The Bird Lover, also known as The Prince as Bird, is a type of narrative structure in folklore, no. 432 in the Aarne–Thompson classification system. In the typical version of story, a woman acquires a bird lover—a nobleman in the shape of a bird—who is wounded by means of a trap set by the woman's husband, such as a set of sharp points set up outside the woman's window. She follows the wounded bird's trail, cures him, and then marries him. In French scholarship, this type is often referred to as "''loiseau bleu''" or "the blue bird", so named for a story by

Madame d'Aulnoy Marie-Catherine Le Jumel de Barneville, Baroness d'Aulnoy (1650/1651 – 14 January 1705), also known as Countess d'Aulnoy, was a French author known for her literary fairy tales. When she termed her works ''contes de fées'' (fairy tales), sh ...

Origins

Folklorist Jack Haney traced the origins of the tale type to France and Germany in the Middle Ages. An example of the motif is found in one of

Marie de France Marie de France (fl. 1160 to 1215) was a poet, possibly born in what is now France, who lived in England during the late 12th century. She lived and wrote at an unknown court, but she and her work were almost certainly known at the royal court o ...

's '' Lais'', "

Yonec "Yonec" is one of the ''The Lais of Marie de France, Lais of Marie de France'', written in the twelfth century by the French poet known only as Marie de France. ''Yonec'' is a Breton lai, a type of narrative poem. The poem is written in the Anglo-No ...

", though the lai develops somewhat differently: instead of a happy ending, the lai ends in tragedy. A "sophisticated rationalization" of the type is found in Chrétien de Troyes's ''

Lancelot, the Knight of the Cart , original_title_lang = fro , translator = , written = between 1177 and 1181 , country = , language = Old French , subject = Arthurian legend , genre = Chivalric romance , fo ...

'', where Lancelot appears at Guinevere's heavily barred window and cuts his fingers bending the bars back. Swedish scholar also pointed ''Yonec'' as a predecessor to the tale type. However, he also noted that in tales of "later tradition", especially from India and Persia, the lover comes to the heroine in the shape of a bird, and in that regard cited the tale of "King Parrot", from a 15th century Turkish version of '' The Seven Wise Masters''.

Overview

Some variants may begin akin to type ATU 425C, "

Beauty and the Beast ''Beauty and the Beast'' (french: La Belle et la Bête) is a fairy tale written by French novelist Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve and published in 1740 in ''La Jeune Américaine et les contes marins'' (''The Young American and Marine ...

": the third daughter asks her father for a present, a memento that belongs to the Bird Prince that she will use to contact him. In other tales, the heroine is trapped in a high tower, which is only accessible by the prince in his bird form. Whatever its beginning, the heroine's lover is eventually hurt in his bird form by blades, pieces of glass or thorns left by the heroine's sisters. The Bird Prince vanishes back to his kingdom and the heroine goes after him intending to heal his wounds. A line of scholarship (e.g., ,

Aurelio Macedonio Espinosa Sr. Aurelio Macedonio Espinosa Sr. (1880–1958), a professor at Stanford University, was an internationally known scholar because of his studies in Spanish and Spanish American folklore and philology. He was especially known for his promotion of th ...

, ) recognizes the independence of the narrative, but argues that it could fit as a subtype of the more general tale type ATU 425, "

The Search for the Lost Husband In folkloristics, "The Animal as Bridegroom" refers to a group of folk and fairy tales about a human woman marrying or being betrothed to an animal. The animal is revealed to be a human prince in disguise or under a curse. Most of these tales are ...

", due to their proximity.

Motifs

According to Samia Al Azharia Jahn, in

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

language variants, the heroine asks her father for a strangely named object, which also happens to be the name of the Bird Prince. Jahn also noted that "in all Arabic variants", the Bird Prince is put in mortal danger by the use of glass.

Distribution

Haney stated the tale type enjoyed "worldwide distribution". According to professors Stith Thompson, , Anna Angelopoulou and Aigle Broskou, the tale type is "especially popular" in Mediterranean countries, being found in

Iberian Peninsula The Iberian Peninsula (), ** * Aragonese and Occitan: ''Peninsula Iberica'' ** ** * french: Péninsule Ibérique * mwl, Península Eibérica * eu, Iberiar penintsula also known as Iberia, is a peninsula in southwestern Europe, def ...

and in Greece. In the same vein, professor Christian Abry stated that the tale type is "frequent" (''fréquent'') in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

. The ATU 432 folktype is also present in the folklore of Latin America, for instance, in

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

(''The Parrot Prince''). Further variants are found in Canada and New Mexico. In the ''Typen türkischer Volksmärchen'' ("Turkish Folktale Catalogue"), by

Wolfram Eberhard Wolfram Eberhard (March 17, 1909 – August 15, 1989) was a professor of Sociology at the University of California, Berkeley focused on Western, Central and Eastern Asian societies. Biography Born in Potsdam, German Empire, he had a strong ...

and

Pertev Naili Boratav Pertev Naili Boratav, born Mustafa Pertev (September 2, 1907 – March 16, 1998) was a Turkish folklorist and researcher of folk literature. He has been characterized as 'the founding father of Turkish folkloristics during the Republic'.Arzu Öztür ...

, both scholars identified a cycle of stories they classified as TTV 102, "Die Traube I" ("The Grape - Version I"), with 31 variants registered. These tales are comparable to the international tale type ATU 432, "The Prince as Bird". German folklorists and Manfred Hesse stated that the tale type was "widespread" in the Arab-speaking regions, although with different motifs.''Die Silberpappel mit den goldenen Früchten und andere türkische Volksmärchen'' erstmals übersetzt von Otto Spies. Textbearbeitung von Manfred Hesse. Wiesbaden: B. Heymann Verlag, 1976. p. 113.

References

Bibliography