SurLaLune Fairy Tales: Marian Roalfe Cox: Cinderella: Three Hundred and Forty-five Variants of Cinderella, Catskin, and Cap O' Rushes, abstracted and tabulated

King Lear judgment--Loving like salt--Outcast heroine-- Servants spare heroine's life; delude king with horse's heart-- Heroine lives in forest on plants brought by birds and flowers brought by bees--Heroine discovered--Happy marriage--Value of salt--Two sisters remain old maids.

TABULATION

(1) A king's son proposes to marry one of three daughters of another king. This king asks daughters how much they love him. Eldest says, "As much as my little finger"; second says, "As much as my middle finger."-- (2) Youngest daughter says, "As much as bread loves salt." Father, enraged, sends her with two servants into forest to be killed.-- (3) They spare her, and carry horse's heart to king.-- (4) heroine lives in forest on plants brought by birds, and flowers brought by bees.¹ -- (5) King's son, while hunting, finds her there, takes her home, and marries her.-- (6) At wedding-feast heroine gives father bread without salt, then discovers herself. Two sisters remain old maids.

[Note.--In a story given pp. 22-32, ibid., the hero is unjustly censured by his father, who "would like to eat his heart, half-cooked, and without salt". Hero invites father to his wedding, and serves him a sheep's heart, half-cooked, and without salt.]

NOTES

1: See Note 68.

Note 68

(P. 423.) Bees bring the juice of flowers to the mouth of the shepherd Komatas, Theocritus, 7, 60-89. Semiramis, the daughter of the fish-goddess, Dercete, of Ascalon, and the Syrian youth, was exposed when an infant by her mother, and miraculously preserved by doves, who fed her till she was discovered by the shepherd Simmas (from whom she derived her name), Diodorus, ii, 1-20. Elijah was fed by ravens. A woodpecker purveyed for Romulus and Remus, when the wolf's milk did not suffice them, Ov., Fasti, 3, 37, 54.

A wookpecker also brought food to the sons of Mars. It was called [Greek name], and was held sacred by the ancient peoples of Italy.

See also Frere's O. D. D., pp. 84-90 (eagles).
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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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