The Green Knight (fairy tale)

The Green Knight (fairy tale)

The Green Knight is a Danish fairy tale, collected by Evald Tang Kristensen in "Eventyr fra Jylland" and by Svendt Grundtvig in "Danish Fairy Tales".

This tale combines Aarne-Thompson type 510A with type 425N, the bird husband, and type 432, the prince as bird.

Andrew Lang included a translation of Kristensen's version in "The Olive Fairy Book".

ynopsis

A dying queen asked her husband to do whatever their daughter asked of him, whatever it was, and the king promised. The widow of a count and her daughter did everything to make themselves the princess's favorites (in some variants persuading the princess to have them stay at the castle), and then the widow told her that they could not stay unless the king married her. The princess implored the king to do it, and when his objections could not convince her, he married the woman.

As soon as she was her stepmother, the woman began to maltreat the princess. The king, seeing this, sent the princess to a summer palace, or had one built for her. He went there one day to bid her farewell because he was going on a long journey, to a great tournament. She told him to greet her to the Green Knight. At the tournament, he met no Green Knight, but on the way home, he came through a forest where he found a swineherd, and on asking whose pigs they were, was told they were the Green Knight's. He went on and found the marvellous castle where the Green Knight, a handsome young man lived. He gave him his daughter's greetings. The Green Knight had never heard of her -- in some variants, he says she must have been thinking of the green of the graveyard -- but makes the king welcome and gives him a gift: either a green book or a casket with his portrait.

The king returned home. In the variants with the book, the princess had not known why she had spoken of the Green Knight, and when she went through the pages of the book, he flew in as a bird and courted her; in the variants with the casket, she recognizes him as the man she dreamed of, and he comes to court her. In all variants, he visits her secretly, to avoid her stepmother, but her stepmother learns of it. In the bird variants, she puts a poisoned pair of scissors in the window; in the others, she puts a poisoned nail in the oar he used to row out. In all, he was injured visiting the princess and stopped.

The princess, not knowing why, is told by a bird, or overhears two birds talking, of his illness, and that a snake with nine young snakes in her father's stables could cure him. She got the snakes, went to the Green Knight's castle, and got a job in the kitchen. There, she persuaded them to let her cook the soup for him. For three days, she fed him a soup made from three of the young snakes, and he recovered.

In some variants, he went to the kitchen and recognized her; in others, she asked to marry him, and he refused because he had already promised to marry, and she cleaned herself up so that he recognized her. In all, they marry.

ee also

*Cinderella
*The Canary Prince
*The Blue Bird
*The Feather of Finist the Falcon
*The Three Sisters
*The Enchanted Snake

External links

* [http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/greenknight.html "The Green Knight"]
* [http://www.mythfolklore.net/andrewlang/338.htm "The Green Knight"] , Andrew Lang's version


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем решить контрольную работу

Look at other dictionaries:

  • The Three Sisters (fairy tale) — The Three Sisters is an Italian literary fairy tale written by Giambattista Basile in his 1634 work, the Pentamerone .ynopsisA woman had three daughters; the two older were very unlucky but the youngest, Nella, was very fortunate. A prince… …   Wikipedia

  • The Blue Bird (fairy tale) — For other literary works called The Blue Bird or L Oiseau Bleu, see The Blue Bird. The Blue Bird is a French literary fairy tale by Madame d Aulnoy, published in 1697. An English translation was included in The Green Fairy Book , 1892, collected… …   Wikipedia

  • Green Knight (disambiguation) — The Green Knight is a figure in Arthurian romance.Green Knight can also refer to:* The Greene Knight , a late medieval romance that tells the same story as Sir Gawain and the Green Knight * The Green Knight (fairy tale), a Danish fairy tale… …   Wikipedia

  • Green Knight — This article is about the character in Arthurian legend. For other uses, see Green Knight (disambiguation). A painting from the original Gawain manuscript. The Green Knight is seated on the horse, holding up his severed head in his right hand.… …   Wikipedia

  • The Water of Life (German fairy tale) — The Water of Life ( de. Das Wasser des Lebens) is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, tale number 97. [Jacob and Wilheim Grimm, Household Tales , [http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/authors/grimms/97wateroflife.html The Water of… …   Wikipedia

  • The Brown Bear of the Green Glen — is a Scottish fairy tale collected by John Francis Campbell in Popular Tales of the West Highlands , listing his informant as Neill Gillies, fisherman, near Inverary. He also noted the parallels with The Water of Life . [John Francis Campbell,… …   Wikipedia

  • The Children of Húrin —   …   Wikipedia

  • The Enchanted Snake — or The Snake is an Italian fairy tale. Giambattista Basile wrote a variant in The Pentamerone .Giambattista Basile, The Pentamerone [http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/pentamerone/14serpent1911.html The Snake ] ] Andrew Lang drew upon this… …   Wikipedia

  • The Book of Lost Tales — The History of Middle earth Volumes I and II Volume III Volume IV Volume V Volumes VI–IX Volume X Volume XI Volume XII …   Wikipedia

  • The History of The Hobbit —   Author(s) J. R. R. Tolkien John D. Rateliff …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”