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adarkrainbow · 7 months ago

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Some scholarly notes about the Grimm fairytales (2)

A follow-up of this post.

The Frog King or Iron Henry (Der Froschkönig oder der eiserne Heinrich)

This story belongs to the AaTh 440, "The frog-king".

The story first appears in the 1810's manuscript, written by Wilhelm - it was probably told by Henriette Dorothea "Dortchen", Wilhelm's future wife. A second version, called "The frog prince", had been told to them by their friend Marie Hassenpflug and was published in the 1815 edition as the thirteenth tale, before being moved to the notes of the 1822 due to its too-great similarity with the KHM 1.

This fairytale was originally called "The king's daughter and the bewitched prince". The 1810 manuscript has, written by Jacob right next to the title, "The frog-king", while the paper on which he had placed all his notes about the fairytale bore the name "Iron Henry". The evolution of this fairytale is very interesting because it testifies the brothers' love and care for details, hich had the story double in sie throughout the editions. In the final text we have, for example, a long sentence describing how the princess sees the ball fall into a well so deep she can't see the end, and about her crying a lot and lamenting, etc, etc... In the 1810 manuscript it was just one short sentence "She stood near the well and she was sad."

The major editing of this tale was the removal of the erotic motif from the tale's ending. Originally, the frog asked the princess the authorizaton to sleep in her bed, and right after the frog became a human it was written "the princess joined the prince in bed". This, plus the addition by the Grimms of moral lessons delivered by the father (the king tells things such as "You must always keep your promise" and "You must not disdain the one who helps you"), completely changed the goal and purpose of the tale - it was originally about setting free an animal husband, but the Grimms turned it into a moral tale to learn a virtuous behavior.

The brothers Grimm considered this fairytale to be the oldest and most beautiful of their collection. Allusions to the frog-king tale can be found as early as the Middle-Ages and the 16th century. In the 1801 edtion of the 1548 Scottish book "Complaynt of Scotland", a note evokes how a tale is similar to "The Frog Prince" due to having a well, the presence of magic, and a frog complaining in rhymes. In this Scottish version, a girl is sent by her stepmother to fetch water at "the well of the world's end". There she meets the frog, who tells her it will offer her water only if she agrees to marry it - if not, the frog will rip the girl apart. The brothers Grimm themselves noted various literary sources for their tale, that they used in their compilation work. The name of Henry (Heinrich) comes from the novel "Der arme Heinrich" by Hartmann von Aue. They also listed the "Froschmeuseler", a didactic epic by Georg Rollenhagen depicting a war between frogs and mice: the association of sadness with "rings of iron" comes from this text, as well as the very name "frog-kng" which is found in the title of the second chapter "Tale of the encounter between Thief-of-Crumbs, son of the mice-king, with the frog-king".

The Wolf and the Seven young Goats (Der Wolf und die sieben jungen Geiblein)

It is the AaTh 123, "The wolf and the lambs".

Collected in the "region of Main" according to the Grimm, it is very likely that the brothers Grimm received this tale from someone of the Hassenpflug family, as they knew the French fables of La Fontaine which correspond to this fairytale. In the 5th edition of their book, the brothers Grimm modified their story due to the publication in 1842 of an Alsacian tale by Ströber, "Die sieben Gaislein", "The seven young goats" (collected in Volksbüchlein, "The Folks' Small Book) - Wilhelm Grimm borrowed several expressions from this text. The brothers Grimm listed this Alsacian tale in their notes.

In their notes the brothers Grimm listed a Pomeranian version about a child who, when his mother is out, is swallowed by a sort of bogeyman known as "The children's ghost". But since the ghost eats stone at the same time, he becomes slow and heavy - he falls and the child can escape his belly unharmed. The brothers Grimm also listed variations collected/written by Boner in his Edelstein, and by Buckhard Waldis - as well as the La Fontaine fables. They also knew of a French fairytale, from which they noted a passage where the wolf asks a miller to turn her paw white with flour, and since the miller refuses, the wolf threatens to eat him. The Grimms linked the episode of the wolf's belly filled with stones with the legend of a Nereid called Psamathe, who sent a wolf destroy the flocks of Peleas and Telamon, only for the wolf to be petrified.

This tale, like many others within the Grimm's collection (it is especially comparable "Cat and Mouse in Partnership) is aimed at educating young children, with the narrator highlighting how children should be wary and distrustful of the wickedness and cowardice of men. Unlike other versions and predecessors of the tale, the brothers Grimm insist on the mother's role as a teacher, and on the fact that she saves her kids.

Rapunzel

It is the AaTh 310, "The maiden in the tower".

The literary sources of this fairytale are well-known. It was preceeded by the French literary tale "Persinette", by mademoiselle de La Force, itself inspired by Basile's story "Parsley Flower". In their notes the brothers Grimm explained they took inspiration from the almost-literal German translation of mademoiselle de La Force's story by Friedrich Schulz. However, in quite a misunderstanding, the brothers admired this tale as being an obvious "folktale" coming from the "oral tradition" - when we know it was a literary fairytale, though based on a folkloric motif.

The text was heavily edited after the many criticism the first edition of the book underwent - the scene depicting the prince's relationship with Rapunzel was regularly changed. In 1837 it is written that the prince asked Rapunzel to marry him almost right away, and she agreed since he was young and pretty, and they "held hands". In 1819, it was written that they lived together in "joy and pleasure" for a certain time, and "loved each other like woman and wife", and the "fairy" only realizes something is up when Rapunzel blurts out it is easier to make the prince climb than her "godmother". In the 1812 edition, it is said that Rapunzel and prince lived together in "joy and pleasure", but no mention of any marital couple whatsoever - and Rapunzel betrays her condition to the "sorceress" because she complains about her clothes getting too tight.

The Grimm noted that many versions of the "girl in the tower" fairytale existed, but with a different opening relying on the "forbidden room" motif: the witch punished the girl by locking her up in a tower because she had opened a door the witch explicitely forbade her to. The Grimm also listed several stories (outside of Basile's version) where a mother (sometimes a father) bargains their future child to satisfy a temporary craving - such as the Nordic "Alfkongs-Saga", where Odin offers Signy's wish for the better bear in the world in exchange of what is "between her and the barrel", aka the child she bears. In a book of Büsching we find a girl named "Petersilie" (Parsley in German) which loves eating prasley more than anything in the world and brushes her long hair by a window. The idea of using hair as a rope or ladder, long before Basile used it, seems first recorded by from the "Book of the Kings" of the poet of Persia Firdoussi, in the 10th century: the hero, Zal, joins the beautiful Roudebeh by climbing up her braids.

The name the sorceress wears in the German tale, "Frau Gothel", had been explained by the Grimm in such a way: "The godfather is not only called Vater (father) but also Pathe (godfather/"parrain" in French), or Goth or Dod ; the baptized child is also called "Pathe" or "Gothel", hence the confusion of the two within the legend". So, the dominating hypothesis (which seems confirmed by the variations of the fairytale) is that "Gothel" means "godmother".

Hansel and Gretel (Hänsel und Gretel)

It is of course the AaTh 327 A, "Hänsel and Gretel" (a subtype of "The children and the ogre"). It also covers the AaTh 1121, "Burning the witch in her own oven".

In the 1810 manuscript this fairytale was called "Little brother and Little sister", a name that would later be reused by another famous Grimm fairytale (KHM 11). It seems that one of the reasons for the Grimm's big edits on this tale was the publication in 1842 of the Alsacian version of this story by August Stöber, "The little house of pancakes" (Das Eierkuchenhäuslein) - which itself was inspired by the Grimm's original publication of "Hansel and Gretel" (full loop here). Wilhelm Grimm notably borrowed several turn of phrases from Stöber.

The motif of the children abandoned in the woods can be found back in Basile's Nennillo and Nennella, though the extension to the encounter of a child-eating monster is rather present within Perrault's Petit Poucet and madame d'Aulnoy's Finette Cendron (both also contain the motif of the treasures inside the ogre's house). While we know the Grimms were aware of Perrault's story, we also know that madame d'Aulnoy's fairytales, including "Cunning Cinders" had been brought to Germany by ther adaptation for the German branch of the "Bibliothèque Bleue" - Blaue Bibliothek. Ludwig Bechstein's own version of "Hansel and Gretel" was very famous - and he actually wrote it inspired by the German translation of Stöber's own tale.

The motif of ashes, crumbs or seeds left behind to tell the way is recurring within the brothers Grimm fairytales: it also appears on the KHM 40 (The Robber Bridegroom) and 169 (The Hut in the Forest), as well as in their first "Legend for children". This motif can be found back in German literature to 1559's Gartengesellschaft (The company within the garden) by Martin Montanus, where it appears in the tale "The small earth-cow", Das Erdkühlein.

It is recognized that this fairytale is the second most popular and famous Grimm fairytale right after Snow-White. It was heavily illustrated - first by none other than Ludwig Emil Grimm himself (another brother of the Grimms). As we said before, Bechstein's own fairytale was a strong "rival" to the Grimm's, and was illustrated by Ludwig Richter in 1853. The motif of the "bird leading to the Ohterworld" is found back in the KHM 123 (The Old Woman in the Wood), and in both cases the fact the bird is white indicates that it is an Otherworldy animal.

The Brave Little Tailor (Das tapfere Schneiderlein)

This fairytale belongs to many different Aa-Th types: 1640 (The brave little tailor), 1051-1052 "Curb, cut and move a tree", 1060-1062 (Throwing-stone conquest), 1115 (Attempt to kill the hero in his bed).

The 1810 manuscript began with this tale as its opening, probably as an homage to Brentano, since Wilhelm Grimm found this tale within his library, in a book called "Wegkürtzer", by Martin Montanus.

Among the modifications of the 2nd edition, a very interesting one is the addition of a sentence closing the first paragraph "and his heart moved with joy like the tail of a small lamb". This sentence comes from a novel by Christian Weise calle "The three most mad madmen in the whole world/The three most foolish fools in the whole wide world" (1762). Wilhelm Grimm explained this, as well as several other similar "borrowings", in the preface of the sixth edition, as his desire to insert in his tales specific sentences and expressions he knew to be typically German.

The brothers Grimm notd that Montanus' Wegkürtzer was frequently alluded to within the Renaissance literature and the baroque one - for example, when Johann Fischart translated in German Rabelais' Gargantua he inserted the sentence "I will kill all these flies, nine at once, like this tailor once did." It was also evoked in the "Simplicissimus" of Grimmelshausen, but references to the Little Tailor story go back to the Middle-Ages. The episode of a giant crushing a stone until water comes out of it is found in "Brother Werner", from the Codex Manesse (which compiled German Minnesang, courtly poetry) ; and Heinrich von Freiberg's Tristan describes at one point the hero crushing a cheese until juice comes out of it. Montanus' text was also used by Ludwig Bechstein in his book of German fairytales. One can compare the story of the Grimms to Tabart's "Jack the giant-killer" and Afanassiev's "Foma Berennikov".

The measurements in this story make no sense at all. The tailor buys four half-ounces of marmelade. Given an ounce was roughly 32 gr, the tailor bought 60 gr roughly... Not a quarter of a pound, as he claims. The reason for this incoherence is because, before 1854, a "pound" varied depending on which area of Germany you were into (it was 467 gr in Berlin, 510 in Nuremberg). It was only in 1854 that the value of the pound was unified in Germany, at 500 gr. Finally we note the presence at the end of the tale of the common European belief n the "Wild Hunt".

Cinderella (Aschenputtel)

Of course, it is the Aa-Th 510A, "Cinderella".

As early as the first edition, this fairytale was a mix of several variations. In their notes, the brothers listed nine different versions of the tale. One of them is quite fascinating: the opening scene of the mother's death and her promises of help is missing, the story begins immediately on the heroine's misfortunes. The end of the version also greatly differs and enters the domain of the KHM 11 "Little-brother, Little-sister". Soon after his wedding with Cinderella, the prince forbids her to enter a specific room of the castle - but encouraged by her sister, she opens the room when the prince is absent. It contains a fountain of blood that Cinderella's sister uses for an evil use: after the queen gives birth to her first child, her sister throws her in the fountain and replaces her in the bed. But the guards of the castle hear the moans of Cinderella, rescue her and the wicked sister is punished. Another version, from Mecklembourg, has an ending which makes the tale close to the legend of saint Genevieve of Brabant: Cinderella's stepmother and stepsister steal away Cinderella's two first children and replace them with animals ; the third time she gives birth, they order the gardener to kill the queen and her child, but he rather hides them in a grotto in the woods, where the child is fed by a doe. One day the child, old enough, goes to the castle to speak to his father, revealing to him the fate of his mother.

Another version, this time from Paderborn, begins in a way very similar to "Snow-White": a queen wishes to have a child as red as a rose and as white as snow. She gets her wish, but then her servant pushes her outside of the window, to replace her as the king's wife. The usurper gives birth to two daughters, and from then on we return to the classical Cinderella tale - her dead mother helping her from beyond the grave by offering her a key, opening a hollow tree where Cnderella finds what she needs to wash herself and dress up pretty for the church (plus a prayer book). Büsching evoked the existence of another version in the Zittau area, where Cinderella is a miller's daughter that is forbidden to go to church, and where it is a dog that denounces the false fiancée. Outside of all these oral sources, the brothers Grimm took inspiration, of course, from Charles Perrault's Cinderella, as well as from the first German literary record of the Cinderella story, "Laskopal and Miliwka", published in an anonymous collection of legends in 1808 (Sagen der böhmischen Voreit aus einigen Gegenden alter Schlösser und Dörfer").

From the second edition onward, the brothers Grimm heavily edited the story. They removed all the words and passages that referenced too much Perrault's version, replacing them by elements taken specifically from the three versions they collected in Hesse (such as the demand for a branch of a nut-tree, and the motif of the tree growing on the grave). In the 1812 edition, it was Cinderella's own mother who advised her daughter to plant a tree on her grave, and who predicted that this tree will help her in the future. Throughout the rewrites, Wilhelm Grimm heavily insisted upon the heroine's virtues, accentuating them so that they would fit the feminine bourgeois ideal of the time.

The first European record of this tale is Basile's "The cat of the ashes", and other famous literary versions include Perrault's Cinderella, madame d'Aulnoy's Cunning Cinders, as well as Ludwig Bechstein's Aschenbrödel. These versions were massively spread throughout Europe, notably due to the "peddling literature", the cheap books sold by peddlers: they helped the "Cinderella" fairytale type becoming as popular as it is today, and it seems very likely they influenced all the versions of the tale that came after them.

In their notes, the brothers Grimm explicitely compared the motif of the shoe in Cinderella with the legend of Rhodopis, who had her shoe stolen by an eagle, and the pharaoh that found it had her owner searched throughout Egypt. However the motif of the animals helping a persecuted heroine (especially when it comes to splitting grains) is very common, and has been popularized by the Roman tale of "Cupid and Psyche".

This fairytale is closely tie to the KHM 130, "One-Eye, Two-Eyes and Three-Eyes", both sharing the idea of a young girl humiliated by her sisters, and who obtains a social ascension as a form of compensation. A. B. Rooth studied the evolution of the Cinderella fairytale-type, and its relation with other fairytale-types: they determined that it is very likely the "Cinderella" story was originally told as a sequel to the "One-Eye, Two-Eyes, Three-Eyes" story-type. Later, the second part of this story gained its own autonomy, and became the "Cinderella" we know today.

The sexual connotations within the motif of "trying on the shoe" has been repeatedly noted and analysed since the Grimms published their story. Jacob Grimm himself saw in this the remains of an archaic Germanic betrothing ritual. Heinz Rölleke highlighted another cultural ritual that involved the future husband of a bride removing her old shoes before marrying her. The idea of the slippers tied to a wedding is also found within the KHM 133 (The Shoes that were danced to Pieces).

The name of the heroine in Germa, "Aschenputtel" designates a type of kitchen girl who searches throughout the ashes, and thus "rolls" herself in them - but it also means figuratively an insignifiant and a dirty girl. It seems to derivate from the greek "achylia", cinders/ashes, and "puttos", female genital organs. A combination echoed by the French name "Culcendron", "Ashen-butt". By extension, the name "Aschenputtel" can also designate the younger brother when he is disdained by his brothers and considered to be an idiot by his family: there is a lot of male Cinderellas in folktales, especially in Northern and Central Europe, but also in all German-speaking countries.

Frau Holle

Belongs to the AaTh 480 "The kind and unkind girls".

This story was told to Wilhelm Grimm by his future wife, Henrietta Dorothea Wild, who was then 18 years old. A secondary source was a tale told to their by the Hanovre pastor, Georg August Friedrich Goldmann - this second version contained the episode of the rooster saluting the girls. The second edition of the brothers Grimm's book added several details to this story to "rationalize" it - notably the Grimm added of their own an explanation as to why the girl jumps into the well.

This fairytale comes from Hesse and Westphalia. The brothers Grimm listed in their notes four other versions of it - and the first is more noticeable, because it echoes "Hansel and Gretel", as the house where the girls arrive is made of pancakes (crêpes). Older literary versions of "Frau Holle" can be found in Basile's Pentamerone (The Months, The Three Fairies), as well as within a French fairytale written by Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve, "Les nymphes" (The Nymphs). Translated in German in 1765, Villeneuve's fairytale notably inspired the Grimms when they composed their 1810 manuscript - they adapted her tale as their own story called "The marmot". Before the brothers Grimm, "ancestors" of "Frau Holle" can be found in various German fairytales, present in the collections of W. Reynitzsch (1802) and Benedikte Naubert (1789). Ludwig Bechsten did his own version of the fairytale (Gold-Mary and Pitch-Mary, Die Goldamaria und die Pechmaria) which had a huge success in Germany.

This fairytale belongs to a wide series of tales in which young girls leave their house to enter a far-away country which might be the Otherworld, and where they become the servants of a spernatural being. There, by performing tasks in a disinterested manner, they are rewarded. As with other fairytales, "Frau Holle" shows how the Otherworld and our world are inter-dependant with each other. "Frau Holle" had a huge mediatic success: it was adapted several times as movies, it is heavily present in children's literature, and it was heavily illustrated. The character of Frau Holle ("Holle" derivading from the Middle-High-German "hulde", "benvolent") is an ambiguous character, and shares several characteristic with Germanic water-spirits. She is a giver of supernatural gifts and goods, but she also punishes the wicked. This supernatural character is very present in German legends, especially in the oral tradition which associates her with the works of weaving and spinning. She might have her roots in the figure of a spirit in charge of women's initiation rituals.

Little Red Riding Hood (Rotkäppchen)

It is of course the AaTh 333: "Little Red Riding Hood".

The two versions the brothers Grimm used to create this story were told to them by Johanna Isabella and Marie Hassenpflug. Isabella's version was most notable for being an obvious transposition of Charles Perrault's fairytales - with two elements changed. The tragic ending was modifed so that the girl and her grandmother would be saved ; and the erotic connotations of Perrault's fairytale (where the wolf was presented as a dangerous seducer) were removed.

Charles Perrault's fairytale was also present in German literature through Ludwig Tieck's verse tragedy "The life and death of little Red Riding Hood" (Leben und Tod des kleinen Rotkäppchens), published in 1800. As for Ludwig Bechstein, he inspired himself from the brothers Grimm tale to create his own "Little Red Riding Hood". M-L-Tenèze has worked on collecting all the oral and popular versions of Little Red Riding Hood in France, its birth-country, and has identified its original format as it must have been told before Perrault: usually they end like his tale in a tragic way for the girl, but rarely she notices she is in bed with a monster and manages to trick it to escape. However a detail Perrault erased and that is present in these versions is how the wolf keeps a bit of the grandmother's flesh and blood, that he offers to the little girl as food.

The first version of this story, in the original edition of the brothers Grimm book, was much more didactic than the one we have today, heavily insisting on how the little girl should have obeyed to her mother, and how there are specific ways to interact with strangers on the road - and in fact, it seems that the reason this fairytale was so popular and widespread was precisely because of its didactic nature. Because everybody knows the "original" version of the Grimm better than the final one, their second and revised text that shows a heroine able to learn from her mistakes, and ending up defeating the wolf of her own without any outside help. It should be noted that the first version of the Grimm tale had an echoing motif with the KHM 5 "The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids".

The Musicians of the Town of Bremen (De Bremer Stadtmusikanten)

They eblong to the AT type 130 "The animals find a house for the night", more specifically the AT 130 B, "The animals flee after a death threat".

This fairytale, like many of those present in the brothers Grimm collection, was actually the fusion of two distinct stories they collected. The brothers Grimm described in their notes a literary source for this story: a long extract from "Froschmeuseler", a didactic epic by Georg Rollenhagen published in 1595 and which had animals as protagonists. In this text however, it is a dog that leads the six other animals (an ox, a donkey, a cat, a rooster and a goose). For this poem (of 20 000 verses) Rollenhagen himself had another literary inspiration: a first-century epic describing a war between frogs and mice.

The nicknames of the various animals were only added in the third edition of the book. The notes of the brothers contain a third version of the tale they did not use, and which mostly differs when they arrive at the robbers' house. Instead of chasing them away, the animals enter peacefully in the robbers' den, play music and are fed as a reward. Then the robbers leave, and when they return they send one of theirs to check if everything is alright in the house - and he suffers the fate described in the Grimm's final tale. There are other versions of the story where there are only two animals involved (a dog and a rooster), who get involved with a fox that the dog ultimately kills. In fact, the oldest versions of this tale all deal with domestic animals confronting, not human criminals, but rather savage animals of the forest. Outside of Rollenhagen's text, another literary precedent was a poem of Hans Sachs from 1551, where the house is inhabited by wolves.

The title of this story seems to refer to traditional mockeries of the music of the town of Bremen, which was a very famous city at the time. Anti-Aarne wrote an entire monography about this tale-type, "The travelling animals" (Die Tiere auf der Wanderschaft) where he highlighted how this story was the Western "sibling" of a more Oriental fairytale-type, the AaTh 210 "The rooster, the chicken, the duck, the pin and the needle are travelling". This tale is mostly present in the Far-East (Middle-East?), and very rare in Western Europe - but it is still present within the brothers Grimm's collection as the KHM 10 (The Pack of Ragamuffins), 41 (Herr Korbes), and 80 (The Death of the Little Hen). The oldest Western form of this other fairytale type is within the Latin poem by Nivard of Gand, 1150's "Ysengrimus", where animals considered too old are banished by their masters or about to be killed, and flee into the forest. The "Roman de Renart" (the Roman of Reynard) also contains ths motif in its eighth branch - and the ingratitude of mankind towards the creatures that served them all their life is also a theme of the KHM 48 (Old Sultan).

#german fairytales #grimm fairytales #brothers grimm #the frog king #rapunzel #hansel and gretel #cinderella #history of fairytales #evolution of fairytales #the musicians of the town of bremen #little red riding hood #frau holle #the brave little tailor

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mask131 · 11 months ago

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I was trying to look around to see if I could find some more information about Père Noël in its pre-Americanized incarnation online, but unfortunately most websites share the misinformation that "Père Noël" only existed from the 50s onward and was a French invention... No. [Note: I know books exist folks, but I precisely wanted to do a web research first]

There is only one website that does not share this idea and does identify Père Noël as a typical French figure that was then overtaken by the American Santa Claus, and the most fascinating thing is that it points out (despite previous sources I shared claiming "Père Noël" was first recorded in literature in the mid-19th century, by people describing their youth around the turn of the 18th-19th century) that Père Noël seems to have existed since the Middle-Ages, with texts referring to "Père Noël" or to "Monseigneur Noël". But it does recognize that the Père Noël traditions really boomed in the 19th century and were associated with the bourgeoisie of the time...

The website in question however is mostly focused on the various local, regional incarnations of the gift-giver - because as with many things in France, this tradition is rather a set of various regional and localized specificities that were ultimately synthetized into one entity.

It reminds that in the Lorraine and Alsace region, the Germanic cultures and German influences make it so that Saint Nicholas and Christkindl are still the main gift-givers. In Lorraine it is Saint Nicolas who is most honored (he is after all the saint patron of Lorraine). Appearing in his bishop outfit that makes him look a lot like Santa Claus (thick white beard, large clothes of red and white), every 6th of December he brings gifts and treats to nice children - while naughty children are confronted by his dreaded companion, Père Fouettard dressed in blacks, who beats up with a stick bad children. Saint Nicolas is also still strongly celebrated in the North of France (aka, what is above the Parisian region, because despite what some foreigners believe, Paris is not part of the North).

While in Alsace it is the Christkindl that still goes strongly, with Hans Trapp as its own Père Fouettard. The website briefly reminds that Christkindl is an avatar/incarnation of the Child-Christ, or Baby Jesus, that ended up being fused with the 23rd of December Saint, Sainte Lucie (Saint Lucia), resulting in this unique Christmas figure appearing as a woman dressed in white with a crown made of fir branches topped by four candles. It also reminds how Christkindl stays a symbol of Protestant end-of-the-year celebrations, as they pushed the Christkindl figure to oppose and replaced the Catholic celebrations of Saint Nicolas. Finally, there is an Alsace-specific legend that claims Hans Trapp actually originated as an Alsacian lord that tyrannized his people - Hans von Trotha, the 15th century lord of Wissembourg.

[Given the Alsace region has a lot of website pages about its traditions I'll place here in brackets informations from other websites:

The Christkindl, also written Christkindel or Chriskindla, is a Christian figure that is supposed to be an embodiment of L'Enfant Jésus, Child Jésus (the name comes from Christ-Kindel ; Christus-Kindlein, Christus als Kind), but definitively was influenced by Saint Lucia, who is very big in Scandinavia. In fact, Saint Lucia and the Christkindl look a lot like each other - female entities dressed in white with a crown of candles... Though the Christkindl can appear both as an adult woman and as a little girl, and also tends to have white veils. People tend to also find in Christkindl remnants of the Germanic goddess Berchta. No need to tell you that the Christkindl is big in all parts of the world influenced by German culture - Germany, Austria, northern Italy, Croatia, Slovenia, Switzerland, Czech Republic, and even some parts of Brazil, the ones where there was strong German imigration.

The Christkindl appeared in the 16th century with the Protestant Reform. Up until this point the day of Saint Nicolas was a very big thing in Alsace - saint-patron of school students, he offered good children mandarines and "manala" (a brioche in shape of a child). But the Protestants did not agree with this (Protestants were known to strongly dislike saints in general), and so they replaced the saint with the Christic figure of Christkindl, while keeping Père Fouettard/Hans Trapp (whose job was to threaten with stern lectures naughty children... or take them in a bag to abandon them in the deep dark woods). The change occured over the 16th century, from 1530-1536 (last mentions of Saint Nicolas in Alsace) to 1570 (first mention of Christkindl, when the Klausemärik was replaced by Christkindelmärk). In fact, Christkindl still has some Saint Nicolas traits - she also goes around with a donkey, named Peckeresel, which carries two bags, one for the treats (mandarines and bredalas), one for the whips. People left hay or carrots for the donkey to eat by the front door. Pastor Johannes Flinner made a strong public attack against saint Nicolas in Strasbourg during the "cultural transition", by pointing out that distributing gifts to all should be the prerogative of the Christ and no one else.

During the 20th century the Christkindl lost popularity in Alsace (jee, I wonder why France would like to bury Germanic traditions in the century of World War II) - but it returned in the traditions from the 1990s onward.

Fascinatingly, despite being supposedly a Christ-figure of an angel, the Christkindl, or White Lady, is also frequently called in alsace, a "fée", a fairy, la fée de Noël, the Christmas fairy. It doesn't help that she sometimes carry around a wand with a star at the tip, that is strikingly reminding of the stereotypical fairy-wand. Another irony of fate - despite the Christkindl being brought over to replace Saint Nicolas, the two currently still coexist in Alsace thanks to people not wanting to abandon the good old bishop. A third fun fact: originally the Christkindl could be played as much by women as by men, due to being a truly androgynous entity. From the 16th century onward, the Saint Nicolas celebrations were replaced in Alsace by parades of teenagers of both sexes dressed in white, going from door to door to give gifts and sing Christmas songs. However you can't have teenage boys and girls go around late at night without getting some problems... And those "Saint Nicolas hook-ups" were a real problem in Alsace, you have records from the 17th and 18th centuries pointing out how authorities have to try to refrain all the Christkindl from... well you know.]

The next entity presented is the famous Pays Basque character of Olentzero, whose appearance is that of a coal-man. Well a bizarre coal man - he has a bag filled with coal in one hand, a sickle in the other, a large beard on his face and a béret on his head. According to the Basque-version of the Nativity lore, he lived at the top of the mountains but saw in the sky the announcement of the birth of Kixmi (Basque name for Jésus), and he descended from his mountains to announce the good news. While he is the gift-giver of Pays Basque, leaving gifts for children in the night between the 24th and 25th of December, entering in the house by the chimney ; he is also a bogeyman figure, as he was a scary-looking man who was said to take away in a bag naughty children. As with everything Basque, Olentzero is actually a pre-Christian figure, as the very name of the character is related to the "pagan" winter solstice celebrations of the old Basque religion.

[Again, time to bring some more information from other websites to make sure I give a more complete portrait:

Long story short, because the Basque folklore is very well documented and I can't spend too much time on this, the Olentzero (or Olentzaro, Orentzaro, Omentzaro, Orantzaro...) is at the same time the Basque name for Christmas and the Basque figure of the coal-man that brings gifts during Christmas. He is supposed to be a grotesque character - rude, fat, dirty, gluttonous, his face blackened by soot, with worn-out clothes... He is basically a caricature of mountain-men and forest-men. Sometimes he is even given monstrous traits such as "having as many eyes as there are days in the year, plus one" - which is reminding of a French being of the New Year folklore called L'Homme aux Nez who also has as many noses as there are days in the year...He typically holds branches of gorse in one hand and a sickle in the other.

He comes down from the mountains, enters houses by chimneys, goes into the kitchen once everybody goes to sleep to eat all leftover food, and he warms himself by the fire - either you had to leave a log burning just for him, either he used the flames of the fire to burn his gorse branches. In fact, "olentzero" was also the name of a special log that was left bruning in the fireplace from Christmas to the 1st or 6th of January. This theme of the "coal man" of winter or the burning of branches all answers to a deep motif of bringing back light and heat in the heart of the cold and the dark. Him holding a sickle has made people draw parallel between him and the figure of Saturn/Kronos.

In fact, there is an old tradition, long before the Olentzero was embodied by a disguised man or by a mannequin paraded through the villages, to embody the character simply by the sickle. The sickle hanged by the chimney, as a threat to all disobedient children, to all lying children, and to all children that refused to go to bed. Another symbol of the Olentzero, outside of the sickle and the coal-sack, is a wine-bag or wine-bottle that he carries around, because to add to the grotesque he is also a drunkard, and according to stories it is because he gets often drunk that his wife regularly beats him. (Because yes the Olentzero has a wife, a character named Mari Domingi and who is typically depicted wearing a medieval regional outfit). However it seems that all this grotesqueness is simply due to the Olentzero being a character from the old Basque mythology that got Christianized - think of how the Dagda of Celtic mythology also got more buffoonish/clownesque/grotesque as time passed. We do know that the roots and origins of the character lie in the valley of Bidassoa...)

Today gone is the creepy bogeyman and grotesque glutton ; the Olentzero has evolved into a kinder, nicer, cleaner incarnation that is closer to the Père Noël traditions. For example he now parades through streets during the day, riding a horse (pottok) or by foot, giving children candies and sweets (including fake-coal actually made of sugar) ; and the legend claims he goes down from the mountain to offer coal and wood-logs to the poor families that can't afford fuel for their fire]

And finally, we find back our good old Père Janvier! Here we have most of the same info as previous. Père Janvier was a Bourgogne character, most present in the Morvan and Nivernais regions up until the 1930s. He brings gifts in the night between the 31st of December and the 1st of January by going through the chimney - chimney which must be decorated with holy and mistletoe. Père Janvier (Father January) typically looks like a skinny old man with a long white beard, dressed in a brown monk-like robe, and he is usually bent due to wearing on his back a heavy wicker basket filled with toys. And he too has for companion the Père Fouettard.

Most interestingly, the website mentions "Père Janvier variations" across France, most notably the Savoie character of Père Chalande, and the Normandie character of Barbassioné.

More information from other website. Le Père Chalande (or Papa Chalande, Daddy Chalande) was indeed a figure of the Savoie region, but also of the Dauphiné, and he was also present in Geneva. Martyne Perrot, in her book "Faut-il croire au Père Noël? Idées reçues sur Noël" even lists the area of action of this figure as: Savoie, Suisse romande, Bresse, Forez, Ardèche, Gard, Lozère and Hérault. He is basically identical to Père Noël because "Chalande" is just an old word for "Noël" (Christmas) in the regional language known as arpitan.

There was a traditional song that went as such: Chalande est venu / Son chapeau pointu / Sa barbe de paille / Cassons les anailles (noisettes) / Mangeons du pain blanc / Jusqu’à Nouvel An. / Il monte dans sa chambre / Il trouve une orange / Il la pluche / Il la mange / On l’appelle le petit gourmand. / Il descend les escaliers / Il se casse le bout du nez / Il va chez le cordonnier / Se faire mettre une pièce au nez / Quand il est malade / Il mange de la salade / Quand il est guéri / Il mange des souris/ Toutes pourries !

I can't translate the full song, but it refers to various traditions. For example leaving an orange for Père Chalande ; Père Chalande wearing a "beard of straw and a pointy hat" (leftovers of Saint Nicolas, especially the pointy hat) ; Père Chalande giving "anailles" (walnuts) to children ; and the habit of placing inside the Christmas log (real log of the fire) chestnuts, so that the burning of the Christmas log doubled as the cooking of the wintery treats. Raymond Christinger wrote in 1965, in a set of research about Geneva folklore, an article studying the character of Chalande, if you know how to read French: here.

While doing Chalande research I stumbled upon a Swiss theory brought forward by a journalist named Bernard Léchot - I don't know how accurate this is when it comes to actual evolution of Christmas figures, but here it is. According to him, the Christmas archetype of the "Old Man" actually comes 18th century Germany. In this era of rationalism, the German Protestant landgraves decided to introduce some laicity to their country, and so cut-off all characters close to Christianity from their Christmas celebrations (from Saint Nicholas to Christkindl). As a result, pagan figures returned, including the Old Man in the shape of Weihnachtsmann. Which then spread to other European countries, each land creating its variation: Bonhomme Noël in France, Father Christmas in England, Père Chalande in Savoie.

As for the Barbassioné of Normandie, I found nothing about him. As in every says it is the Normandie name of Père Noël, but he doesn't have any specific thing to his character.

To conclude, I will link you to a page documenting a Père Noël/Christmas beings exposition that collected various visuals of the history of the Christmas gift-givers through time, right here.

And through it you will see the evolution from the "Scandinavian ancestors" (Thor and Odin) and Saint Nicolas (celebrated in Germanic countries and the Alsace region), to the American Santa Claus and the British "Old Father Christmas", passing by the Germanic Knecht Ruprecht, the also Germanic Weihnachtsmann, the Christinkindel (of Germany, Belgium and Alsace), the Jultomte of Sweden, and the Enfant Jésus/Child-Jesus of France and Italy...

Without forgetting the French Bonhomme Noël, the Italian Befana, the regional ancestors of Père Noël (Tante Arie, Père Chalande, or the Breton Ted Nedelec), the Russian Ded Moroz, and Mère Noël (Mother Christmas)... With additional sections about Santa Claus in advertisements, the theme of "outlaw Father Christmas", Père Noël during the World Wars, and more...

#french folklore #father christmas #père noël #saint nicolas #christkindl #père chalande #père janvier #christmas folklore #olentzero #basque folklore #hans trapp #père fouettard #christmas art #santa claus #christmas

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forestlion · 9 months ago

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Wendy in her Alsacian traditional costume era

#representing #kpop #red velvet #wendy #i wish you hell #rv

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subiysu-chan · 8 months ago

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So, a good idea for an Sanson story that is somewhat historically accurate and character-driven

So...

Established situation:

So, Charles Sanson II died in 1726, leaving behind three children: a daughter and two sons. Anne-Renée is respectively 16 or 10 (unclear notes in the documents, lol, but given how many members of executioner families married young, and she married Chrétien Zelle in 1736, and had to be alive to recommand her nephew Shmidt, so 10 it is. Charles-Jean-Baptiste Sanson is seven at the time of his father's death, and was born the 19th of April 1719. Nicolas-Charles-Gabriel was 5 at the time of his father's death. Before his death, Charles Sanson II made sure his post was inherited by his eldest son, but Anne-Marthe needs to find a "regent". She finds first has George Hérisson who dies, who dies a year after his tenure in a cart accident. He has to be replaced, this time by François Prudhomme who's an old friend of Sanson II, and is the tutor/curator of Nicolas-Gabriel,so all is well. Since he's a questioner, one needs to find replacement for him, so Jules Tronson fits the bill for reasons of his own, as his friendship with an executioner family does make him less employable. Soon enough, with the several affairs, the number of executions is to big to handle, and thus another regent is necessary.

Here, the story would start proper in 1732, with the three Sanson sibblings being respectively 16, 12 (with his birthday in a few days) and 10 (with his birthday in about a month). The antagonist of the story is introduced: Jean-Baptiste Barré, also known as Johannes (because Alsacian). Now, his goal, for the purposes of the story, would be to be the next executioner of Paris, because of the money and power it would bring. Now, Anne-Marthe very much wants to conserve the name and prestige of her late husband's name, and simply wants to use Barré as a regent and then disgard him. And the principe of their union is: keep your friends close, but your enemies closer. Because Anne-Marthe is a master manipulator, she manages to turn the mariage deal very much to her adventage, but Barré doesn't cancel out his plans yet.

So, at first, Barré, he doesn't really want to harm his step-sons and he kind of feels responsable for them. It won't turn that well for the boys, as he's from a region that very much values frequent and harsh canings and birchings. But he also teaches them plenty of practical skills, as well as both Yeniche and Alsacian. Now, the two boys don't really trust him, but they eventually do kind of warm up to him, exept Jean-Baptiste, mostly because at some point, Barré gets delusional enough to try and make the kids call him "father", which they actively refuse to do. Subtly, however, Anne-Marthe does secretely tell Jean-Baptiste about the real reason why she married him.

Things go even further in the wrong direction for Barré when Jean-Baptiste falls for Madeleine Tronson, so he does everything in his power to split appart the "happy couple" so that Jean-Baptiste would be less interested in claiming his inheritence to be with her. So, in his campain, he finds unlikely allies in Henri Tronson, Madeleine's uncle, and the young Soubise, apprentice to Jules Tronson as questionnaire.

Now, time for the love triangle, and Madeleine, she, at age 14, her education ends with a disaster when her identity is discovered, as well as her frequentations.

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tatiejosie · 2 years ago

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🍪 If you were a cookie, what kind would you be?

mmmm I think I'd be something from my home place. Like some sort of bredele

During holidays season it's the proper custom for all Alsacian mothers and grandmothers to bake like, 10 000 tons of these little fuckers and give them to everyone around them.

Bredeles are amazing and buttery, and you can keep them for a LONG time!

#thank you for askinggg <3

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youngyoungcoyote · 1 year ago

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I was originally gonna post this as an addition to someone else's post about eating raw meat safely but I realized I just wanted to talk about Parisa so here's my spiel

I know I know it's not texturally the same as raw beef but if you just want to eat raw beef then tartare is a classic and you can do a fair amount with it. Around where I live there's a local dish made by the descendants of Alsacian immigrants called Parisa which is typically raw beef cured in lime juice, cheese, jalapeño, onions, sometimes garlic or serranos are added too, it's seasoned by choice. Goes great with saltine crackers and tabasco sauce. (And any leftovers can be made into a queso or scrambled with egg, mmmm)

#yyyaping #texas #tartare #also #therian #too I suppose because thats the context

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folkfashion · 2 years ago

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Alsacian Chimney sweep, France, Bruno Boissier

#alsacian #french #europe #france #western europe #traditional clothing #traditional fashion #cultural clothing #folk clothing

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ksslr · 2 years ago

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The Alsacian Deer.

#my art #digital art #artists on tumblr #ufo #ufology #budd hopkins missing time

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dietcokeandoats · 6 months ago

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food log 6/2/24

l: sourdough bagel with salted butter (est. 325)

d: trader joe’s alsacian tart (570) + spring greens with dressing (100)

other: 2 glasses red wine (350)

total: 1295

admittedly not great. also did literally zero exercise and hangover-slept all day. i was honestly just too tired to try to chef up something low cal and im running low on quick options.

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dj-bouto · 2 years ago

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youtube

LBA K7 [103-A] feat. Plaid, Locust, Ze'v, Innerzone Orchestra, Neotropic...

Mixed & recorded 1999/10/10 somewhere under an alsacian roof (F).

Keywords : Plaid / Warp / M.Van Hoen / R&S / ZE'V / Innerzone Orchestra / Carl Craig / Planet e / Neotropic / n-tone / Cinematic Orchestra / Ninja tune / Funki Porcini / Andre de Dienes…

#various #electronic #music #plaid #m.van hoen #ze'v #innerzone orchestra #carl craig #neotropic #cinematic orchestra #funki porcini

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adarkrainbow · 1 year ago

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Since people have taken an interest to some of the "Hansel and Gretel" variations I have been posting about, here is a few more ones for your delight.

I will start with a very important yet currently unreadable one. It is commonly agreed that when the Brothers Grimm re-edited and rewrote Hansel and Gretel, in their post-1842 versions of the tale, they were influenced by an Alsacian story that had been collected and written in German by August Stöber, as "Das Eierkuchenhäuslein". The translation would be "The Little Pancake House" - the Eierkuchen being indeed quite close to a pancake, being an Alsacian variation of the French crêpe, but thicker and crunchier. Notably several expressions and turn of phrase in the final text of the Grimm came from this story. Stöber's work is very famous and influential in the Alsace region, since he was basically the great soruce and collector of folktales and fairytales there - unfortunately his work cannot be easily accessed today. I do not speak German, and there is no online French translation of his work. They exist - his great-great-nephew did a French translation of his "Legends of Alsace" work in 2008 for example, called "A Thousand Years of history, legends, and oral traditions in Alsace", but I couldn't find any copy of the story or any access to the book anywhere. There was also a scientific edition of "Legends of Alsace" done in French in 2010, but again no luck finding it.

The Internet Archive has a big collection of August Stöber's works, but given they're in German, I can't use them.

I also talked previously of the variation of the story involving "a wolf in a sugar house", instead of a "witch in a bread house". The brothers Grimm, in their research notes, wrote that this story existed in the region of Schwaben, but they did not include it in their version of "Hansel and Gretel". And, as I said and described previously, this story survived in the Flanders region of Belgium, where it was collected and stays a known Belgian fairytale usually called "The Sugar-Candy House". (You'll find it under the tag "Belgian fairytales")

One variation that I have access to, however, is a French variant of the story, called "The Cabin with a Cheese Roof".

It was collected by H. A. Gueber in "Contes et Légendes", an 1895 collection of French folktales and legends. "The Cabin with a Cheese Roof" is noted by Gueber to be descending from a Swedish variation of the Hansel and Gretel tale. It goes as such:

Once upon a time there was an old and cruel witch who lived in a cabin, in the middle of the woods, upon a high mountain, and she liked to eat little children. So, she had the habit of placing all of her various cheeses upon the roof to attract the children of the neighbourhood. [Note: You can DEFINITIVELY tell this story is French when the candy is replaced by cheese. France loves its cheeses.] Near the witch's cabin, lived a poor peasant who had two children - a little girl who was very stupid, and a little boy who was very intelligent.

One day, the peasant sent his children in the woods to gather strawberries, and they came upon the witch's house. Since they were hungry, the boy climbed on the roof and took a cheese. The old witch, hearing a noise, asked "Who is here, upon my roof?". The boy answered with the softest voice he could: "It is little angels." "Then, dear little angels," the witch said, "eat as much cheese as you want", and she stayed sitting by the fire. The boy then took as much cheese as he could, and left with his sister.

The following day, the children returned to the witch's house, hoping to trick her again. But this time, when the witch asked who was on her roof, while the boy answered "This is just little angels!", the girl, who was said to be a chatty girl, couldn't help but answer "And I'm here too!". The witch immediately got out of the house and seized the children. "Oh yes, you are two pretty little angels, and you will make a good roast. How does your mother kills her pigs?" she asked.

The little girl said: "She cuts ther head with a big knife." But the boy said: "No, no, she places a rope around their neck." The witch placed a rope around the boy's neck, and he fell onto the ground as if he was dead. "Are you dead now?" the witch asked. "Yes." the boy answered. Of course, the witch was no fool and pointed out that if he was still speaking, he couldn't be dead. The boy answered: "If I am not dead, it is because my mother always fattens up her pig before roasting them - she says they're more delicious that way."

So the witch placed the children into a cage. "How does your mother fattens up her pigs?" she asked. "With grain." the little girl said. But the boy replied: "No, no, my sister is too young, she gets everything wrong! My mother fattens up her pigs with cakes and sweet milk." And so the witch gave them plenty of cakes to eat and sweet milk to drink.

[Note: The fact that the witch asks all that does a double effct. On one side it reduces the children to the state of pigs to be fattened and slaughtered - which is a subtext in other variations of the tale, but here is explicit - on the other, it also portraits the witch as an evil double or caricature-twin of the children's mother, trying to imitate her for perverse purposes]

One day (the story does not precise how much time passes), the witch went to the cage and said: "My eyes are hurting, and I can't see if you are fat enough." So she asks for their finger, of course. The little girl was about to give her finger, but the little boy prevented her, and rather gave a little stick - and since the witch found them "very skinny", she gave them twice as much cake and sweet milk. A few days after she asked for their finger again, and this time the boy gave a "cabbage's tail" (you know, the thick stump/stalk of a cabbage]. Finding them fat enough, she got the children out of the cage and into her cabin, asking the little girl to prepare a great fire in the oven. When it was hot enough, she asked the kids to climb, one after the other, onto the oven's shovel, so she could cook them.

The little girl was about to obey when her brother took her place. But as the witch was about to shove the shovel, the little boy rolled onto the ground. As the witch was getting angry, the boy said: "Madam, we are stupid and clumsy. Show us how to climb on the shovel!". The witch did just so, and the boy pushed her into the oven and closed the door.

The children took all of the witch'es' cheeses and returned to their father. The witch died burned in her oven, and nobody cried upon her death.

I've got more stories, but I'll place them under the cut:

Another French fairytale (folkloric one, not literary) that is often compared to Hansel and Gretel is a story called "The Lost Children" (Les Enfants Egarés). Originally collected by Antoinette Bon, Paul Sébillot took it back for his collection of Auvergne folktales - mentionning the story came from the Cantal area. It is actually a sort of cross between Hansel and Gretel, and Little Thumbling.

The story goes as such: In the past, in the village of Gargeac lived an avaricious coupled called Jacques and Toinon. Toinon was even more avaricious than her husband. They had two children, one boy and one girl, who suffered greatly due to their parents' greed and selfishness, but they were obedient and loving and so they went on in life without complaining. The boy, Jean, was twelve, the girl, Jeannette, was younger than him.

Since Jacques and Toinon hated spending money for their children, they decided to abandon them in the woods. The mother took them in the woods to gather dead wood, planning to abandon them there, so that the wolf might eat them at night. The children called their mother everywhere once they realized they were alone, to no avail. They cried and tried to find back their way, failing at this too. Jeannette told her brother to climb on a tree, to see if he could find anything. He climbed but only saw branches ; his sister told him to climb higher, but he still only saw "the green branches of the forest", she told him a third time to climb higher, and this time he saw two houses. One white, one red. Jeannette was asked by her brother which house they should go towards - and the girl chose the red house because it was "the prettiest". Spoiler: This was the wrong choice.

Knocking at the red house, they met a woman "who was as tall and strong as a man". The wife accepted to let them in, but told them to hide, because her husband was "wicked" and would eat them. She hid them as best as she could, but her husband smelled "a Christian's smell" and discovered the children. He then beat up his wife as a punishment. Something of importance: the husband is the devil. Now, it isn't the actual religious devil of Christianity, but the folkloric devil. In French fairytales of the folkloric kind, a lot of times you'll find the "devil" as an antagonist, but actually replacing what is commonly known as an ogre or a giant. Which is why you find tons of stories about man-eating, giant devils killed by heroes: this is just a Christianization of the old tales of giants and ogres. In this precise case, the devil is clearly an ogre by another name.

When the devil took Jean by the hand, he perceived that he was skinny, so he locked him up in a little stable, so that he might be fattened up - and once he is fat enough, he shall be killed. As for Jeannette, she became the servant of the household, and she regularly fed her brother (Trivia: there is an inconsistency here, as the opening of the tale mentions Jean is the oldest, but here it is said he is the "little brother" of Jeannette). Since the devil was too big/too large to enter in the stable, he couldn't check by himself Jean's atness. After a few days of fattening, he asked Jeannette to cut the tip of her brother's little finger, and to bring it to him. Jeannette rather cut the tail of a rat, and the devil was fooled into believing Jean was too skinny.

Some times later he asked again for a piece of Jean's finger, and Jeannette brought another rat tail. But the third time, the devil realized it was a rat's tail - so he placed his own hand within the stable and took Jean out of it, realizing he was fat eough to be eaten. He prepared a trestel to bleed Jean, but then decided to do a promenade before cooking. He told his wife to watch over Jean - and especially keep an eye on Jeannette, that he greatly mistrusted. However the devil's wife got drunk and sleepy. Jeannette opened the door to the pigs stable in which Jean was imprisoned [Note: we have a confirmation here of the "pigification" of the boy, already hinted by the fact that the devil wanted to bleed Jean, the same way farmers bled pigs]. Jeannette than pretended not knowing how to tie Jean to the trestle. The devil's wife, finding her stupid, placed her body onto the trestle to show her - Jean promptly tied her up, and cut off her neck. The children then took the devil's gold and silver, and fled with his horse-drawn carriage.

When the devil came back, and found his beheaded wife and the pig-stable empty, and his carriage missing, he understood what had happened. He wandered through the area searching for the children, and met a plowman. The devil asked him in a rhyme: "Vous n'avez pas vu Jean, Jeannette/ Ma charrette, / Mon cheval rouge et mon cheval blanc, / Couvert d'or et d'argent?". In English: "Have you seen Jean, Jeannette / My carriage / My red horse and my white horse / Covered in gold and silver?". The plowman however understands that the devil is saying he is badly plowing his field - and the devil has to clear up the misunderstanding before finally hearing the plowman didn't saw anything.

The devil later met a shepherd and asked him the rhyme again, but the shepherd understood that the devil was telling him his dog was not barking enough. So after the shepherd told his dog to bark after the devil, the devil had to repeat himself once again, and once more the shepherd saw nothing. The devil finally reached a river where washer-woman were working. He asked them the rhyme, the washer-women understood that the devil was telling them "You are not beating up the cloth enough", and once again he had to repeat himself to be understood. This time the washerwomen understood, and told the devil the kids had crossed the river with their carriage. But there was no bridge, and the devil complained about it. One of the washer-women understood that it was the devil they were talking to, and she informed her companions, telling them they should play some "tricks" to him.

What the washerwomen did was ask the devil to let his hair being cut, so that the women could make a bridge out of it. The devil agreed, and once his hair was cut, they elongated themselves and formed a bridge over the river - that was held by the washerwomen. But once the devil was in the middle of the bridge, they let go of the bridge, which fell in the water with the devil - and the devil drowned. The washerwomen then went to Jean and Jeannette (who had returned home), and informed them that the devil had drowned. [Note: Yes they seem to be some fairy, witchy, washerwomen, though the text doesn't say anything beyond them just being badass washerwomen].

Jean and Jeannette made their parents rich, and "everybody was happy". The moral of the story is apparently "One must be good for their parents, even when they were bad for their children". A... very debtable and questionable moral. The story ends with : "Night came, the rooster sang, and the tale ended."

To conclude this post, I will leave one final variation of the Hansel and Gretel story, that was name-dropped by the Wikipedia article about the fairytale: the Moravian fairytale "Old Grule". Collected in 1899 by Marie Kosch, the fascinating thing with this story is that it clearly takes after the German version created/collected by the brothers Grimm - for example, having the two sibling-protagonists being named "Gretel and Hans".

In this story, Gretel and Hans are naughty, disobedient children who are often beaten by their parents. One day, the two wanted to go pick strawberries in the woods, but their mother told them no, because a thunderstorm was approaching. The children being disobedient, they still went in the woods - and ended up caught in the dreadful storm (hail, rain, branch-breaking winds, thunder and lightning). They hid in a rocky cave and when the storm died own, they realized they were completely lost. [Note: It is fascinating how the beginning of this tale is the very reverse of "The Cabin with the Cheese Roof"]. As night fell, Gretel urged Hans to climb to the top of a tree, and from there he saw a light they followed.

The light led to a little cottage made of gingerbread, with a marzipan roof. [Note: Given this story is ulterior to the Grimm's H&G, we see here clearly how the idea of gingerbread and marzipan settled itself in popular imagination] The children took a ladder lying narby and climbed on the roof to eat the marzipan. The inhabitant of the house was about to go to bed when she heard the noises: she was a witch named Grule who loved to eat children. Running outside, she said with a deep voice "Who is robbing my house?" and Gretel answered "The wind, the wind" with a soft voice. The witch, satisfied, went to bed... But as the moon rose up, the witch noticed a large hole in her roof, and poking from it a child's head. So she quickly captured the two children on her roof, and locked them up in a chicken coop, enraged that they were ruining her house.

For a few days she fed the children only the best foods (cakes, sweets, fruits) to fatten them up so they could make a good roast. When it came time to check if they were fat enough, she took a knife and asked Gretel to stick out her finger - but she held out her apron's string, and as the witch cut it she said "Skinny, skinny". Same thing with Hans who gave his trouser's string. The witch, understanding that her meals of good things didn't work, switched to a diet of exclusively flour porridge. And the children grew so tired of eating flour porridge every day they didn't trick the witch the next time she came ith her knife: each time they gave their finger for her to cut into it, and as she saw one drop of blood come out from each child's finger she said "Fat, fat".

The witch went to her kitche, and the narrator describes how she prepares her oven: she makes a fire in the oven, when it dies out she takes a wooden crook to spread the coals over the entie surface of the oven, she then uses a wet straw whisk to sweep the coals in front of the oven, and then takes them out. Going to the chicken coop, she took the children, claimed she had some baked plums in her oven, and needed the kids to retrieve them for her. The kid gladly agreed, hoping they could eat the plums instead of the flour porridge. The witch went to fetch a baker's peel (what I called an "oven's shovel before) and meanwhile Gretel looked into the oven, seeing no plum at all. Understanding what the witch tried to do, Gretel played dumb and pretended not knowing how to sit on the peel, falling onto the ground every time she tried. Old Grule gathered her skirts and sat on the peel, only for the kids to burn her to death in her oven.

They returned to their parents, who were happy to see them alive - because they thought the children were dead. But the two kids still received a good beating because they had disobeyed their parents. The end.

As you can see this story is... WEIRD. There is definitively something meant to be dark humor and almost a parody of the original with how the kids are naughty brats, who enjoy being fattened up, and ultimately are not morally good heroes. In fact, the two children stay blissfully unaware of the witch's true intentions until the very end: the reason they trick the witch at first is because they actually wanted to keep eating sweets, cakes and fruits all day long, not knowing they were to be cooked later! Similarly, the whole "the witch notices a big hole in her roof" seems almost like a joke - showing how from the German story collected and spread across Europe by the Grimm, a sort of more down-to-earth, humoristic tone was added typical of many "peasant versions" of fairytales, that usually involve more jokes and like to point out a tale's own absurdity or moral ambiguity.

#hansel and gretel #hansel and gretel variations #french fairytales #german fairytales #moravian fairytales

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