gold. Again the bird came, saw it, and said, laughing, “A golden snare was never made for me!” Then she flew away beyond reach.

The prince was now determined to catch her. He ordered a fourth snare, this one sparkling with precious stones. The next day the dove returned, repeated her accustomed question, and looked at the glittering snare.

“Yes,” she said, “this is the snare that suits my leg.” And she let herself be caught.

When the woman whom the prince had brought to the palace learned that the dove had been taken, she declared herself terribly ill. She insisted that the only thing that would cure her was broth made from the captured bird.

The prince would not consent. He had grown deeply fond of the dove and would not allow anyone to kill her. Instead he took the gentle bird into his hands and stroked her head. As his fingers passed over her feathers, he felt something hard and sharp. It was a pin, buried where no pin should be.

He carefully drew it out.

At once the dove disappeared, and before him stood the beautiful maiden who had stepped from the third citron beside the fountain. The prince could scarcely believe his eyes.

She told him everything: how she had waited in the tree, how the witch had lured her down, how the pin had changed her into a dove, and how the witch had taken her place.

The prince then understood the deception. He ordered the witch put to death. In the harsh custom of this old tale, he further commanded that a drum be made from her skin and steps to the maiden’s bed from her bones.

Afterward the prince married the maiden of the third citron. They lived together in happiness, and so the story ends.

Source: Traditional Portuguese folktale collected by Zófimo Consiglieri Pedroso, in Portuguese Folk-Tales (1882), translated by Henriqueta Monteiro. Literary adaptation based on “The Three Citrons of Love.”

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Once upon a time, a king had three daughters whom he loved dearly. When war threatened his kingdom, he was obliged to ride away at the head of his soldiers. Before leaving, he entrusted his daughters with the keys to the palace and told them that they might enter every room except one: a chamber at the back, on the right-hand side. Whatever happened, they must not open its door.

For a while the princesses kept their promise. They sewed, read, spun thread, and walked in the palace gardens. But day after day their curiosity grew. The eldest began to wonder aloud what might be hidden in the forbidden room. The youngest protested that their father surely had good reason for his warning, yet the second sister sided with the eldest. In the end they turned the key and went inside.

There was no treasure and no monster. The room was almost empty. Only a splendidly covered table stood in its center, and upon it lay an open book. The eldest princess read that she would marry a prince from the East. The second turned a page and discovered that she would marry a prince from the West. They laughed with delight and urged their younger sister to look at her own fate. Reluctantly she read the words: the king’s youngest daughter would marry a pig from the North.

The young princess was overcome with dread. Her sisters tried to persuade her that no such marriage could ever take place, but she could not forget the mysterious prediction. Nor could she forget that she had disobeyed her father. She grew pale and quiet, and the songs she had once sung as she worked were heard no more.

The king returned victorious from battle. He embraced his daughters, but soon noticed that the youngest was troubled. When he questioned them, the three confessed that they had entered the forbidden chamber and read the book. He was deeply saddened. Yet nothing could now be done to undo what had happened.

Before long a prince arrived from the East and asked to marry the eldest princess. The king consented, and the wedding was celebrated for three days. Some time afterward, a prince from the West came for the second daughter, and she too was married. The youngest saw that the book had told the truth about her sisters, and her fears returned with greater force.

Then one day an enormous pig walked into the royal palace. He spoke to the king with all the courtesy of a noble visitor and announced that he had come to ask for the hand of the youngest princess. The king was astonished. Outside the palace a great multitude of pigs had gathered, and the strange suitor would not depart without a solemn promise. The king at last agreed that the wedding would take place within a week.

He told his daughter that this creature could hardly be an ordinary pig, for his words and behavior suggested some hidden enchantment. He urged her to be patient and to trust that the mystery might one day be explained. The princess, sorrowful as she was, agreed to do as her father asked.

After the wedding the bride and her unusual husband set off in a royal carriage. When they reached a muddy marsh, the pig commanded the driver to stop. He climbed down, rolled in the mud until he was filthy, and returned to ask his wife for a kiss. She wiped his snout gently with her handkerchief and kissed him.

At nightfall they reached his home in a thick forest. They ate their supper and lay down to sleep. But during the night the princess discovered something astonishing: beside her was not a pig, but a man. Before morning he had become a pig again. The same change occurred each night. Her husband treated her with kindness, and little by little her fear gave way to affection. She understood that a spell must be holding him captive.

One day an old woman passed the house. The princess called to her, grateful for the chance to speak to another person. The visitor claimed to know the secrets of herbs, fortunes, and enchantments. When the princess asked whether she could free a husband who was human by night and a pig by day, the old woman offered her a length of thread. She instructed her to tie it tightly around his left foot while he slept, without telling him what she intended. By morning, she promised, he would remain a man.

The princess wished so much to free her husband that she accepted the advice. That night she rose quietly and began to fasten the thread around his foot. Just as she pulled the knot tight, the thread snapped with a sharp crack.

Her husband awakened in distress. Only three more days, he told her, had remained before the spell would have ended of its own accord. Now he must leave her, and they would not meet again until she had worn out three pairs of iron shoes and blunted a staff of steel while searching for him. With those words he vanished.

The princess wept, but mourning could not bring him back. She went to a town and had three pairs of iron shoes made, together with a steel staff. Then she set out to find him, no matter how far she might have to travel.

She crossed nine seas and nine lands. She wandered through forests of enormous trees, over fallen branches and through thorny thickets. Her hands were scratched, her feet ached, and still she continued. At last, exhausted and sorrowful, she came to a lonely house. It was the dwelling of the Moon.

The Moon’s mother opened the door and took pity on the weary traveler. She gave her food, shelter, and care. While staying there, the princess gave birth to a child. When she was well enough to tell her story, she asked whether the Moon might know where her husband had gone. The old woman said that the Moon did not know, but perhaps the Sun, far to the East, could help.

Before the princess departed, the Moon’s mother gave her a roasted chicken to eat. She warned her to keep every bone, for the bones might be useful one day. The princess carefully gathered them. She cast aside her first pair of worn iron shoes, put on the second, took her child in her arms, and continued her search.

Now she traveled across sandy wastes where every step was a struggle, over sharp mountains and through treacherous swamps. Sometimes she crawled around cliffs, leaning on her steel staff to keep from falling. At length she reached the palace of the Sun.

The Sun’s mother was amazed to find a mortal woman so far from home. She welcomed the princess and promised to ask her son about the missing husband. Because the Sun often returned in an angry mood after his journey across the heavens, his mother hid the visitor where he could not see her. Even so, the Sun sensed that a stranger had entered the palace. His mother calmed him, and later she explained to the princess why the Sun’s mood changed: he rejoiced at the gates of paradise in the morning, saw the wrongs of the world as the day passed, and grew sorrowful when he reached the gates of death in the evening.

The Sun knew nothing of the enchanted husband. His mother advised the princess to seek the Wind. She gave her another roasted chicken, repeating the warning to save the bones. The princess put on her final pair of iron shoes, took up her child and staff, and went on.

This part of the journey was harder still. Fiery tongues leapt from stony mountains; untrodden forests barred her path; and beyond them lay ice and deep snow. At last she reached a vast cave in a mountainside. Here lived the Wind.

The Wind’s mother admitted her and allowed her to rest. She too hid the weary visitor from her son. The following morning she brought the first real news the princess had heard. Her husband, she said, lived alone in a forest so dense that no axe had ever opened a path through it. He had built a little house from tree trunks bound together with flexible branches, and avoided the company of others.

The Wind’s mother directed the princess to follow the Milky Way and gave her a third roasted chicken, once more instructing her to keep all its bones. With gratitude and renewed hope, the princess resumed her journey.

She walked until her last iron shoes fell apart. Barefoot, she crossed bogs, stones, and thorns. At the edge of a green meadow she stopped briefly to rest, but the sound of birds calling to their mates reminded her of the one she sought. She gathered her child and her precious bundle of bones and entered the forest.

For three days and three nights she wandered among the trees. Her steel staff had been worn blunt by her long travels. At last, just as she feared she could go no farther, she found a strange little house made of bound tree trunks. There were no windows. Its only door was high in the roof.

She searched all around for a ladder or steps and found nothing. Then she remembered the chicken bones carried so faithfully from the homes of the Moon, the Sun, and the Wind. She joined two bones together, and to her surprise they held firm. Bone after bone became the sides and rungs of a ladder. She climbed as she worked, until she was almost at the roof. But one last rung was missing. In the old tale, the desperate princess sacrificed her little finger to complete it. The final step held, and she climbed through the door with her child.

Inside, the house was neat and orderly. The princess found something to eat, settled her child to sleep in a wooden trough, and sat down to await its owner.

When the enchanted pig returned, he was startled by the ladder of bones and the strange final rung. Fearing another spell, he changed himself into a dove and flew through the opening without touching the ladder. Inside he saw a worn and weary woman rocking a child. He looked again and recognized his wife. At the sight of all she had endured for him, his heart filled with such love and pity that his enchanted shape vanished. He stood before her as a man.

At first the princess scarcely recognized him. Then he spoke, and joy overcame the grief of all her wandering. They sat together while she told him the story of the iron shoes, the three kindly mothers, the journey under the Milky Way, and the ladder of bones. When she had finished, he told her his own secret.

He was a king’s son. Long ago his father had fought against dragons that terrorized their land, and the prince had killed the youngest dragon. Its mother, a witch, had punished him by turning him into a pig. She was also the old woman who had tricked the princess into tying the rotten thread around his foot. The spell would have ended after three days, but the broken thread had prolonged it for three years. Now, after all their suffering, they had found each other and the enchantment was over.

The next morning they began their journey home. First they went to the prince’s kingdom, where his father and mother welcomed them with rejoicing and held a feast that lasted three days and three nights. Then they traveled to the princess’s father. The old king was overjoyed to see his daughter again and to learn that her husband had indeed been a prince under a spell.

As the king had grown old and had no son to succeed him, he gave his throne to the reunited couple. They ruled with the wisdom that comes from hardship, and their people remembered them as a king and queen who had endured much before finding happiness.

Source: Romanian folktale “Porcul cel fermecat,” collected by Petre Ispirescu; adapted from the Romanian tradition as published in Andrew Lang, The Red Fairy Book (1890), drawing on Mite Kremnitz’s Rumänische Märchen (1882).

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Long ago, in a kingdom beyond the blue seas and the distant mountains, there lived a king and queen with three sons. The princes were strong and handsome, and the youngest, Ivan, was especially dear to his parents. When the king began to grow old, he summoned all three brothers to his hall.

“It is time for you to marry,” he told them. “Each of you shall take a bow and an arrow into the meadow. Shoot wherever you will, and wherever your arrow comes to rest, there you shall find your bride.” The brothers bowed to their father and went out together.

The eldest prince shot first. His arrow fell inside the courtyard of a wealthy nobleman, whose daughter came out to meet him. The second prince’s arrow landed on the steps of a rich merchant’s house, where the merchant’s daughter stood. Then Ivan drew his bow. His arrow rose so high that it disappeared against the sky, and no one saw where it fell.

Ivan searched the meadows and the woods until his feet grew sore. Two days passed without a trace. On the third day he wandered into a marsh, where the reeds grew thick and the dark water trembled beneath his steps. There, on a small patch of ground, sat a frog holding his arrow.

Ivan recoiled, but the frog spoke in a clear voice. “Prince Ivan, come and take your arrow. You must take me with it, or you will not find your way out of the marsh.” The prince was miserable. How could he bring a frog home as his bride? Yet he had given his word to obey his father’s command. He gathered the creature into his coat and carried her back to the palace.

The king would hear no complaint. “That is where your arrow fell,” he said. “You must accept what fortune has chosen.” So the eldest brother married the nobleman’s daughter, the second married the merchant’s daughter, and Ivan was wedded to the little frog. While his brothers shared grand houses with their wives, Ivan kept his strange bride in a dish, unable to imagine what their future might hold.

After some time the king decided to test his daughters-in-law. He ordered each to bake him a loaf of fine white bread by the following morning. When Ivan returned home, his head was bowed with worry. “What troubles you?” asked the frog. “My father demands a loaf of bread,” answered Ivan, “and I do not know how you can make one.” “Do not grieve,” said his wife. “Go to sleep. Morning is wiser than evening.”

Once Ivan slept, the frog slipped off her skin. In her place stood Vasilisa the All-Wise, a maiden of extraordinary beauty and skill. She summoned her helpers and bade them prepare bread such as had once been served in her father’s house. By morning a splendid loaf stood ready, decorated with the likenesses of cities and gateways. Ivan carried it to the king. The loaves brought by his brothers were poorly made, but Ivan’s bread delighted his father, who declared it fit for the greatest feast.

The next evening the king set another task. Each daughter-in-law must make him a fine shirt before dawn. Once again Ivan returned in sorrow, and once again the frog told him to rest: “Morning is wiser than evening.” While he slept, Vasilisa cast aside her skin and summoned her helpers. They fashioned a magnificent shirt embroidered in silver and gold. The king admired it above the others, and the elder brothers began to wonder whether Ivan’s wife was truly an ordinary frog.

At last the king commanded all three princes to come to a great feast with their wives. Ivan was in despair. “How can I present you at court?” he asked. The frog reassured him. “Go ahead without me. When you hear a mighty rumbling outside, tell everyone that your little frog has arrived in her little box.”

Ivan went to the palace alone. His brothers mocked him, asking whether he had carried his bride in his pocket or left her in the swamp. Then came a thunderous clatter. The doors shook and the guests sprang from their seats. Ivan remembered the frog’s words. “Do not be afraid,” he said. “It is only my little frog arriving in her little box.”

A golden coach drawn by six horses came to the steps. From it descended Vasilisa the All-Wise, dressed with such splendor that everyone fell silent. She took Ivan’s hand, and together they entered the hall. At supper Vasilisa poured the last drops of her drink into her left sleeve and tucked the bones from her meal into her right. The wives of Ivan’s brothers watched closely and copied her every movement, hoping to appear equally accomplished.

When the music began, Vasilisa rose to dance with Ivan. She swept her left sleeve through the air, and a shining lake appeared. She waved her right sleeve, and white swans glided across the water. The king and all the guests stared in wonder. The elder brothers’ wives hurried onto the floor to imitate her. But when they shook their sleeves, water splashed the company and a bone struck the king in the eye. Angrily, he ordered them away.

Ivan, however, was thinking of something else. He had seen Vasilisa in her true form, and he longed never to lose her. While the feast continued, he slipped home, found the frogskin and threw it into the fire. He believed he had freed his wife from the disguise forever.

When Vasilisa returned, she looked for the skin. Seeing the ashes, her face filled with grief. “Oh, Ivan, what have you done?” she cried. “If you had waited a little longer, I would have remained with you always. Now you must seek me beyond thrice-nine lands, in the thirtieth kingdom, where Koshchei the Deathless dwells.” Before Ivan could reach her, she changed into a white swan and flew through the window.

For a whole year Ivan mourned her absence. Then he asked his father and mother for their blessing and set out to find her. He traveled along roads, over hills and through forests until he met a little old man. The stranger listened to his story and shook his head. “Why did you burn the skin? It was not yours to put on or to take off. Vasilisa was wiser than her own father, and in anger he commanded her to live as a frog for three years. Take this ball of thread. Follow wherever it rolls, and do not lose heart.”

Ivan thanked him and followed the rolling ball. Soon he saw a bear and raised his weapon, thinking to hunt it for food. “Spare me, Prince Ivan,” the bear pleaded, “and one day I may help you.” Ivan lowered his weapon. Farther on, a wild drake rose before him. Again he prepared to shoot, and again the creature begged for its life. Ivan let it fly. A hare darted across his path and received the same mercy. At the shore of a wide blue sea, Ivan found a sturgeon stranded on the sand. It gasped for water. He lifted it gently and returned it to the waves.

At last the ball rolled toward a little hut standing on hens’ legs. The hut spun slowly in place. “Little hut,” Ivan called, “turn your face toward me and your back toward the sea.” The hut obeyed. Inside, Baba Yaga lay upon a high stove, fierce and frightening. She demanded to know why he had come. Ivan asked first for food, drink and a warm bath, as a weary traveler should. When he had rested, he told her of Vasilisa and his search.

“She is with Koshchei the Deathless,” Baba Yaga said. “His death is hidden far from his body. At the point of a needle lies his life. The needle is inside an egg, the egg inside a duck, the duck inside a hare, and the hare inside a box. That box rests high in an oak tree which Koshchei guards with all his power.” She told Ivan where the oak stood, and he went to find it.

The tree towered above him, and the box was beyond his reach. As he wondered what to do, the bear he had spared came crashing through the wood. With one great effort it tore the oak from the earth. The box fell and broke open. Out raced a hare, faster than Ivan could follow. But another hare sprang after it—the very creature Ivan had allowed to live—and caught it. A duck burst free and beat its wings into the sky. Then the rescued drake appeared and pursued it, until the duck dropped an egg into the blue sea.

Ivan sank to his knees in despair. The egg had vanished among the waves. Then the water stirred. The sturgeon he had returned to the sea rose to the surface with the egg held carefully in its mouth. Ivan took it, broke the shell and found the needle. He snapped its sharp point. At that moment the power of Koshchei the Deathless came to an end.

Ivan hurried to Koshchei’s dwelling and found Vasilisa the All-Wise. No enchantment held her now. Together they traveled home through the far kingdoms and beyond the wide seas. The prince had learned that love cannot be hurried by force, and that mercy freely offered may return when it is needed most. Ivan and Vasilisa lived together in happiness for the rest of their days.

Source: Russian folktale “The Frog-Queen” (Tsarevna-lyagushka), collected in the tradition of Aleksandr Afanasyev; adapted from the public-domain version in The Russian Fairy Book.

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Long ago, when the slopes of Mount Titano were quiet and the paths were little more than tracks among the stones, a man named Marinus came to the mountain. He had traveled across the Adriatic Sea from the island of Rab, and he knew well the difficult work of cutting and carrying stone.

Marinus sought a peaceful life on the mountain. There he worked with his hands, gathering what he needed and making a modest home among the rocks. For his heavy tasks he had a donkey, a patient little creature that carried stones and supplies along the steep and uneven paths.

The donkey was a humble companion, but an important one. There was no easy way to move a load up those slopes, and every journey required steady feet and great effort. Day after day the animal helped Marinus with the work that had to be done.

One day, when Marinus returned to the place where he had left his donkey, he found a terrible sight. A wild bear had come down from the mountain and killed the animal. The creature that had helped him so faithfully was gone, and before him stood the powerful beast responsible for its death.

Anyone meeting a bear at such a moment might have turned and fled. But according to the old legend, Marinus did not run. He approached the bear without anger or fear, and spoke to it as though it could understand every word.

“You have eaten the companion who carried my burdens,” he told the animal. “Now you must take its place and do the work that it did.”

And then something wonderful happened. The bear, fierce and untamed a moment before, grew calm. It did not attack Marinus. It submitted to him and allowed itself to be led where the donkey had once gone.

From that day onward, the bear helped to carry the loads. Along the stony paths of Mount Titano, where people might have expected to see a little donkey, they could instead have seen an enormous bear walking obediently beside the stonecutter. The beast that had taken away Marinus’s helper had become his helper in turn.

So the story was told and retold: not as a tale of a hunter defeating a wild animal, but as a tale of a man whose quiet authority made a dangerous creature gentle. The mountain, the stonecutter and the bear became part of the memory of the little community that grew there.

In time, that community became associated with the Republic of San Marino, which took its name from Marinus. The legend of the bear did not disappear. It lived on in local storytelling and in images carved in stone, reminding later generations of the extraordinary animal said to have walked the paths of Mount Titano beside their founding saint.

Source: Traditional Sammarinese legend of Saint Marinus and the bear; documented by Visit San Marino (Saint Peter’s Church) and in National Geographic, “The Arrival of Marinus and Leo.”

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Once upon a time, there was a king who had only one son. When the prince grew to manhood, his father sent him out into the world to find a young woman whom he might love and marry. The prince obeyed and traveled from country to country. He passed through cities and villages, crossed mountains and broad plains, and met many people, yet nowhere did he find the bride he sought.

As the months passed, he became weary of his search. He had spent much time and treasure and had begun to believe that his journey had been in vain. At last, overwhelmed with sorrow, he climbed a high mountain, intending to cast himself from a steep rock where no one would ever find him.

He was approaching the edge when a voice rang out behind him. “Stop, young man! Stop, for the sake of all three hundred and sixty-five days of the year!” The prince turned, but could see no one. “Who speaks to me?” he called. “Show yourself! If you knew my troubles, you would understand my despair.”

At once an old man appeared before him, with hair as white as wool. “I know what has brought you here,” the stranger said. “But before you do anything, look across at that high hill. Do you see the great blocks of marble standing upon it?” The prince looked and said that he did.

“Upon the summit,” the old man continued, “sits a golden-haired old woman. Day and night she holds a bird against her breast. Whoever obtains that bird will become the happiest of men. Yet take care! You must seize the old woman by her hair before she catches sight of you. If she sees you first, she will turn you into stone. Every marble figure upon that hill was once a young man who failed.”

The prince listened closely. He had come to the mountain expecting to lose his life; now, before him, lay a chance of finding happiness. He thanked the stranger and set off toward the neighboring hill.

When he reached the summit, he saw the old woman exactly as he had been told. Her golden hair shone in the sunshine, and she sat with her back toward him, warming herself and playing with the bird nestled in her arms. The prince moved carefully, placing each foot upon the ground as quietly as he could. He came closer and closer until he was almost within reach.

Then, with one sudden leap, he caught the old woman firmly by her long hair. She gave such a dreadful cry that the whole hill shook as though an earthquake had passed beneath it. But the prince did not release his hold.

At last the old woman understood that she could not escape. “What do you want of me?” she demanded. “Give me the bird you are holding,” replied the prince, “and restore to life all the people whom you have changed into stone.” The enchantress consented and handed him the bird.

Then she breathed a blue wind from her mouth toward the marble figures. As the strange breath passed over them, the cold stone changed. The motionless figures stirred, and one by one the young men stood living upon the hillside again.

The prince held the little bird in his hands and was filled with such joy that he kissed it. The instant his lips touched its feathers, the bird was transformed into a beautiful young woman. The old enchantress had placed her under a spell and turned her into a bird to tempt unwary travelers into her power.

The prince looked at the maiden, and she looked at him, and each was delighted with the other. Together they left the hill, making ready for the long journey to his father’s kingdom. As they began their descent, the young woman gave him a little stick. “Keep this,” she told him. “It will do whatever you command of it.”

The prince wished to see whether her words were true. He struck a rock with the stick. Immediately the stone opened and revealed a great heap of golden coins. They took as much gold as they needed for their journey and went on their way.

Before long, they came to a wide river. Its waters flowed swiftly, and they could find neither bridge nor ford. Remembering the gift, the prince touched the surface of the river with his stick. At once the waters drew apart, leaving a dry passage between them. The prince and the maiden walked safely across without wetting their feet.

Farther on, a pack of wolves appeared and rushed toward the travelers. The animals came so fiercely that it seemed certain they would tear the pair to pieces. But the prince raised the stick and struck at the wolves. As he did so, each wolf was changed into a tiny ant, and the danger passed.

After these wonders, the journey brought no further harm. The prince reached his father’s home with the maiden he loved. Before long they were married, and the two lived happily together for many years. So ended the prince’s search, which had nearly brought him to despair but had led him, at last, to the enchanted bird and the young woman who had been hidden within it.

Source: Traditional Serbian folk tale “Bird Girl,” in Serbian Fairy Tales, translated by Elodie Lawton Mijatovich (1918), pp. 52–55. Literary adaptation follows the recorded storyline.

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In a little cottage at the edge of a forest lived a widow and two young women. One was her daughter, Holena; the other was her stepdaughter, Maruška. The widow cherished Holena and let her spend her days by the warm stove. Maruška, meanwhile, swept the floor, washed the linen, prepared the meals, fed the cow, and worked until darkness came. Yet no matter how much she did, she received only harsh words in return.

Maruška was gentle and beautiful, though she scarcely gave a thought to her looks. Her stepmother noticed them all too well. She feared that when young men came to the cottage, they would admire Maruška rather than Holena. So she and her daughter became more unkind with every passing day.

One bitter January morning, while snow lay thick upon the fields and the forest paths had vanished beneath it, Holena suddenly declared that she wanted violets.

“Go into the woods, Maruška, and bring me a bunch,” she ordered. “I want their scent in the house.”

“But sister,” Maruška answered softly, “the earth is frozen. Violets do not bloom in January.”

Holena sprang up in anger. Her mother seized Maruška by the shoulders and pushed her toward the door. “Do as you are told. Do not come back without them!”

The door closed behind the girl. She walked into the forest, shivering in her thin clothes. The snow was so deep that she could hardly lift her feet, and nowhere could she see another person’s tracks. She wandered for a long time, hungry, weary, and afraid she would never find her way home.

Then, far above her on the mountainside, she saw a glow. She struggled toward it and came to a clearing where an immense fire burned. Twelve great stones stood in a circle around the flames, and on each stone sat a man. Three had white hair and beards, three were middle-aged, three were younger, and three were youths. The eldest, with a snow-white beard, sat on the highest stone, holding a wooden staff. These were the Twelve Months, and January was their ruler for the day.

Maruška stood hesitantly at the edge of the circle. “Kind sirs,” she said, “may I warm myself for a moment? I am nearly frozen.”

January looked at her. “Come near the fire, child. But tell us, what brings you to this mountain in such weather?”

“I have been sent to gather violets. My sister and stepmother will not let me return without them.”

“Violets?” January said. “You know that this is winter.”

“I know,” she replied, “but I had no choice.”

January rose and carried his staff to one of the young men. “Brother March, take my place.”

March sat upon the highest stone and raised the staff above the fire. The flames leapt upward. The snow softened, ran into streams, and disappeared. Green grass spread across the earth, buds opened on the trees, and beneath the bushes little blue violets appeared in clusters. For a brief moment the winter clearing had become spring.

“Gather them quickly,” March told her.

Maruška filled her hands with the flowers, thanked the Twelve Months, and hurried back down the mountain. When she entered the cottage, the fragrance of violets drifted through the room. Holena and her mother stared in astonishment.

“Where did you find these?” Holena demanded.

“On the mountain, beneath the bushes,” Maruška answered. Holena took every flower for herself. She did not offer her stepsister even one to smell.

Not long afterward, Holena grew restless again. This time she wanted fresh strawberries. “Go to the forest and pick some,” she said.

“Strawberries cannot grow beneath the snow,” Maruška protested. But the two women threatened her as before and forced her outdoors.

She climbed the mountain, guided by the light of the same great fire. The Twelve Months sat upon their stones just as she remembered. She respectfully asked to warm herself, and January inquired why she had returned.

“My family has ordered me to bring home strawberries,” Maruška explained. “Please forgive me for troubling you once more.”

January handed his staff to June. As June took the highest place and waved it over the fire, the cold vanished. Trees burst into leaf and birds began to sing. Wildflowers brightened the ground, and beneath them tiny white blossoms changed into ripe red strawberries. Summer had come to the clearing.

“Pick them while you can,” said June.

Maruška gathered the berries into her apron, thanked her helpers, and hurried home. Holena and her mother could scarcely believe their eyes when they saw the fruit. They ate every strawberry themselves, without offering Maruška a taste.

Their delight soon became greed. On the third day, Holena demanded red apples.

“Apples in the middle of winter?” Maruška whispered. Her stepmother would hear no objection. Once more the girl was sent away into the snow, with a warning not to return empty-handed.

By now she knew the path toward the glow on the mountain. She found the Twelve Months and politely told January of her new task. He rose and passed the staff to September.

The fire glowed red as September lifted the staff. The snow melted, but this time the trees did not put forth the tender leaves of spring or the full green canopy of summer. Golden leaves drifted in the wind. Autumn flowers bloomed along the hillside, and in a clearing stood an apple tree carrying ripe red fruit.

“Shake the tree,” September instructed.

Maruška shook its trunk. One apple fell to the ground. She shook it again, and a second apple dropped beside the first.

“Now hurry home,” September called. She obeyed, taking only the two apples and thanking the Months for their kindness.

At the cottage, Holena snatched the apples and demanded to know why Maruška had brought so few.

“Only two fell,” the girl explained. “I was told to go home after the second.”

Holena accused her of eating the rest, though Maruška had tasted none. She and her mother shared the two apples; they found them sweeter than any fruit they had ever known. Instead of being satisfied, Holena wanted an entire basket.

“I shall go myself,” she declared. “Maruška must have kept the best fruit hidden.”

Her mother tried to persuade her to stay, for the weather was fierce. But Holena wrapped herself in a fur coat, covered her head, and set off toward the mountain.

After wandering through the deep snow, she saw the fire and came upon the Twelve Months. Without greeting them or asking permission, she pushed close to the flames and held out her hands.

January regarded the stranger. “What are you seeking here?” he asked.

“That is none of your business, old man,” Holena snapped. “Keep your questions to yourself.”

She turned away and walked toward the trees. January frowned and lifted his staff. In an instant the sky darkened. The fire dimmed, thick snow swept across the mountain, and an icy wind rushed through the forest. Holena lost the path and stumbled into deep drifts. Though she wore a fur coat, the cold overcame her. She never found her way back.

Meanwhile, her mother waited at the cottage door. She watched the road and peered from the window until she could wait no longer. At last she wrapped herself warmly and went out to search for her daughter. But the storm had not abated, and she too lost her way in the forest. Neither woman returned.

Maruška had prepared the meals and tended the cow as usual. She waited through the long evening, listening for footsteps, and she prayed for the two women when darkness fell. In the morning she waited again. Only later did it become known that both had perished in the winter snow.

The little cottage, the field, and the cow were left to Maruška. In time she married a kind man, and together they made a happy home. She had passed through spring, summer, and autumn in the heart of winter, yet the greatest gift she carried from the mountain was the kindness with which the Twelve Months had answered her own.

Source: Traditional Slovak folktale, “O dvanástich mesiačikoch,” collected in the tradition of Pavol Dobšinský; adapted from the complete traditional narrative of Maruška, Holena, and the Twelve Months.

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Long ago, high above the valley of the Soča River, the mountains of Triglav held a garden more beautiful than any garden made by human hands. On the pastures near the Triglav Lakes and the rocky slopes of Komna, flowers bloomed among the stones, and grass grew even where there seemed hardly enough earth to nourish a single blade.

The guardians of this mountain paradise were the White Ladies, gentle beings who lived far from human villages. They helped mothers at the birth of their children and taught shepherds which herbs could heal the sick. Yet they did not wish for strangers to enter their hidden home. When people approached too closely, white mountain goats would send stones tumbling down the slopes to warn them away.

The leader of those goats was Zlatorog, a magnificent white chamois with horns of shining gold. It was said that the horns were the key to treasure concealed in Mount Bogatin, where a many-headed serpent kept watch. But no hunter could easily claim such a prize. Whenever Zlatorog was wounded, drops of his blood caused the miraculous Triglav flowers to spring from the rock. One leaf of those flowers was enough to restore him to health.

In the valley of Trenta lived a young hunter, the only son of a widowed mother. The White Ladies had stood beside his cradle when he was born, and from that day he enjoyed their protection. No one else could climb so surely among the most dangerous heights. He knew the paths where the mountain flowers grew, and he gathered them with care.

The hunter loved the beautiful daughter of an innkeeper whose tavern stood where the Koritnica joined the Soča. He brought the girl flowers from the high mountains, blossoms that no one else in the valley could find. For a time, she welcomed his gifts, and the young man believed that their happiness would last.

But merchants traveled through the Soča valley carrying goods from Venice, and one Sunday, near the end of winter, a company of them stopped at the inn. Among them was a wealthy young stranger. He noticed the innkeeper’s daughter and began to court her with splendid presents. He slipped golden rings onto her fingers, placed a necklace of pearls around her neck, and ordered musicians to play so that she might dance.

When the hunter came forward to ask his beloved to dance with him, she looked at him reproachfully. Beside the glittering gifts of the Venetian, his simple mountain flowers suddenly seemed to her worth very little. Hurt by her coldness, the young man turned away from the inn.

Outside he encountered a man known as the Green Hunter. People in the valley said that this hunter had led more than one young man into trouble. Seeing the wounded pride of the youth from Trenta, he spoke of Zlatorog and the treasure of Bogatin. Why should a poor hunter come bearing flowers, he asked, when golden horns could open the way to riches greater than anything carried by the merchants?

The young man listened. The girl he loved had been dazzled by gold, and he imagined that with treasure of his own he could win back her favor. He forgot the kindness of the White Ladies and the protection they had given him since his birth. That very night he set out for the mountains with the Green Hunter.

Before the next morning was far advanced, the two had climbed into the high country where snow and ice still lay on the stone ledges. There, among the ridges, they found Zlatorog. The white animal stood against the mountain, his golden horns catching the early light.

The hunter raised his gun and fired.

The shot struck Zlatorog. Wounded, the chamois moved away along a narrow ledge above a deep precipice. The Green Hunter urged the young man onward, eager that they should finish the chase before the animal could heal itself.

Then the young hunter saw flowers growing in the most unlikely place: lovely blossoms opening among snow and bare stone. From the blood of the wounded Zlatorog the Triglav flowers had sprung. Nearby he recognized edelweiss, flowers he had often gathered to make a remedy for his mother’s eyes.

The sight brought her to mind. He remembered his widowed mother waiting in the valley and the many times he had traveled these mountains safely under the care of the White Ladies. For a moment he wanted to turn away, gather the healing plants, and go home.

But the Green Hunter pressed him to continue. If they delayed, he warned, Zlatorog would reach the flowers and regain his strength. The young man followed, taking the dangerous ledge farther above the abyss.

They were too late. Zlatorog had already eaten the miraculous flowers. Strength returned to his wounded body, and he turned upon the hunters. As he rushed toward them, his golden horns blazed in the sunlight with a brilliance greater than before.

The young hunter was blinded by their dazzling light. He glanced down at the depths below, lost his footing on the treacherous rock, and fell into the precipice.

Far down in the valley, the innkeeper’s daughter had begun to regret her unkindness. The fine gifts of the Venetian merchant could not comfort her. She waited for the hunter to return, but the days passed and he did not come.

Then the snow began to melt. The waters of the Soča swelled and hurried through the valley, carrying with them the body of the young hunter from Trenta. The girl who had waited for him learned at last that he would never climb the mountain paths again.

Nor did the high paradise remain as it had been. In his fury Zlatorog tore through the flowering pastures with his horns. When shepherds came to the heights in summer, they found bare rock where green meadows had once been. The White Ladies too had departed, never again to dwell among those mountains.

The treasure of Bogatin remained hidden. Zlatorog had vanished from human sight, and the beautiful garden of the White Ladies was gone. Yet the people of the valleys remembered the golden-horned guardian, the hunter who pursued him, and the flowers that rose from a drop of blood upon the rock.

And so the legend of Zlatorog lived on among the mountains of Slovenia.

Source: Slovenian folk legend Zlatorog, recorded by Karel Dežman in Laibacher Zeitung, no. 43 (21 February 1868). Adapted from the recorded traditional narrative; cross-checked against Triglav National Park’s account of the legend.

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Once there lived an elderly husband and wife who, though poor, had passed their lives in peace. They worked diligently, tended their small patch of land, and managed their humble household together. Yet one winter evening, as they sat beside their hearth, they began to speak not of the good things they possessed but of all that their neighbors had and they lacked.

“If only I had Uncle Polainas’s fine farm,” said the old man, “instead of my miserable little field!”

“And if only I had our neighbor’s sturdy house,” replied his wife, “instead of this one, which would tumble down if someone gave it a push!”

“Or his strong mule instead of our old donkey,” the husband went on.

“Or a great fat pig such as our neighbor can afford to slaughter,” said the wife. “Those fortunate people need only wish for a thing, and they seem to have it. Oh, if only our wishes could come true!”

No sooner had she spoken than a wondrous little lady descended through the chimney. She was scarcely half a yard tall and wore a golden crown like a queen. Her gown and veil seemed woven of pale smoke, and the sparks that danced upward from the fire settled upon them like glittering jewels. In her hand she held a tiny golden sceptre tipped with a brilliant red gem.

“I am the fairy Fortunata,” she announced. “I was passing by and heard your complaints. Since you long so earnestly to have your wishes fulfilled, I shall grant you three. One is for the wife, one for the husband, and the third must be chosen together. I shall return at this hour tomorrow evening to grant the last. Until then, you have time to decide.”

As she finished speaking, a cloud of smoke rose from the flames, and the beautiful little fairy disappeared within it.

How delighted the old couple were! They imagined fields, houses, livestock, and riches beyond counting. But each new thought displaced the one before it. At last, unable to choose, they agreed to sleep on the matter and settle their wishes in the morning. For the moment, they turned their conversation to ordinary things.

Soon they began speaking once more about their prosperous neighbors.

“I went to their house today,” said the husband. “They were making blood sausages. What magnificent sausages they were!”

“Oh, if only we had one here,” said his wife, “to roast over the embers for supper!”

The words were scarcely out of her mouth when the finest sausage anyone had ever seen appeared upon the glowing coals.

The old woman stared in astonishment. Her husband leapt to his feet, wringing his hands and pacing about the room.

“You have wasted one of our wishes on a sausage!” he cried. “Of all the foolish things! I wish that sausage were stuck to your nose!”

Instantly the sausage flew from the fire and fastened itself to the old woman’s nose.

Now it was the husband’s turn to stand speechless, while his wife tried in vain to pull the sausage away.

“Well done!” she exclaimed bitterly. “I may have wasted my wish, but at least I harmed no one. You have used yours to make a fool of me! As for the last wish, I shall ask for nothing but to have this sausage taken off my nose.”

“My dear wife!” pleaded her husband. “Think of the farm!”

“No.”

“Think of the house!”

“No.”

“We could wish for a gold mine,” he suggested desperately. “Then I could have a golden case made for your sausage!”

“Not for anything in the world!”

“Then are we to remain just as poor as we were before?”

“That is exactly what I wish,” she replied.

He begged and argued, but she would not yield. The sausage was miserable enough, and matters grew worse whenever the dog or the cat tried to leap up and seize it. By the following evening, the poor woman was more determined than ever.

When Fortunata returned, husband and wife told her what they had agreed upon: their last wish was that the sausage should disappear from the old woman’s nose.

The fairy granted it. Then she looked at them and said, “You see how blind and foolish people may be when they believe that having every desire fulfilled will make them happy. Happiness does not lie in the satisfaction of endless wishes. A person may be rich because he possesses much, yet truly happy because he desires nothing more.”

Source: Adapted from “Los deseos” by Fernán Caballero, published in Cuentos, adivinanzas y refranes populares (1921); based on the complete Spanish text.

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Once upon a time, a girl was sent into the woods to bring the cattle home. She searched among the trees and along the familiar paths, but she could not find the herd. The farther she went, the less she knew the way. At last she came to a great hill such as she had never seen before.

There were gates in the hill, and doors beyond the gates. Finding them open, the girl went inside. There she saw a table spread with every sort of good food. Near it stood a bed, and in the bed lay an enormous snake.

The snake spoke to her as gently as if it had been expecting a guest.

“Sit down, if you wish. Eat, if you wish. Come and lie beside me, if you wish. But if you do not wish to, you need do none of these things.”

The girl was so astonished to hear a snake speak that she neither sat down nor touched the food. She kept her distance from the bed.

After a while the snake said, “People will soon come here and ask you to dance with them. Do not go with them.”

Before long, people came into the hill. They invited the girl to dance, but she refused. Then they began to feast, eating and drinking around the laden table. Still the girl would not join them. When she could, she left the strange hill and found her way home.

On the following day she was sent once more into the woods to look for the cattle. Once more she searched without finding them; once more she lost her way. And, just as before, she came to the great hill with its gates and doors.

She went inside. Nothing had changed. There stood the table covered in food; there stood the bed; and in the bed lay the great snake.

“Sit down, if you wish,” it said. “Eat, if you wish. Come and lie beside me, if you wish. But if you do not wish to, you need do none of these things.”

The girl did not accept its invitation. The snake then warned her that even more people would arrive that day, wanting her to dance. She was not to go with them.

And so it happened. A great company entered the hill. They danced and made merry, and they ate and drank. But the girl did not dance, nor did she take part in their feast. She left them behind and went home a second time.

On the third day the girl again went into the woods. Again the cattle were nowhere to be found, and again the path led her, lost and wandering, to the great hill. She passed through its doors for the third time.

The table was still spread with food, and the snake still lay in the bed. As on the other days, it invited her to sit, eat, and come beside it, while leaving the choice to her.

But this time the girl chose differently. She sat at the table and ate heartily of the good food. When the snake asked her to lie beside it, she did so.

“Put your arm around me,” said the snake.

The girl obeyed.

“Now give me a kiss,” it said. “If you are frightened, you may place your apron between us.”

She was afraid, and so she held her apron between her face and the snake as she kissed it.

In that very instant the huge snake disappeared. Where it had lain was a wonderfully handsome young man. He was a prince who had been bound by a spell and forced to live in the shape of a snake. The girl’s courage had freed him at last.

Then the prince and the girl went away together. And of what became of them afterward, the old tale says no more.

Source: Traditional tale from Södermanland, Sweden, recorded in Gustav Erikson’s manuscript collection; published as “The Girl and the Snake” in The Swedish Fairy Book, edited by Klara Stroebe, translated by Frederick H. Martens (1921).

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In the mountain country of Uri, where steep slopes rise above deep valleys and Lake Lucerne lies among the peaks, the people treasured their freedom. They worked their fields, kept their herds, and followed paths that their families had known for generations. Yet, according to an old Swiss legend, a cruel governor named Gessler came to rule over them, and under his commands their lives grew troubled.

Gessler wanted every person to show him obedience. To test them, he placed his hat upon a pole in the marketplace of Altdorf and ordered everyone who passed it to bow. It mattered little to him whether the hat was worn by a man or stood alone upon a stick. He wished the people to acknowledge his power wherever they went.

Some bowed because they were afraid. Others lowered their heads only to protect their families. But in the valley lived a man named William Tell, a skilled marksman who knew the mountain paths and the waters of the lake. He could guide a boat when the wind rose suddenly, and his steady hand was famous among his neighbors.

One day Tell crossed the marketplace and passed the pole without bowing to the hat. The governor’s men noticed. They seized him and brought him before Gessler.

“Why did you refuse to honor my hat?” the governor demanded.

Tell stood before him. He had shown no reverence to the empty hat, and he could not pretend otherwise.

Gessler was furious. He wished not only to punish Tell but also to frighten all who had seen him disobey. Hearing of the man’s remarkable skill with a crossbow, the governor devised a dreadful test.

Tell’s young son was brought into the square. An apple was set upon the boy’s head. Gessler ordered Tell to shoot the apple with a single bolt. If Tell failed, the governor threatened terrible punishment for father and child.

A hush fell over the people. They knew Tell was an excellent marksman, but no one could imagine a father willingly taking such a risk. Tell begged to be spared the task, yet Gessler would not change his command.

The boy stood where he had been placed. Tell looked at his son, then at the apple, and took up his crossbow. From his bolts he chose two. He placed one in the bow and kept the other hidden beneath his clothing.

He raised the crossbow. The marketplace seemed to grow still around him. The distance was short enough for a skilled hunter, yet the smallest mistake would be unbearable. Tell aimed carefully and released the bolt.

It struck the apple. The fruit split, and the boy remained unharmed.

For a moment the crowd could hardly believe what it had witnessed. Then relief swept through the square. Tell had succeeded in the terrible task.

But Gessler had seen something that troubled him. He had noticed the second bolt.

“Why did you take two?” he asked. “I ordered you to shoot only once.”

Tell tried at first to avoid answering. At last he told the truth: if his shot had injured his son, the second bolt would have been meant for Gessler.

The governor’s anger returned. Though Tell had struck the apple and saved the boy, Gessler ordered him bound and taken across Lake Lucerne to the castle at Küssnacht, where he was to be kept a prisoner.

The guards led Tell to a boat. Gessler and his men went aboard, and the vessel put out across the lake. For a while they sailed between the mountains, but the weather in those waters could change with astonishing speed. Clouds gathered. A strong wind swept down from the slopes, and waves rose against the boat.

The men struggled to keep their course. Water struck the sides of the vessel; the oarsmen could scarcely master it. Even Gessler saw that they were in danger. Then someone remembered that Tell knew the lake as well as any boatman.

The governor ordered his bonds removed so that he could take the helm.

Tell took control of the vessel. He watched the waves and the shore, using all the knowledge he had gained over years upon the water. He steered toward a rocky ledge beside the lake. When the boat drew close enough, he sprang onto the stone, pushing the vessel back into the troubled water as he leapt.

Before the guards could seize him, Tell climbed away among the rocks. The boat was carried onward by the wind, while he escaped into the mountains.

He was free, but he knew Gessler’s power had not vanished. The governor could still threaten the people of Uri, and Tell himself remained a hunted man.

Tell traveled toward Küssnacht. There, along a narrow passage called the Hohle Gasse—the Hollow Lane—he waited for the governor to pass. High banks and trees enclosed the road. A traveler coming through it had little room to turn aside.

When Gessler approached, Tell lifted his crossbow. This time no apple stood before him and no child was in danger. He shot the governor, and Gessler fell. The man who had demanded that a whole people bow before his empty hat could command them no longer.

So the old story tells how William Tell resisted a tyrant, saved his son with an extraordinary shot, escaped through a storm upon the lake, and struck down the governor in the Hollow Lane.

The legend became part of Switzerland’s memory of its struggle for freedom. Long after the people who first told it were gone, parents repeated it to their children, and travelers heard of the apple, the crossbow, the storm, and the leap onto the rock. Whether every event truly happened cannot be established. But the story endured, carrying with it a question as old as the mountains themselves: what should a person do when those in power demand obedience to an unjust command?

Source: Traditional Swiss legend of William Tell, first attested in the White Book of Sarnen (c. 1470); adapted with reference to the Swiss National Museum and the Swiss federal authorities’ historical accounts.

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Once upon a time, in a town of busy bazaars and narrow streets, there lived a woman who was cleverer at deception than anyone who knew her. She had two husbands, and each believed himself to be her only husband. One made his living by stealing, the other by cheating. Both had learned their dishonest trades from the woman, but neither knew about the other.

The thief would carry his stolen goods to a merchant, sell them, and bring home the money. Soon afterward the deceiver would visit the same merchant, seize him by the collar, and claim that the goods had been stolen from him. In this way the three had grown accustomed to living by their wits at other people’s expense.

One day their schemes began to unravel. The merchant protested that he had bought the goods honestly, and a great quarrel broke out. Word spread that the authorities were looking for the thief. The woman warned him to leave town until the danger passed. She packed him some bread and half a sheep’s tail for his journey.

Not long afterward the deceiver arrived home in distress. His own trick had been discovered, he said, and he too must hide for a few days. The woman gave him the other half of the loaf and the remaining half of the sheep’s tail, and sent him away.

By chance the two men came to the same riverbank. Tired from walking, they sat down to eat and agreed to share their provisions. At once they noticed that their pieces of bread fitted together into one whole loaf. Their portions of sheep’s tail fitted together just as neatly.

They stared at the food, then at one another.

“Where do you live?” asked one.

“In a certain town, on a certain street,” replied the other, and he described his house.

“But that is where my wife lives!” cried the first.

“Your wife?” answered the second. “She is my wife!”

Each insisted that the woman was married to him. At last they decided to return to town together and ask her to explain.

When she saw them approaching side by side, she immediately understood what had happened. Instead of denying anything, she welcomed them indoors and listened to their complaints.

“Yes,” she said, “I have been the wife of you both. But from this day forward I shall belong to whichever of you proves the cleverer at his trade. I taught you both your skills. Let us see who has learned the better lesson.”

The men agreed to the contest. The deceiver insisted on going first.

The following day he watched a wealthy man in the marketplace place a thousand gold coins in a purse and hide it inside his clothing. In the crowd the deceiver secretly took the purse, removed nine coins, slipped his own seal ring inside, and returned it unseen.

Then he approached the man and loudly accused him of stealing his money. The astonished owner protested, but the deceiver dragged him before the judge.

“How much money is in the purse?” asked the judge.

“One thousand gold coins,” said its owner.

“And what do you claim is yours?” the judge asked the deceiver.

“Nine hundred and ninety-one coins,” replied the deceiver. “And my seal ring is with them.”

The purse was opened. There were exactly nine hundred and ninety-one coins, and among them lay the ring. The judge believed the false accusation. The innocent man was punished, and the deceiver departed with his stolen prize.

The thief had watched the entire trick. Now it was his turn.

That evening he took a rope and led his rival to the sultan’s palace. They climbed over the wall and found their way into the treasury. The thief invited the deceiver to take as much gold as he could carry, and he gathered a heavy bundle for himself.

Yet the thief was not finished. He went to the poultry yard, took a goose, and set it roasting over a fire. He ordered the deceiver to turn the spit while he went farther into the palace.

“Where are you going?” whispered the deceiver in alarm.

“To ask the sultan which of us deserves to win the contest,” replied the thief.

“Do not be ridiculous! Let us escape before we are caught. You may have the woman!”

“You say that now,” the thief replied, “but tomorrow you may deny it. I want the sultan himself to decide.”

He slipped into the royal bedchamber. The sultan was asleep while an attendant rubbed his feet, sleepily chewing a raisin. The thief found a horsehair and, with extraordinary care, drew the raisin out of the attendant’s mouth. The puzzled man looked everywhere for it, then began to doze again.

The thief held a bottle of strong spirits beneath the attendant’s nose until he fell unconscious. He gently put the man into a basket and lowered it from the balcony. Then he took the attendant’s place at the foot of the bed. His terrified companion, who had followed him, hovered by the doorway.

When the sultan stirred, the thief spoke softly. “Your Majesty, may I tell you a story?”

The half-asleep ruler consented.

The thief began at the beginning. He told of the woman with two husbands, the divided bread and sheep’s tail, and the deceiver’s clever but wicked trick in the marketplace. Then he told how the two men had entered the royal treasury. He even described stealing the raisin and lowering the attendant in a basket.

From the doorway the deceiver whispered again and again, “Come away! We shall both be caught!”

“Mind the goose,” the thief whispered back, and continued his tale.

At last he asked, “O Sultan, which man’s feat was the greater? Which has proved himself cleverer?”

The drowsy sultan answered that the thief had shown the greater skill. Then he fell asleep again.

The thief quietly withdrew and found his companion trembling with fright. “You heard the sultan’s judgment,” he said. “Do you admit that I have won?”

“Yes, yes,” the deceiver replied. “Only let us leave!”

But the thief pretended that he might go back and ask the sultan once more. In desperation the deceiver promised not only to abandon the contest but even to serve the thief if he would depart at once. Finally they gathered their gold and fled the palace.

The woman was greatly impressed by what the thief had accomplished. She chose him, and the two were married openly.

The next morning the sultan awakened and called for his attendants. No one answered. Then he noticed a basket hanging beyond the balcony. Inside was the missing servant, still dazed. When the man was revived, he could explain nothing. Slowly the sultan remembered the extraordinary story he had heard during the night.

He summoned his ministers and told them what had happened. Rather than send soldiers through the streets, he ordered heralds to announce that the daring thief might come safely to the palace. The sultan promised that he would not be harmed, that he could keep the gold he had taken, and that he would receive a pension besides.

Trusting the ruler’s solemn word, the thief came forward.

“Why did you do such a thing?” asked the sultan.

The man related the whole adventure without concealing his misdeeds. The sultan kept his promise and pardoned him. Moved by this unexpected mercy, the thief vowed never to steal again.

And so the man who had tried to win a contest in dishonesty ended it by giving up his dishonest trade. He and his wife lived thereafter grateful for the mercy they had received, and they wished the sultan health and happiness for the rest of their days.

Source: Traditional Turkish folk tale collected and translated by Ignácz Kúnos, “The Deceiver and the Thief,” in Forty-Four Turkish Fairy Tales (George G. Harrap & Co., 1913). Literary adaptation following the published narrative.

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An old man was walking through the forest, and his little dog was running along behind him. As he went on his way, one of his mittens slipped from his hand and fell upon the ground. The old man did not notice. He walked deeper into the woods, with his dog following close behind.

Before long, a mouse came running by. She saw the mitten lying on the forest floor and crept inside.

“Here is where I shall live!” said the mouse, settling herself in her new home.

A little later, a frog came hopping along. She stopped beside the mitten and called, “Who is it, who is it, living in this mitten?”

“I am Mouse the Scratcher,” came the answer. “And who are you?”

“I am Frog the Croaker. Let me come in!”

“Come in, then!” said the mouse.

And now there were two living in the mitten.

Soon a hare came running through the forest. He noticed the mitten and called, “Who is it, who is it, living in this mitten?”

“Mouse the Scratcher and Frog the Croaker,” came the reply. “And who are you?”

“I am Hare the Runner. Let me come in!”

“Come in!” they answered.

The hare squeezed inside, and now there were three.

Next a fox came trotting by. At the sight of the mitten, she stopped and asked, “Who is it, who is it, living in this mitten?”

“Mouse the Scratcher, Frog the Croaker, and Hare the Runner. And who are you?”

“I am Sister Fox. Let me come in!”

“Well, come in!” they said.

The fox joined them. Now four creatures were sitting in the mitten.

Along came a wolf. He too stopped and called, “Who is it, who is it, living in this mitten?”

“Mouse the Scratcher, Frog the Croaker, Hare the Runner, and Sister Fox. And who are you?”

“I am Brother Wolf. Let me come in!”

“Come in, then!” said the animals inside.

The wolf climbed into the mitten, and now there were five.

Then, from somewhere in the woods, came a wild boar.

“Grunt, grunt, grunt!” he cried. “Who is it, who is it, living in this mitten?”

“Mouse the Scratcher, Frog the Croaker, Hare the Runner, Sister Fox, and Brother Wolf. And who are you?”

“Grunt, grunt, grunt! I am Boar the Tusked. Let me come in!”

“Oh, what a bother!” cried the animals. “Everyone who passes wants to live in our mitten. How could you possibly fit?”

“I shall fit somehow,” said the boar. “Only let me in!”

“What else can we do?” they answered at last. “Come in!”

So the boar squeezed himself inside. Now there were six, and they were packed so tightly together that there was scarcely any room left.

But just then the bushes began to crackle and rustle. Out came a great bear. He made his way to the mitten and roared, “Who is it, who is it, living in this mitten?”

“Mouse the Scratcher, Frog the Croaker, Hare the Runner, Sister Fox, Brother Wolf, and Boar the Tusked. And who are you?”

“Grr, grr, grr! What a crowd you are! I am Bear the Wanderer. Let me come in!”

“Where could we put you?” the others cried. “We are already pressed together so tightly!”

“We shall manage somehow,” replied the bear.

“Well, come in, then,” said the animals, “but stay right at the edge!”

The bear pushed himself into the mitten. Now there were seven inside, and the mitten was stretched so tightly that it seemed ready to tear at any moment.

Meanwhile, the old man had noticed that his mitten was missing. He turned around and went back through the forest to look for it. His little dog ran ahead of him.

The dog ran and ran until he saw something lying on the ground. It was the mitten—but it was moving!

“Woof! Woof! Woof!” barked the dog.

At that sound, all seven animals were terribly frightened. Out they burst from the mitten, one after another, and away they scattered into the forest.

The old man came up, found his mitten, and picked it up again. Then he went on his way.

Source: Traditional Ukrainian folk tale “Рукавичка” (Rukavychka), recorded in nineteenth-century Ukrainian folklore collections. Adapted from the Ukrainian text published in From Storytelling to State-building: Folklore and Poetry in the Development of the Nation (Simon Fraser University History Honours Project).

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Long before the days of King Arthur and his knights, a king held his court at Colchester in the east of England. He had a daughter who was loved by everyone who knew her, for she was as gentle and kind as she was beautiful. When the princess was fifteen years old, her mother died, and sorrow fell upon the palace.

After a time, the king married again. His new wife was a wealthy widow with a daughter of her own. But neither the queen nor her daughter had any love for the young princess. They envied her and whispered unkind stories about her until even her father began to treat her coldly.

At last the princess could bear the unhappiness of the court no longer. One day she met her father in the palace garden and begged him to let her go out into the world and seek her fortune. The king agreed. He told his new wife to give the girl whatever she thought suitable for the journey.

The queen gave her no fine clothes, money, or jewels. Instead she handed her a coarse canvas bag with a little brown bread and hard cheese, and a bottle of small beer. The princess thanked her all the same, took up her poor provisions, and set out alone.

She passed through groves and woods, crossed valleys, and traveled until she came to a cave. At its entrance an old man sat upon a stone.

“Good morning, fair maiden,” he said. “Where are you going?”

“I am seeking my fortune, father,” she answered.

“And what have you in your bag and bottle?”

“Only bread and cheese in the bag, and a little beer in the bottle. But you are welcome to share them.”

She opened her bag and offered him what she had. The old man ate gratefully. When he had finished, he told her of a thick hedge of thorns that blocked the path ahead.

“Take this wand,” he said. “When you reach the hedge, strike it three times and say, ‘Pray, hedge, let me come through.’ It will open for you. Beyond it you will find a well. Sit beside it, and three golden heads will rise out of the water. Whatever they ask of you, do it.”

The princess thanked him and continued on her way. Soon the thorn hedge stood before her, tangled so thickly that she could not see a way through. She tapped it three times with the wand and spoke the words the old man had taught her. At once the branches drew apart and made a passage.

On the other side she found the well and sat down on its edge. Before long a golden head rose from the water and sang:

“Wash me and comb me, And lay me down softly; Set me on the bank to dry, So I may look fair to every passer-by.”

“Gladly,” answered the princess. She gently washed the head, combed its hair with a silver comb, and laid it on a bank of primroses. A second golden head rose from the well and asked the same favor, and then a third. She cared for each as tenderly as the first.

While the princess was preparing to eat her simple meal, the three heads spoke together.

“What gifts shall we give this maiden, who has treated us so kindly?” asked the first.

“I give her such beauty that she shall charm the mightiest prince in the world,” it said.

“I give her a voice sweeter than the song of a nightingale,” said the second.

“And I give her the good fortune to become queen beside a great king,” said the third.

The princess thanked the heads, lowered them gently into the well, and went on her way.

Not long afterward she came upon a king who was hunting in his park with his nobles. She would have slipped quietly past, but he saw her and approached. He was struck by her beauty and even more by the sweetness of her voice. As they spoke, he found that he wished never to part from her. Before long he asked her to marry him, and she consented.

When the king learned that his bride was the daughter of the King of Colchester, he ordered splendid carriages to be prepared and took his new queen to visit her father. Their carriage shone with gold and precious stones. The old king could scarcely believe the change in his daughter’s fortunes, but the young king told him how it had all come about.

There was feasting and dancing at Colchester for many days. Everyone rejoiced except the stepmother and her daughter, who were consumed with envy. At last the visitors departed, taking with them the dowry that the princess’s father now gave her.

The queen’s daughter soon announced that she, too, would go out and seek her fortune. Her mother provided her with rich dresses, sugar, almonds, and sweetmeats, and a large bottle of fine wine. Thus supplied, she followed the road her stepsister had taken.

At the cave she met the same old man.

“Where are you going so quickly, young woman?” he asked.

“What is that to you?” she replied.

“And what have you in your bag and bottle?”

“Good things that you shall have none of.”

“Will you share a little with me?”

“Not a morsel, nor a drop!” she said, and hurried away.

“May ill fortune follow you,” the old man murmured.

Soon she reached the thorn hedge. Seeing a small opening between the branches, she tried to squeeze through it. But the hedge closed around her and its thorns tore at her skin. By the time she escaped she was scratched and bleeding. Looking for water to wash herself, she found the well and sat down beside it.

The first golden head rose and sang its familiar request to be washed and combed. Instead of helping it, she struck it with her bottle.

“There is your washing!” she cried.

The second head appeared, and then the third, but she treated them no better. When they had sunk beneath the water, the three conferred about the stranger’s cruelty.

“I give her a disfiguring disease upon her face,” said the first.

“I give her a voice as rough as the cry of a corncrake,” said the second.

“And I give her a poor country cobbler for a husband,” said the third.

The young woman continued until she came to a town on market day. People stared at her altered face and fled when they heard her harsh voice. One man, however, did not turn away. He was a poor cobbler who had recently repaired the shoes of an old hermit. The hermit had no money to pay him, but had given him a box of healing ointment and a bottle of medicine for a damaged voice.

The cobbler approached the stranger and asked who she was.

“I am the daughter of the Queen of Colchester,” she told him.

“If I cure your face and voice,” the cobbler asked, “will you agree to marry me?”

“Yes,” she answered, “with all my heart.”

He used the remedies the hermit had given him. In a few weeks she was well again. True to her promise, she married the cobbler, and together they traveled to Colchester.

When the queen discovered that her daughter had married a poor shoemaker instead of a prince, she fell into such furious despair that she took her own life. The king, who had long been weary of his second wife’s cruelty, gave the cobbler a hundred pounds on condition that the couple leave the court and live elsewhere in the kingdom.

They did so. For many years the cobbler earned his living by repairing shoes, while his wife spun the thread he needed. And far away, the kind princess lived as queen, her fortune changed by the kindness she had shown when she had so little to give.

Source: Traditional English folktale, “The Three Heads of the Well,” collected by Joseph Jacobs in English Fairy Tales (1890), from J. O. Halliwell’s earlier version (p. 158). Literary adaptation based on the complete published narrative.

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In the heart of Rome, where the great church of Saint Peter now overlooks a wide square, stands a tall stone obelisk. It is older than the city that surrounds it, older even than the church. Long ago it came from Egypt across the sea, and for centuries it stood near the place where the Vatican rises today.

In the year 1586, Pope Sixtus V decided that the ancient stone should be moved to a new position before Saint Peter’s Basilica. It was a mighty undertaking. The obelisk was made of solid red granite and weighed as much as many hundreds of horses. How could such a burden be lifted without breaking it—or crushing the men who worked beneath it?

The pope entrusted the task to an architect named Domenico Fontana. Fontana planned every part of the operation: the timber framework, the great turning winches, the ropes that would hold the stone, and the teams of men and horses who would pull together. There were hundreds of workers and scores of horses, yet the strength of all of them would count for nothing unless each rope tightened at the proper moment.

On the day the obelisk was to be raised, people gathered to witness the extraordinary sight. The enormous stone lay secured within its wooden machinery. Thick ropes ran from the framework to the winches. Every man had his place, every horse its team, and every movement depended on a signal from the architect.

The work demanded such attention that, according to the old story, silence was ordered throughout the square. No one was to shout or call out while the stone was rising. A mistaken cry might distract a team at the wrong instant and bring disaster upon them all.

Slowly, under the strain of the ropes, the obelisk began to move. The great winches creaked. The horses pulled; the men hauled and steadied the lines. Inch by inch the ancient stone lifted away from the earth. The crowd watched it climb toward the sky.

Among the onlookers, the legend says, was a sailor from the Ligurian coast named Benedetto Bresca. He was a man who knew ropes—not from raising monuments, but from ships, where hemp lines must withstand the pull of wind and water. He watched the lifting with a sailor’s practiced eyes.

Then he noticed something alarming. The ropes were under a terrible strain. As the weight shifted, some appeared to stretch and grow dangerously hot. If they failed, the great stone could fall before anyone had time to escape.

Bresca remembered what sailors did when hemp ropes needed to tighten. Water could make their fibers contract. But there was the command to keep silent. All around him the work continued, and the vast stone hung above the ground.

For a moment he faced a choice. He could obey the order and say nothing, or he could speak and risk punishment. The legend remembers the choice he made.

“Acqua alle funi!” he shouted. “Water on the ropes!”

His cry rang through the square. The workers heard it. Water was brought and poured upon the strained hemp. The ropes tightened, and the dangerous moment passed. The men returned to their task, the horses pulled again, and at last the obelisk was raised upright in its new place.

Only then could the crowd look up at the towering granite and understand what had been accomplished. The ancient stone stood secure, where it would remain for centuries. Above the bustle of the square it rose into the clear Roman air, an immense witness to the courage and labor of those who had lifted it.

But what of the sailor who had broken the command of silence? The people had heard him cry out. Would he be punished?

According to the tradition, Pope Sixtus V learned why Bresca had shouted and chose to reward him instead. The sailor did not ask for gold or a title. He asked that his home town, Sanremo, should have the privilege of providing the palm branches used in Rome for Palm Sunday. The request was granted, the story says, and the custom became another way of remembering the sailor and his warning.

Today visitors to Saint Peter’s Square can still see the obelisk standing at its center. They can walk around its base and look up to the cross that crowns the ancient stone. They may learn of Fontana’s remarkable engineering, of the men and horses who labored to raise it, and of the sailor whose voice, so the legend tells us, was heard just when silence had become dangerous.

And whenever the story is told, the words that saved the obelisk are spoken once more: “Acqua alle funi!”—“Water on the ropes!”

Source: Traditional account of Benedetto Bresca and the raising of the Vatican Obelisk in 1586; historical setting verified against the Vatican’s official description of the obelisk and Vatican Radio’s account of Domenico Fontana’s work. The sailor’s intervention and reward are related as legend.

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