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"Katie Woodencloak" or "Kari Woodengown" (originally "Kari Trestakk") is a
Norwegian
Norwegian, Norwayan, or Norsk may refer to:
*Something of, from, or related to Norway, a country in northwestern Europe
* Norwegians, both a nation and an ethnic group native to Norway
* Demographics of Norway
*The Norwegian language, including ...
fairy tale
A fairy tale (alternative names include fairytale, fairy story, magic tale, or wonder tale) is a short story that belongs to the folklore genre. Such stories typically feature magic (paranormal), magic, incantation, enchantments, and mythical ...
collected by
Peter Christen Asbjørnsen
Peter Christen Asbjørnsen (15 January 18125 January 1885) was a Norwegian writer and scholar. He and Jørgen Engebretsen Moe were collectors of Norwegian folklore. They were so closely united in their lives' work that their folk tale collection ...
and
Jørgen Moe
Jørgen Engebretsen Moe (22 April 1813–27 March 1882) was a Norwegian folklorist, bishop, poet, and author. He is best known for the ''Norske Folkeeventyr'', a collection of Norwegian folk tales which he edited in collaboration with Peter ...
in ''
Norske Folkeeventyr
''Norwegian Folktales'' ( no, Norske folkeeventyr) is a collection of Norwegian folktales and legends by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe. It is also known as ''Asbjørnsen and Moe'', after the collectors.
Asbjørnsen and Moe
Asbj ...
''.
Andrew Lang
Andrew Lang (31 March 1844 – 20 July 1912) was a Scottish poet, novelist, literary critic, and contributor to the field of anthropology. He is best known as a collector of folk and fairy tales. The Andrew Lang lectures at the University ...
included it in ''
The Red Fairy Book
''The Langs' Fairy Books'' are a series of 25 collections of true and fictional stories for children published between 1889 and 1913 by Andrew Lang and his wife, Leonora Blanche Alleyne. The best known books of the series are the 12 collections ...
''.
It is
Aarne–Thompson type 510A, the persecuted heroine. Others of this type include "
Cinderella
"Cinderella",; french: link=no, Cendrillon; german: link=no, Aschenputtel) or "The Little Glass Slipper", is a folk tale with thousands of variants throughout the world.Dundes, Alan. Cinderella, a Casebook. Madison, Wis: University of Wisconsi ...
", "
The Sharp Grey Sheep The Sharp Grey Sheep or The Sharp-Horned Grey Sheep is a Scottish fairy tale collected by John Francis Campbell in ''Popular Tales of the West Highlands'', listing his informant as John Dewar, labourer, from Glendaruail, Cowal.
It is Aarne-Thompso ...
", "
The Golden Slipper
The Golden Slipper (russian: Золотой башмачок) is a Russian fairy tale collected by Alexander Afanasyev in ''Narodnye russkie skazki''.
It is Aarne-Thompson type 510A, the persecuted heroine.
Synopsis
An old man brought back two ...
", "
The Story of Tam and Cam
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the ...
", "
Rushen Coatie
Rushen Coatie or Rashin-Coatie is a Scottish fairy tale collected by Joseph Jacobs in his ''More English Fairy Tales''.
It is Aarne–Thompson type 510A, the persecuted heroine, as is Cinderella.
Synopsis
A queen with a daughter died. On her de ...
", "
The Wonderful Birch
The Wonderful Birch (russian: Чудесная берёза) is a Finnish/Russian fairy tale. A variant on Cinderella, it is Aarne–Thompson folktale type 510A, the persecuted heroine. It makes use of shapeshifting motifs. Andrew Lang included i ...
", and "
Fair, Brown and Trembling
Fair, Brown and Trembling is an Irish fairy tale collected by Jeremiah Curtin in ''Myths and Folk-lore of Ireland'' and Joseph Jacobs in his ''Celtic Fairy Tales''.
It is Aarne-Thompson type 510A. Other tales of this type include ''Cinderella'', ...
".
Synopsis
A king, who had a daughter, married a widowed queen, who also had a daughter. Unfortunately, the king had to go to war and the
stepmother
A stepmother, stepmum or stepmom is a non-biological female parent married to one's preexisting parent.
A stepmother-in-law is a stepmother of one's spouse. Children from her spouse's previous unions are known as her stepchildren.
Culture
Ste ...
maltreated and starved her stepdaughter. A
dun
A dun is an ancient or medieval fort. In Ireland and Britain it is mainly a kind of hillfort and also a kind of Atlantic roundhouse.
Etymology
The term comes from Irish language, Irish ''dún'' or Scottish Gaelic ''dùn'' (meaning "fort"), ...
bull helped the child, telling her that she would find a cloth in his left ear. When she pulled out the cloth and spread it out, she magically had all the food she needed. When the queen discovered this and, when the king returned, she feigned sickness and then bribed a doctor to say that she needed the flesh of the dun bull to be well again.
Fearful for the bull's life, the princess told him of her stepmother's plan. The bull decided that they must flee together. They passed through a forest made of copper trees and although the bull told her not to break off any branches, she broke off a leaf. Seeing this, the bull told the princess to keep the leaf safe and not lose it under any circumstances.
The bull and the princess came upon a
troll
A troll is a being in Nordic folklore, including Norse mythology. In Old Norse sources, beings described as trolls dwell in isolated areas of rocks, mountains, or caves, live together in small family units, and are rarely helpful to human bei ...
that roared that they were touching his wood, and started a fight with the bull. The bull won, though he was gravely injured, and the princess had to cure him with a horn of ointment that the troll carried on his person.
The same thing happened in a silver wood and a golden one, and soon the princess had a silver leaf and a golden apple, along with the copper leaf.
The princess and the bull continued to travel until they came upon a castle. The bull gave her a wooden cloak and told her to ask for work at the castle as "Katie Woodencloak". However, she must first cut off the bull's head, flay him, and put the hide away in a rock, along with the leaves and apple. Should she need anything, the bull told the princess to knock on the stone. Though at first the princess refused to kill the bull, she was eventually persuaded.
The princess went to castle and got work in the scullery. One day, she was told to carry water to the prince for bathing. The prince, not wanting to use water from such a filthy creature, threw it on her. Later, the princess went to the rock and asked to be magnificently dressed in copper. She went to a church, where the prince fell in love with her at once. She told him she came from Bath and used a charm to keep him from following her, but he had caught one of her gloves.
A second time, she brought him a towel, to the same treatment, and went to church dressed in silver. She told the prince she came from Towelland, and she dropped her riding whip.
The
third
Third or 3rd may refer to:
Numbers
* 3rd, the ordinal form of the cardinal number 3
* , a fraction of one third
* Second#Sexagesimal divisions of calendar time and day, 1⁄60 of a ''second'', or 1⁄3600 of a ''minute''
Places
* 3rd Street (d ...
time, she brought him a comb, to the same treatment, and went to church dressed in gold. She told the prince she came from Combland, and he got her golden shoe.
Wanting to find the woman, the king had all women in the kingdom try on the shoe, and it fit Katie's stepsister. A bird warned the prince that the stepsister had cut her foot to fit in the shoe, and sang that it was Katie Woodencloak's shoe.
Having disposed of the
false bride The false hero is a stock character in fairy tales, and sometimes also in ballads. The character appears near the end of a story in order to claim to be the hero or heroine and is usually of the same sex as the hero or heroine. The false hero presen ...
, the prince asked after Katie Woodencloak. Though he was warned off, he insisted, so they married and lived happily ever after.
Commentary
Although this is of the type of "Cinderella" in that she is persecuted by her stepmother, most of that type do not include her being driven off, a motif more usually found in type 510B, such as "
Catskin
Catskin is an English fairy tale collected by Joseph Jacobs, in ''More English Fairy Tales''. Marian Roalfe Cox, in her pioneering study of ''Cinderella'', identified as one of the basic types, the Unnatural Father, contrasting with ''Cinderella'' ...
" and "
Cap O' Rushes
"Cap-o'-Rushes" is an English fairy tale published by Joseph Jacobs in ''English Fairy Tales''.
Jacobs gives his source as "Contributed by Mrs. Walter-Thomas to "Suffolk Notes and Queries" of the ''Ipswich Journal'', published by Mr. Lang in ''Lo ...
", where the heroine is persecuted by her father.
According to
Norwegian
Norwegian, Norwayan, or Norsk may refer to:
*Something of, from, or related to Norway, a country in northwestern Europe
* Norwegians, both a nation and an ethnic group native to Norway
* Demographics of Norway
*The Norwegian language, including ...
custom, the couple meets at Church, not at a royal ball. In Norway, the church plays a prominent role in many fairy tales, as this was a common place for meetings.
In Norway, other versions of the story bear a greater resemblance to the classical Cinderella story. In these versions, it is the girl's dead mother that aids her. These versions are written down in
Valdres
Valdres () is a traditional district in central, southern Norway, situated between the districts of Gudbrandsdalen and Hallingdal. The region of Valdres consists of the six municipalities of Nord-Aurdal, Sør-Aurdal, Øystre Slidre, Vestre Slidre ...
and
Telemark
Telemark is a traditional region, a former county, and a current electoral district in southern Norway. In 2020, Telemark merged with the former county of Vestfold to form the county of Vestfold og Telemark. Telemark borders the traditional ...
, and the girl is called Kirsti or Åse (the latter wearing a dirty leather dress).
Versions
A tale titled ''Kari Woodencoat'' is attested as hailing from a
Lapp source in ''Wonder Tales from Baltic Wizards'' (1928).
[Olcott, Frances Jenkins. ''Wonder tales from Baltic wizards: from the German and English''. London, New York: Longman, Green and Co. 1928. pp. 12-16.]
See also
*
Black Bull of Norroway
The Black Bull of Norroway is a fairy tale from Scotland. A similar story titled The Red Bull of Norroway first appeared in print in ''Popular Rhymes of Scotland'' by Robert Chambers in 1842. A version titled The Black Bull of Norroway in the 1 ...
*
Fair, Brown and Trembling
Fair, Brown and Trembling is an Irish fairy tale collected by Jeremiah Curtin in ''Myths and Folk-lore of Ireland'' and Joseph Jacobs in his ''Celtic Fairy Tales''.
It is Aarne-Thompson type 510A. Other tales of this type include ''Cinderella'', ...
*
Brother and Sister
"Brother and Sister" (also "Little Sister and Little Brother"; German: ''Brüderchen und Schwesterchen'') is a European fairy tale which was, among others, written down by the Brothers Grimm (KHM 11). It is a tale of Aarne–Thompson Type 450. In ...
References
{{Cinderella
Woodencloak, Katie
Norwegian fairy tales
Norwegian folklore
Woodencloak, Katie
Woodencloak, Katie
Woodencloak, Katie
ATU 500-559
Asbjørnsen and Moe