Tatterhood is a
fairy taleA fairy tale is a fictional story that may feature folkloric characters such as fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, giants, gnomes, and talking animals, and usually enchantments, often involving a far-fetched sequence of events...
collected by
Peter Christen AsbjørnsenPeter Christen Asbjørnsen was a Norwegian writer and scholar. He and Jørgen Engebretsen Moe were collectors of Norwegian folklore...
and
Jørgen MoeJørgen Engebretsen Moe was a Norwegian bishop and author.He is best known for the Norske Folkeeventyr, a collection of Norwegian folk tales which he edited in collaboration with Peter Christen Asbjørnsen....
.
It is Aarne-Thompson type 711, the beautiful and the ugly twin. This tale type is quite common in Norway and Iceland and very rare elsewhere.
A version of the tale also appears in
A Book of WitchesA Book of Witches is a 1966 anthology of 12 fairy tales from Europe that have been collected and retold by Ruth Manning-Sanders. It is one in a long series of such anthologies by Manning-Sanders....
and
A Choice of MagicA Choice of Magic is a 1971 anthology of 32 fairy tales from around the world that have been collected and retold by Ruth Manning-Sanders. In fact, the book is mostly a collection of tales published in previous Manning-Sanders anthologies...
, by
Ruth Manning-SandersRuth Manning-Sanders was a Welsh poet and author who was perhaps best known for her series of children's books in which she collected and retold fairy tales from all over the world. The dust jacket for A Book of Giants aptly describes her writing style: "Mrs. Manning-Sanders tells the stories with...
.
Saddened by her inability to bear children, a queen adopts an orphan. The orphan becomes close friends with a beggar girl.
When the queen's daughter is called to the queen's presence, the beggar girl comes with her, holding her hand.
Tatterhood is a
fairy taleA fairy tale is a fictional story that may feature folkloric characters such as fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, giants, gnomes, and talking animals, and usually enchantments, often involving a far-fetched sequence of events...
collected by
Peter Christen AsbjørnsenPeter Christen Asbjørnsen was a Norwegian writer and scholar. He and Jørgen Engebretsen Moe were collectors of Norwegian folklore...
and
Jørgen MoeJørgen Engebretsen Moe was a Norwegian bishop and author.He is best known for the Norske Folkeeventyr, a collection of Norwegian folk tales which he edited in collaboration with Peter Christen Asbjørnsen....
.
It is Aarne-Thompson type 711, the beautiful and the ugly twin. This tale type is quite common in Norway and Iceland and very rare elsewhere.
A version of the tale also appears in
A Book of WitchesA Book of Witches is a 1966 anthology of 12 fairy tales from Europe that have been collected and retold by Ruth Manning-Sanders. It is one in a long series of such anthologies by Manning-Sanders....
and
A Choice of MagicA Choice of Magic is a 1971 anthology of 32 fairy tales from around the world that have been collected and retold by Ruth Manning-Sanders. In fact, the book is mostly a collection of tales published in previous Manning-Sanders anthologies...
, by
Ruth Manning-SandersRuth Manning-Sanders was a Welsh poet and author who was perhaps best known for her series of children's books in which she collected and retold fairy tales from all over the world. The dust jacket for A Book of Giants aptly describes her writing style: "Mrs. Manning-Sanders tells the stories with...
.
Sypnosis
Saddened by her inability to bear children, a queen adopts an orphan. The orphan becomes close friends with a beggar girl.
When the queen's daughter is called to the queen's presence, the beggar girl comes with her, holding her hand. The princess is chided for associating below her class, but the beggar tells the queen that if she knew of her own mother's power, she would not drive her away. Skeptical, the queen protests, but is soon convinced by the child to test the beggar-woman's abilities. She is brought to the queen's presence and denies having any power to grant the queen fertility, but the beggar-child insists that if she is gotten drunk, she will tell her secrets.
The queen treats the woman to large amounts of alcohol, and as the woman becomes drunk, the queen repeats the question of how she can be granted fertility. The woman tells her to take in two pails of water one evening before she goes to bed, and wash in each of them and toss the water under the bed. Two flowers will spring up overnight where the water was, she says, one beautiful, and one ugly. The woman tells the queen that if she eats the beautiful flower, she will bear a child. But she is warned not to eat the ugly flower.
The queen takes the woman's advice, but eats the ugly one as well.
The queen gives birth eventually to an ugly girl who is named Tatterhood and is dressed in rags, and who rides a goat and carries a wooden spoon. This ugly child promises the queen that soon she will be followed by a beautiful daughter, who duly arrives some time later. The two children are very close.
One
Christmas EveChristmas Eve, December 24, is the night before Christmas Day, which celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ.-Western Churches:Many Roman Catholics and Anglicans traditionally celebrate a midnight Mass which begins sometime before midnight on Christmas Day; this ceremony, which is held in churches...
Tatterhood takes it upon herself to vanquish witches and trolls celebrating outside the queen's chamber, and her sister, trying to watch, has her head turned to a calf's by one of the witches.
Rebuking the guards for their carelessness, Tatterhood has a ship fitted out and sails with her sister to the kingdom where the witches come from. She does battle with the witches until they agree to free her sister from the spell. The king meets Tatterhood and her sister when he learns of the witches' defeat, and promptly falls in love with the beautiful sister. Tatterhood refuses to give permission for them to marry until she has married the king's son. This is finally arranged, and the prince is very sad.
On the wedding day, Tatterhood asks the bridegroom why he does not ask why she rides a goat, and when he duly asks, she answers that is a grand horse, which it promptly becomes. She then asks why he does not ask why she carries a wooden spoon, which he asks, and she declares it to be a fan (or in some versions a wand), which it turns into. This is repeated with the tattered hood, which is turned into a golden crown, and with Tatterhood herself, whose beauty she declares to surpass her sister's, which it then does. The prince is overjoyed by her beauty and finally glad to be married to her.
See also
- Kate Crackernuts
- Prince Lindworm
- The Cat on the Dovrefell
The Cat on the Dovrefjell is a Norwegian fairy tale collected by Asbjørnsen and Moe. It is Aarne-Thompson type 1161.-Synopsis:...