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118

Thorpe, Benjamin, Yule-Tide Stories. Popular Tales and Traditions from the Swedish, Danish, and German. (Variant from Upland of the foregoing, No. 112.)

"KRAKNABBA PELSEN"
(Crow's-nib Cloak).

[You can read Thorpe's Krâknabba-pelsen on SurLaLune.]

ABSTRACT

Ill-treated heroine (by step-mother)--Menial heroine (tends cattle)--Helpful animal (black ox)--Ear cornucopia--Heroine sent to fetch step-mother's axe, finds three doves on it. They begift her. Gold ring falls from her mouth when she speaks; she grows fairer and fairer; will marry a king--Step-daughter sent for axe, curses doves. They punish her. Frog springs from her mouth; she grows fouler and fouler; nose grows longer and longer, like crow's nib. She makes cloak to cover it, which heroine steals--Heroine flight on helpful animal. Obstacles to troll-wife's pursuit; forest, lake, mountain--Menial heroine (stair sweeper at palace)--Magic dresses from ox--Meeting-place (church)--Threefold flight--Lost shoe--Shoe marriage test-- Animal witness (bird)--- Marriage--Heroine requested to cut black ox in three, releasing enchanted prince.

TABULATION

(Introduction composed of originally unconnected fragments.)

(1) Stepdaughter sent without food to tend cattle in forest.-- (2) Black ox says, "Shake my ear, and hold thy apron under." She gets delicate food. Step-mother treats her more cruelly still-- (3) Sends her one day to fetch axe left out in rain. Heroine finds three doves sitting on haft of axe, caresses them, and gives them food. In return for this first dove says gold ring shall fall from her mouth every time she speaks; second says she shall grow fairer and fairer; third dove says she shall marry a king.-- (4) Stepmother sends own daughter for axe. She curses doves and drives them away. They wish that a frog may spring from her mouth when she speaks; that she may grow fouler every day; that her nose may grow longer and longer. So it happens. Her nose is like a crow's nib, and so long that she cannot open a door; she hangs cloak over it.-- (5) Black ox counsels heroine to take stepsister's crow's nib cloak and to travel away with ox, who gives her piece of tree, a bottle, and a stone to be thrown behind one at a time, when in need. -- (6) Troll-wife pursues them; heroine casts piece of wood behind, and a forest springs up. Crone returns for axe, and hews down forest. Heroine throws bottle; a lake appears; crone fetches horn and drinks up lake. Heroine casts stone, and lofty mountain rises; crone fetches pickaxe, and picks and hacks till mountain falls in and buries her.-- (7) Heroine is employed as stair-sweeper at palace, rides three Sundays on ox, and magnificently clad, to church.-- (8) Third time prince watches at door and gets her shoe.-- (9) Shoe test at palace follows. None can wear it. Bird sings:

"In the chimney sits the damsel whom the shoe fits;
In the chimney sits the damsel whom the shoe fits."

-- (10) Prince finds Kraknabba-Pelsen in kitchen, and marries her.-- (11) On wedding-day she visits black ox in meadow, and at his request divides him with sword into three pieces. An enchanted prince starts up.

Cox, Marian Roalfe. Cinderella: Three Hundred and Forty-five Variants of Cinderella, Catskin, and Cap O' Rushes, abstracted and tabulated. London: David Nutt for the Folklore Society, 1893.

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