"The Three Princesses of Whiteland" (''De tre prinsesser i Hvittenland'') is a Norwegian

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 Norwegian writers

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 their collection of folktales and legends ''

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 ...

'' (1879). Scottish poet and novelist

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 ...

collected it his ''

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 ...

'' (1890).

Synopsis

A fisherman caught nothing one day, and near evening, a head popped up from the water, to make a bargain for him: fish for what his wife carried under her girdle. When he returned home, his wife told him that she was pregnant and the baby was what he had offered. The king heard of their story and offered to raise their son when he was born, to protect him, but when the boy was grown, he begged to go with his father fishing for one day, and as soon as he set foot in the boat, it was dragged off to a far land. He met an old man, who told him that he had come to Whiteland. If he walked down the shore, he would come to three princesses buried up to their necks in sand. If he passed by the first two and spoke to the third, the youngest, it would bring him good luck. The youngest princess told him that three

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 be ...

s had imprisoned them there. If he went up into the castle by the shore and let each troll beat him for one night, the princesses would be freed. A flask of ointment by the bed there would cure all the injuries he suffered, and a sword would let him cut off their heads. The first troll had three heads and three rods, and when he had suffered the princesses stood in the sand up to their waists; the second had six heads and six rods, and the princesses stood in sand up to their knees; the third had nine heads and nine rods, and beat him so severely that he could not reach for the ointment, but it threw him against the wall, and the flask broke, spilling ointment on him, and he killed it, freeing the princesses entirely. He married the youngest and lived happily with her for several years, but at the end of them, he wanted to visit his parents. His wife finally agreed but told him that he must do only what his father asks, not what his mother wishes, and gave him a ring that would grant two

wish A wish is a hope or desire for something. In fiction, wishes can be used as plot devices. In folklore, opportunities for "making a wish" or for wishes to "come true" or "be granted" are themes that are sometimes used. In fiction In fictio ...

es, one to go home and one to return. He went, and his mother wanted to show him to the king. His father said not to, but in the end she had her way, and while at the king's, he wished that his wife was there to compare to the king's. That summoned his wife and used up his second wish. Sadly, his wife took the ring, knotted a ring with her name on it in his hair, and wished herself home again. Princesses of whiteland

He decided to see if he could reach Whiteland on his own and set out. He came to the king of all the animals and asked if he knew the way. He did not, and neither did all the animals when he summoned them, so the king lent the man a pair of snowshoes to reach his brother, who was the king of all the birds. The king of the birds did not know, and neither did the birds, so that king lent him a pair of snowshoes to reach his brother, the king of all the fish. 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 ...

king did not know, but an old pike, the last of all the fish to arrive, knew the way and that his wife was to remarry the next day. The king sent him to a field where three brothers had fought for a hundred years over a magical hat, cloak, and pair of boots, which would let the wearer make himself

invisible Invisibility is the state of an object that cannot be seen. An object in this state is said to be ''invisible'' (literally, "not visible"). The phenomenon is studied by physics and perceptual psychology. Since objects can be seen by light in ...

and wish himself wherever he wanted. He tricked the brothers into letting him try them and set out to Whiteland. He met the North Wind on the way, and it promised to storm the castle as if to blow it down when it reached the land after him. He arrived, and the North Wind carried off the new bridegroom. His wife recognized him by the ring in his hair.

Analysis

Tale type

The tale is classified in the international Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index as type ATU 400, "The Man on a Quest for the Lost Wife". In this tale type, the hero finds a maiden of supernatural origin (e.g., the

swan maiden The swan maiden is a mythical creature who shapeshifts from human form to swan form. The key to the transformation is usually a swan skin, or a garment with swan feathers attached. In folktales of this type, the male character spies the maiden, ...

) or rescues a princess from an enchantment; either way, he marries her, but she sets him a prohibition. The hero breaks the prohibition and his wife disappears to another place. He goes after her on a long quest, often helped by the elements (

Sun The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...

and

Wind Wind is the natural movement of air or other gases relative to a planet's surface. Winds occur on a range of scales, from thunderstorm flows lasting tens of minutes, to local breezes generated by heating of land surfaces and lasting a few hou ...

) or by the rulers of animals of the land, sea and air.

Legacy

''De tre prinsesser i Hvidtenland'' is the name given to tale type ATU 400 in 's ''The Types of the Norwegian Folktale''.Hodne, Ørnulf.
The Types of the Norwegian Folktale
'. Universitetsforlaget, 1984. p. 89.

References

External links