The Maiden from the Apple Tree
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| The Maiden from the Apple Tree | |
|---|---|
| Folk tale | |
| Name | The Maiden from the Apple Tree |
| Also known as | Jabloňová panna; Die Jungfrau vom Apfelbaum |
| Aarne–Thompson grouping | ATU 408, "The Love for Three Oranges" |
| Region | Czech lands |
| Related | |
The Maiden from the Apple Tree (Czech: Jabloňová panna) is a Czech fairy tale, first collected by author Karel Jaromír Erben in the 19th century, but only published in the 20th century. It is classified as tale type ATU 408, "The Love for Three Oranges", of the international Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index. As with The Three Oranges, the tale deals with a prince's search for a bride that lives inside a fruit, who is replaced by a false bride and goes through a cycle of incarnations, until she regains physical form again.
The tale Jabloňová panna was first collected by Erben in the mid-19th century, but it was only published in the 20th century.[1] Scholar Jaromír Jech translated the story to German as Die Jungfrau vom Apfelbaum ("The Maiden from the Apple Tree") and sourced it from Bohemia.[2]
Summary
In this tale, a young king likes to hunt in the woods. One day, while on a hunt, he starts to feel thirst and searches for anything that can sate it. He reaches an apple tree with apples half-crimson and half wax yellow, and he wants to have one. He plucks a fruit and opens it: out comes a beautiful maiden that asks for water, but the prince is stunned at the appearance of the maiden and forgets to give her some, so she vanishes like a burst bubble. The prince goes to pluck another apple, cuts it and out comes another maiden that asks for water, which he also forgets to give, so she also disappears. He takes the third apple and hides it until he can find a water source. He reaches a river and opens the last apple, releasing a beautiful naked maiden to whom he gives water. She notices she is naked and asks the prince for his cloak, which he gives after she agrees to marry him. He leaves her there while he goes back home to find her some clothes and a carriage.
After the prince leaves, an ugly old woman appears behind the apple maiden and shoves her down the stream, then takes the cloak. The prince returns and finds the ugly old woman, whom he thinks is the apple maiden under a disguise to test him. He marries the ugly old woman and believes that she will return to her younger form after the wedding, on the wedding night, or after she gives birth. Meanwhile, a red-beaked dove perches on the window and he caresses it, cooing that he married the wrong person. The following day, the dove returns to the prince's happiness, and coos that his true bride is in the stream. On the third day, the old woman discovers the prince is talking to the dove and orders a hunter to catch it. The hunter lies in waiting below the prince's window and shoots the dove, then takes it to the old woman, who tosses the bird inside an oven to burn it to cinders. However, three drops of the dove's blood fall on the garden and an apple tree sprouts yielding beautiful flowers in red and white.
The gardener's daughter comes in and plucks a flower to bring home. When the gardener's daughter leaves and returns later, she finds the house swept and the food prepared, and decides to investigate: one night, she untidies the pans and exits the house, then sees the apple maiden, in "blood and milk", coming out of the flower, and doing chores. The gardener's daughter discovers the apple maiden, who, scared, begs for water, and some is sprinkled on her body. The gardener's daughter gives her some clothes and goes to report to the king, who rushes to meet with the apple maiden. They reunite, and she explains how the ugly old woman threw her in the river, and she and her sisters were princesses, cursed by that same old woman, and that, as long as the witch lives, her sisters will remain in dove form. Suddenly, two doves fly in and perch on the apple maiden's shoulders. The king then orders the execution of the old witch by burning, and, with her death, the doves are restored to human form, and embrace their sister. The king marries the apple maiden, and her sisters also find marriages.[3][4]
Analysis
Tale type
The tale is classified in the international Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index as tale type ATU 408, "The Three Oranges".[5][6] In an article in Enzyklopädie des Märchens, scholar Christine Shojaei Kawan separated the tale type into six sections, and stated that parts 3 to 5 represented the "core" of the story:[7]
- (1) A prince is cursed by an old woman to seek the fruit princess;
- (2) The prince finds helpers that guide him to the princess's location;
- (3) The prince finds the fruits (usually three), releases the maidens inside, but only the third survives;
- (4) The prince leaves the princess up a tree near a spring or stream, and a slave or servant sees the princess's reflection in the water;
- (5) The slave or servant replaces the princess (transformation sequence);
- (6) The fruit princess and the prince reunite, and the false bride is punished.
Motifs
The maiden's appearance
According to the tale description in the international index, the maiden may appear out of the titular citrus fruits, like oranges and lemons. However, she may also come out of pomegranates or other species of fruits, and even eggs.[8][9] According to Walter Anderson's unpublished manuscript, variants with eggs instead of fruits appear in Southeastern Europe.[10] In addition, Christine Shojaei-Kawan located the motif of the heroine emerging from the eggs in Slavic texts.[11]
According to Jaromír Jech, in the Czech texts, the heroine may come out of oranges (as in Malý), of lemons (in two variants), or apples (as in Erben and the Czech tradition).[12]
The transformations and the false bride
The tale type is characterized by the substitution of the fairy wife for a false bride. The usual occurrence is when the false bride (a witch or a slave) sticks a magical pin into the maiden's head or hair and she becomes a dove.[a] In some tales, the fruit maiden regains her human form and must bribe the false bride for three nights with her beloved.[14]
In other variants, the maiden goes through a series of transformations after her liberation from the fruit and regains a physical body.[b] In that regard, according to Christine Shojaei-Kawan's article, Christine Goldberg divided the tale type into two forms. In the first subtype, indexed as AaTh 408A, the fruit maiden suffers the cycle of metamorphosis (fish-tree-human) - a motif Goldberg locates "from the Middle East to Italy and France"[16] (especifically, it appears in Greece and Eastern Europe).[17] In the second subtype, AaTh 408B, the girl is transformed into a dove by the needle.[18]
Separated from her husband, she goes to the palace (alone or with other maidens) to tell tales to the king. She shares her story with the audience and is recognized by him.[19]
According to Jaromír Jech, the Czech variants have a "relatively fixed" form: the heroine is turned into a bird or a dove by the antagonist, then transforms, via her blood, into a flower or a flowering tree, from where she emerges.[20]