Here you will find a list of stories similar to Snow White from across the world. There are also other stories which feature an enchanted sleep, but which don't quite qualify as versions of "Snow White."
Please let me know on the contact form if you see something missing or incorrect.
Contents
Snow White (Type 709)
Sleeping Beauty (Type 410)
The Fruitful Sleep
The Supplanted Bride / The Needle Prince (Type 437)
Miscellaneous Tales
Sources
Please let me know on the contact form if you see something missing or incorrect.
Contents
Snow White (Type 709)
Sleeping Beauty (Type 410)
The Fruitful Sleep
The Supplanted Bride / The Needle Prince (Type 437)
Miscellaneous Tales
Sources
Snow White (Type 709)
This story is characterized by a young woman's rivalry with an older woman, often her mother, who poisons her and puts her into an enchanted sleep.
EUROPE
British Isles
The Bright Star of Ireland: Ireland. Very similar to "Gold-Tree and Silver-Tree." The stepmother consults with a talking trout. With her stepmother after her heart and liver, Bright Star flees to an island where she must endure being attacked by cats for three nights, at which point she is allowed to marry a handsome young king. Stepmother kills Bright Star with a needle; prince's second wife revives her, then becomes her new stepmother when the villainness is caught.
In his notes, MacLeod mentioned another variant where the characters are unnamed, the fish's role is played by a witch or wise woman who manipulates the mother into killing the king's livestock and blaming the heroine. The girl takes refuge with a prince's henwife, and is found by the prince who marries her. At the end, the king takes the prince's second wife.
Iberian Peninsula
The Bad Stepmother (La mala madrastra): The heroine is aided by robbers who live in a cave, which opens with the magic phrases "Open, parsley!" and "Close, peppermint!”
Similar to "The Young Slave."
France
Boule-de-neige: France.
Belgium
Mauricia: Flemish version from Hamme. A woman is convinced by a demon to kill her daughter Mauricia to become beautiful. She tries turning Mauricia into a bird, but this spell is broken. The magic sleep is caused by an enchanted ring. In the end, Mauricia stays with the 17 robbers who helped her.
Italy
Anghjulina: Corsica. Heroine aided by group of bandits.
See also Perrault's "Sleeping Beauty," “Princess Aubergine,” “Sodewa Bai,” "Maroula and the Mother of Erotas," “The Pretty Girl and the Crystal Bowls,” “Maruzzedda,” “Beautiful Anna,” “La Bella Ostessina,” “Zellandine and Troylus.”
Germany
Richilde: A short story by Johann Karl Musaus. Richilde is a vain noblewoman who owns a magic mirror. When her stepdaughter Blanca grows more beautiful than Richilde, Richilde wants to kill her and the girl escapes with aid from the court dwarfs. This is a semi-realistic retelling from the stepmother's point of view.
Poland
The Beautiful Sophie and Her Envious Sisters: by Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff (probably collected in 1808). Instead of a wicked stepmother, there are two wicked sisters. The heroine is aided by an old woman. The events are set in England. This appeared in the collection Oberschlesische Märchen und Sagen (Upper Silesian fairytales and sagas).
Hungary
The World’s Beautiful Woman: Hungary
The Mediterranean
Fatimé: Albania. Villains are heroine’s two older sisters.
Scandinavia
The Daughter of the Sun and the Twelve Bewitched Princes (Solens dotter och de tolv förtrollade prinsarna): Sweden. The magic mirror’s role is filled by the sun. The heroine takes refuge with twelve cursed princes. She is poisoned with candy and awoken by a king. She gives birth to a son. The queen turns her into a bird and takes her place, but the princess breaks the curse.
Jomfru means maiden. As for Gyltrom – I need to find someone fluent in Norwegian, but I would guess that the “gylt” in this name means gold, referring to the gold dove on her head.
Eastern Europe
The Magic Mirror: Russia. A merchant has a beautiful daughter. While the merchant is away, his brother begins to lust after her. When she refuses him, he write to her father accusing her of improper behavior. In response, her father orders her killed. The girl's brother spares her and kills a dog instead to show its heart. The girl enters the forest and winds up living with two knights. Back home, her father marries again; the stepmother has a magic mirror which tells her that the heroine is more beautiful. The jealous stepmother sends an old woman with a ring, which causes the girl to die when she puts it on. The knights save her, so the stepmother follows this up with a magic ribbon and finally a magic hair. The knights put her in a crystal coffin and kill themselves from grief. One day a prince finds the coffin and takes it home. When he combs her hair, she comes back to life. She eventually returns home and tells her story while disguised as a cook, and the people who mistreated her are executed.
ASIA
Atpshelakh ("Like a swan"): a Nenets tale from Siberia.
South Asia
Baingan Bâdshâhzâdî (Princess Aubergine): India. A poor couple finds an eggplant, from which appears a little girl. She grows up to be a beautiful woman, whose life is contained in a precious nine-lakh necklace hidden inside a fish. The Queen becomes jealous, as well as afraid that the King will want her as his wife, and tries to kill her. Aubergine initially says that her life is tied to the queen's seven sons, so the queen immediately murders them, but of course this doesn't work. Eventually the girl gives up her secret, the Queen takes her necklace, and she dies. Her parents place her on a bed out in the wilderness, cover her in flowers, and build a high mud wall around her. While hunting, the King discovers her and falls in love with her. As a result, she gives birth to a son. The King learns that she awakens to take care of her son at night, when the Queen has taken off the necklace to go to sleep. They recover the necklace, freeing Aubergine, and bury the old Queen alive.
Western Asia
Little Snow-white: Sílata, Turkey. The details are almost identical to Grimm’s Snow White, beginning with a woman who stabs her finger sewing and wishes for a daughter with "cheeks like this" (the blood).
Similar to stories such as "The Seven Ravens" and "Udea and Her Seven Brothers."
The Middle East
Hajir: Iraq. Hajir's stepmother talks to the moon. Hajir is taken in by seven ‘afarit who adopt her as their sister. She is poisoned by chewing resin; grieving ‘afarit do not bury her but wrap her in reed matting; prince discovers her and fetches a physician who notices she is not dead.
AFRICA
North Africa
Amna and her stepmother (Amna et sa marâtre): An Arabic tale from Algeria.
Compare Syair Bidasari and related Indian tales.
West Africa
The Beautiful Daughter: West Africa. Heroine "Maria" is aided by robbers, awoken by the love interest’s daughter.
Central Africa
The Favored Daughter: a story from the Mpongwe people of Gabon. The heroine is named Ilambe. Possibly a fragment; the story ends with Ilambe's death, and her interment in a coffin suspended in the air.
East Africa
The Most Beautiful Woman in the World: Swahili. A Sultan's wife is vain, talks to the sun and moon, but her daughter surpasses her beauty. She abandons her newborn daughter, Amina, but Amina is saved and grows up in the house of the jinns. Her mother learns of her survival and tries to kill her and eventually gives her poisoned shoes. The jinns put Amina into a jeweled box and throw it into the sea, where a sultan's son and a merchant's son find and argue over it. The merchant's son gets it and marries the box. When he finally manages to open it, he takes off Amina's shoes and she comes back to life.
AMERICAS
Blanca Flor ("White Flower")
British Isles
The Bright Star of Ireland: Ireland. Very similar to "Gold-Tree and Silver-Tree." The stepmother consults with a talking trout. With her stepmother after her heart and liver, Bright Star flees to an island where she must endure being attacked by cats for three nights, at which point she is allowed to marry a handsome young king. Stepmother kills Bright Star with a needle; prince's second wife revives her, then becomes her new stepmother when the villainness is caught.
- The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0766, Page 112-117. Collected in the 1930s.
- Blog post
In his notes, MacLeod mentioned another variant where the characters are unnamed, the fish's role is played by a witch or wise woman who manipulates the mother into killing the king's livestock and blaming the heroine. The girl takes refuge with a prince's henwife, and is found by the prince who marries her. At the end, the king takes the prince's second wife.
- Jacobs, Joseph. Celtic Fairy Tales. 1892. no. 11, pp. 88-92.
- Macleod, Kenneth. Celtic Magazine, xiii. 1888. 213–8.
- Bruford, Alan and Donald A. MacDonald. Scottish Traditional Tales. 1994. page 11.
- Tatar, Maria. The Classic Fairy Tales. 1999.
- Briggs, Katharine Mary A Dictionary of British Folktales in the English Language London: Routledge & Kegan Paul 1970 pp. 494-495
Iberian Peninsula
The Bad Stepmother (La mala madrastra): The heroine is aided by robbers who live in a cave, which opens with the magic phrases "Open, parsley!" and "Close, peppermint!”
- Espinosa, Aurelio Macedonio. Cuentos populares de Castilla y León, vol. 1. 1987. pp. 337-342
- Maspons y Labrós, Francisco. Lo Rondallyere: Quentos Popular Catalans vol. II. 1871 pp. 83-85. "La hermosa fillastra."
- Milá y Fontanals, Manuel. Observaciones sobre la poesía popular: con muestras de romances catalanes inédictos. 1853. p. 184. "La hermosa hijastra."
- Espinosa, Aurelio M. Cuentos Populares Expanoles, tomo II. 1924. no. 115.
- Espinosa, Aurelio Macedonio. Cuentos populares de Castilla y León, vol. 1. 1987. pp. 331-334
- Espinosa, Aurelio Macedonio. Cuentos populares de Castilla y León, vol. 1. 1987. pp. 334-336
- Espinosa, Aurelio Macedonio. Cuentos populares de Castilla y León, vol. 1. 1987. pp. 342-346
- Espinosa, Aurelio M. Cuentos Populares Expanoles, tomo II. 1924. no. 116.
- José Antonio Sánchez Pérez. Cien cuentos populares españoles. "La madrastra guapa."
- Llano Roza de Ampudia, Aurelio Cuentos Asturianos Recogidos de la Tradición Oral Madrid: Cario Ragio 1925 pp. 91-92
- Nogués y Milagro, Romualdo. Cuentos para gente menuda. 1886 pp. 91-96
- Zipes, Jack. The Golden Age of Folk and Fairy Tales: From the Brothers Grimm to Andrew Lang. 2013 pp. 580-582
- Coelho, Adolfo. Contos Populares Portuguezes. 1879. no. 35 'Os sapatinhos encantados'.
- Monteiro, Henriqueta. Tales of Old Lusitania from the Folk-Lore of Portugal. 1888. 136-43. "The Magic Slippers."
- Tatar, Maria. The Fairest of Them All: Snow White and Other 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. 2020. p. 108. "The Magic Slippers."
Similar to "The Young Slave."
- Pedroso, Consiglieri. Portuguese Folk-Tales. 1882. "The Maiden with the Rose on her Forehead."
- Alcover, Antoni Maria. Aplech de rondayes mallorquines: Ab llegencia del ordinari. 1896. Pg. 95.
- Pedroso, Consiglieri. Portuguese Folk-Tales. Folk Lore Society Publications, Vol. 9. 1882.
- Zipes, Jack. The Golden Age of Folk and Fairy Tales: From the Brothers Grimm to Andrew Lang. 2013. pp. 580-582
France
Boule-de-neige: France.
- Morin, Louis. "Contes Troyens." Revue des traditions populaires, Volume 5. 1890. pg. 725.
- Cadic, François. Contes et légendes de Bretagne. Les contes populaires. Terre de Brume University Press.
- Harper's Young People, Volume 11, Part 1. 1889. pg. 80.
- Sébillot, Paul. Contes populaires de la Haute-Bretagne, Volume 1. 1880. no. 21. "Les bas enchantés."
- Tatar, Maria. The Fairest of Them All: Snow White and Other 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. 2020. pp. 89-93
- Cerquand, J. F. Légendes et récits populaires du pays basque, Volume 2. 1882. No. 106. "La mère jalouse et la jeune persécutée."
- Sébillot, Paul. Contes des landes et des grèves. 1900. pp. 144-152.
- Cadic, François. Contes et légendes de Bretagne. 1992. p. 77.
- Charles Perrault, Histoires ou contes du temps passé, avec des moralitéz (Paris, 1697). The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood.
Belgium
Mauricia: Flemish version from Hamme. A woman is convinced by a demon to kill her daughter Mauricia to become beautiful. She tries turning Mauricia into a bird, but this spell is broken. The magic sleep is caused by an enchanted ring. In the end, Mauricia stays with the 17 robbers who helped her.
- Roelans, J. "XLI. Mauricia". Wondervertelsels uit Vlaanderen, edited by Pol de Mont and Alphons de Cock. 1924. pp. 313–319.
- Lox, Harlinda. Flämische Märchen Munich. 1999. p. 36. no. 11
- de Meyere, Victor. De Vlaamsche vertelselschat. Deel 2. 1927. pp. 272–279. CLXXX. Sneeuwwitje.
Italy
Anghjulina: Corsica. Heroine aided by group of bandits.
- Massignon, Geneviève Contes Corses Paris: Picard 1984 pp. 169-171.
- Gonzenbach, Laura. Beautiful Angiola: The Lost Sicilian Folk and Fairy Tales of Laura Gonzenbach. Jack Zipes, editor and translator. 2005.
- Gonzenbach, Laura. Sicilianische Märchen. vol. 1. 1870. No. 4. "Von der schonen Anna."
- Nerucci, Gherardo. Sessanta novelle popolari montalesi. 1880. no. 6, pg. 43.
- Imbriani, Vittorio. La novellaja Fiorentina. 1877. pg. 239.
- De Nino, Antonio Usi e costumi abruzzesi Volume Terzo. Firenze: Tipografia di G. Barbèra 1883 pp. 253-25
- Calvino, Italo. Italian Folktales. George Martin, translator. New York: Pantheon Books, 1980.
- Archivio per lo studio delle tradizioni popolari, Volume 10, no. XV, p. 322. On Archive.
- Pitrè, Giuseppe. Fiabe novelle e racconti popolari siciliani. 1870. No. 57. "La 'Nfanti Margarita."
- Pitré, Giuseppe. The Collected Sicilian Folk and Fairy Tales of Giuseppe Pitré. Volume 1. Jack Zipes and Joseph Russo, editors. New York: Routledge, 2008.
- Thomas Frederick Crane, Italian Popular Tales. 1885. no. 21, pp. 326-31.
- Pitrè, Giuseppe. Novellina Popolare Senese. 1875.
- De Gubernatis, Angelo. Le Novellino di Santo Stefano. 1869 pp. 32-35
- Coronedi-Berti, Carolina. Novelle popolari bolognesi. 1874. No. 13, pg. 78.
- Propugnatore, Volume 8, Part 1. 1875. No. XIII, pg. 106.
- Coronedi Berti, Carolina. Favelo bolognesi. 1883 pp. 8-10
- Calvino, Italo. Italian Folktales. George Martin, translator. New York: Pantheon Books, 1980. "Giricoccola." no. 50, p. 154.
- Paget, Violet. Tuscan Fairy Tales. 1880. No. IX, p. 93.
- Imbriani, Vittorio. La novellaja Fiorentina. 1877. No. 18, pg. 232.
- Gonzenbach, Laura. Sicilianische Märchen. vol. 1. 1870. No. 2, pp. 4-7. "Maria, die böse Stiefmutter und die sieben Räuber."
- Zipes, Jack. The Robber with the Witch's Head: More Story from the Great Treasury of Sicilian Folk and Fairy Tales Collected by Laura Gonzenbach New York and London: Routledge 2004 pp. 22-25
- D. L. Ashliman. Snow-White and other tales of Aarne-Thompson-Uther type 709
- Gonzenbach, Laura. Sicilianische Märchen. 1870. No. 3, pg. 7.
- Zipes, Jack and Laura Gonzenbach. The Robber with a Witch's Head: More Stories from the Great Treasury of Sicilian Folk and Fairy Tales Collected by Laura Gonzenbach. 2005. No. 13.
- Andrews, James Bruyn. Contes Ligures: Traditions de la Riviere. 1892. No. 18. "Le Miroir."
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Visentini, Isaia. Fiabe Mantovane. 1879. no. 28.
- De Leonardis, La Calabria, VIII. 1896. No. 12, p. 93.
- Calvino, Italo. Italian Folktales. no. 139. p. 487-489. (Renamed the heroine “Carol.”)
- Andrews, James Bruyn. Contes Ligures: Traditions de la Riviere. 1892. No. 58, pg. 16. "Le Maratre."
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
See also Perrault's "Sleeping Beauty," “Princess Aubergine,” “Sodewa Bai,” "Maroula and the Mother of Erotas," “The Pretty Girl and the Crystal Bowls,” “Maruzzedda,” “Beautiful Anna,” “La Bella Ostessina,” “Zellandine and Troylus.”
- Giambattista Basile. Il Pentamerone; or, The Tale of Tales. 1634.
- Pitré, Giuseppe. The Collected Sicilian Folk and Fairy Tales of Giuseppe Pitré. Volume 1. Jack Zipes and Joseph Russo, editors. New York: Routledge, 2008. Originally published 1875.
- Mango, Francesco. Novelline popolari sarde; in: Giuseppe Pitré, Curiosità popolari tradizionali.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Schneller, Christian. Marchen und Sagen aus Walschtirol. 1867. P. 55, no. 23. Die drei Schwestern (Le tre sorelle).
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Anderton, Isabella M. Tuscan Folk-Lore and Sketches: Together With Some Other Papers. 1905. pp. 11-16
- Giambattista Basile, Il Pentamerone; or, The Tale of Tales. 1634.
Germany
Richilde: A short story by Johann Karl Musaus. Richilde is a vain noblewoman who owns a magic mirror. When her stepdaughter Blanca grows more beautiful than Richilde, Richilde wants to kill her and the girl escapes with aid from the court dwarfs. This is a semi-realistic retelling from the stepmother's point of view.
- Musäus, Johann Karl August. Volksmärchen der Deutschen. 1782.
- Grimm. Kinder- und Hausmärchen, 1812, v. 1, no. 53, pp. 238-50
- English translation with the Grimms' notes
- Zipes, Jack. The Golden Age of Folk and Fairy Tales. 2013. "Snow White, Snow White, or the Unfortunate Child."
- Tatar, Maria. The Fairest of Them All: Snow White and Other 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. 2020. "Little Snow White, or The Unlucky Child." p. 73.
Poland
The Beautiful Sophie and Her Envious Sisters: by Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff (probably collected in 1808). Instead of a wicked stepmother, there are two wicked sisters. The heroine is aided by an old woman. The events are set in England. This appeared in the collection Oberschlesische Märchen und Sagen (Upper Silesian fairytales and sagas).
Hungary
The World’s Beautiful Woman: Hungary
- Tatar, Maria. Fairest of Them All: Snow White and 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. p. 114.
- Erdélyi, Kriza, Pap, Jones, and Kropf. The Folk-Tales of the Magyars. "A világ szép asszonya."
- Jones, W. Henry and Lewis L. Kropf. The Folk-Tales of the Magyars. 1889. “The World’s Beautiful Woman.”
The Mediterranean
Fatimé: Albania. Villains are heroine’s two older sisters.
- Dozon, Auguste. Contes Albanais: Recueillis et Traduits. 1881. no. 1.
- Elsie, Robert. Albanian Folktales and Legends. 2001.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Georgeakis, G., and Leon Pineau. Le Folk-lore de Lesbos. 1894. “Le Miroir de la Magicienne,” 57-67.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Carnoy, E. Henry, and Nicolaides, Jean, Traditions populaires de l'Asie Mineure. Paris, 1889. No. 15. "Marietta et la sorcière, sa marâtre."
- Cox, Marian Roalfe. Cinderella. No. 231.
- Schmidt, Bernhard. Griechische Marchen, Sagen und Volkslieder. 1877. No. 17, "Maroula und die Mutter des Erotas." pg. 110.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Tatar, Maria. The Fairest of Them All: Snow White and 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. p. 85ff.
- Mitakidou, Christodoula, et al. Folktales from Greece: A Treasury of Delights. 2002. pg. 9.
- Megas, Georgios A. Folktales of Greece. 1970. p. 107.
- Legrand. Recueil de contes populaires grecs. 1881.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Hahn, Johann Georg von. Griechische und Albanesische Märchen. 1864. No. 103, Schneewittchen.
Scandinavia
The Daughter of the Sun and the Twelve Bewitched Princes (Solens dotter och de tolv förtrollade prinsarna): Sweden. The magic mirror’s role is filled by the sun. The heroine takes refuge with twelve cursed princes. She is poisoned with candy and awoken by a king. She gives birth to a son. The queen turns her into a bird and takes her place, but the princess breaks the curse.
- Sanavio, Annuska Palme Fiabe popolari svedesi Milano: Rizzoli 2017 Tale nº 7
Jomfru means maiden. As for Gyltrom – I need to find someone fluent in Norwegian, but I would guess that the “gylt” in this name means gold, referring to the gold dove on her head.
- Janson, Kristofer. Folke-eventyr, uppskrivne i Sandeherad. 1878. No. 1.
- Lundell, J. A. Nyare bidrag till kännedom om de svenska landsmålen ock svenskt folklif, Volume 5. 1891. Pg. 49. "Kungen ock torparedottern."
- Kristensen, Evald Tang. Jydske folkeminder, især fra Hammerum-Herred: Æventyr fra Jylland. No. 51, pg. 273.
- Badman, Stephen. Folk and Fairy Tales from Denmark vol. 1. 2015. pp. 263-267
- Vang, Andres Eivindson. Gamla segner fraa Valdres. Nielsen, ed. 1871. p.62.
- Summarized in Eventyrlige sagn i den ældre historie By Moltke Moe, p644.
- Winter, Mathias. Danske folkeeventyr. 1823. pp. 40-47
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010. "The Story of Vilfrídr Fairer-than-Vala."
Eastern Europe
The Magic Mirror: Russia. A merchant has a beautiful daughter. While the merchant is away, his brother begins to lust after her. When she refuses him, he write to her father accusing her of improper behavior. In response, her father orders her killed. The girl's brother spares her and kills a dog instead to show its heart. The girl enters the forest and winds up living with two knights. Back home, her father marries again; the stepmother has a magic mirror which tells her that the heroine is more beautiful. The jealous stepmother sends an old woman with a ring, which causes the girl to die when she puts it on. The knights save her, so the stepmother follows this up with a magic ribbon and finally a magic hair. The knights put her in a crystal coffin and kill themselves from grief. One day a prince finds the coffin and takes it home. When he combs her hair, she comes back to life. She eventually returns home and tells her story while disguised as a cook, and the people who mistreated her are executed.
- Afanasyev, Alexander. Народные Русские Сказки. 1855. No. 211: The Magic Mirror.
- Haney, Jack V. The Complete Folktales of A.N. Afanas'ev Volume II. 2015. no. 211.
- Schott, Arthur and Albert. Walachische Marchen. 1845. No. 5, "Der zauberspiegel."
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Löwis of Menar, August von. Russische Volksmärchen. 1914. no. 23, p. 123.
- Kurysheva, Lyubov. "On Pushkin’s Synopsis of the Russian Version of Snow White." Studia Litterarum 3(4):140-151. 2018.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010. "The Tale of the Dead Tsarevna and the Seven Heroes."
- Staraya pogudka na novyy lad : Russkaya skazka v izdaniyakh kontsa XVIII veka. 1795. no. 25.
ASIA
Atpshelakh ("Like a swan"): a Nenets tale from Siberia.
- Турутина, П.Г. Лесные ненцы: Сказания земли Пуровской. 2004. pg. 43-44, "Лоездка на тот свет (Атпешелаха – “Похожая на лебеденка”)."
- Stuart, Kevin, Li Xuewei, & Shelear. "China's Dagur Minority: Society, Shamanism, and Folklore." p. 136.
South Asia
Baingan Bâdshâhzâdî (Princess Aubergine): India. A poor couple finds an eggplant, from which appears a little girl. She grows up to be a beautiful woman, whose life is contained in a precious nine-lakh necklace hidden inside a fish. The Queen becomes jealous, as well as afraid that the King will want her as his wife, and tries to kill her. Aubergine initially says that her life is tied to the queen's seven sons, so the queen immediately murders them, but of course this doesn't work. Eventually the girl gives up her secret, the Queen takes her necklace, and she dies. Her parents place her on a bed out in the wilderness, cover her in flowers, and build a high mud wall around her. While hunting, the King discovers her and falls in love with her. As a result, she gives birth to a son. The King learns that she awakens to take care of her son at night, when the Queen has taken off the necklace to go to sleep. They recover the necklace, freeing Aubergine, and bury the old Queen alive.
- Steel, Flora Annie Webster. Tales of the Punjab Told by the People. 1894. "Princess Aubergine," pg. 71.
- Venkataswami, M. N. Heeramma And Venkataswami Or Folktales From India. 1923. No. 38, pg. 93.
- Frere, Mary. Old Deccan Days. 1868. No VI. Little Surya Bai.
- Frere, Mary. Old Deccan Days. 1868. XXI. Sodewa Bai.
- Fraser. The Golden Bough, vol. 3.
- Bidasari: A South Asian "Snow White" Tradition (blog post)
Western Asia
Little Snow-white: Sílata, Turkey. The details are almost identical to Grimm’s Snow White, beginning with a woman who stabs her finger sewing and wishes for a daughter with "cheeks like this" (the blood).
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Dawkins, R. M. Modern Greek in Asia Minor; a study of the dialects of Siĺli, Cappadocia and Phárasa, with grammar, texts, translations and glossary. 1916. pp. 347-351.
Similar to stories such as "The Seven Ravens" and "Udea and Her Seven Brothers."
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Dawkins, R. M. Modern Greek in Asia Minor; a study of the dialects of Siĺli, Cappadocia and Phárasa, with grammar, texts, translations and glossary. 1916. pp. 347-351.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Kúnos, Ignaz. Türkische Volksmärchen aus Stambul. 1905. "Die Zaubernadel."
- Kunos, Ignacz. Forty-Four Turkish Fairy Tales. “The Magic Hair-Pins,” 174-181.
- Villa, Susie Hoogasian. 100 Armenian Tales and Their Folkloristic Relevance. 1966. “Nuri Hadige.”
- Sherents, Gevorg. Vana Saz, Vol. 1. 1885. “Nar Khatyun” (Pomegranate Queen), pp. 106–112.
- Tatar, Maria. Fairest of Them All: Snow White and 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. p. 179. "Nourie Hadig."
- Kúnos, Ignácz. Turkish fairy tales and folk tales. 1901. P. 30.
The Middle East
Hajir: Iraq. Hajir's stepmother talks to the moon. Hajir is taken in by seven ‘afarit who adopt her as their sister. She is poisoned by chewing resin; grieving ‘afarit do not bury her but wrap her in reed matting; prince discovers her and fetches a physician who notices she is not dead.
- Stevens, E. S. Folktales of Iraq. 2005. XXVII, page 114.
- Gay-Para, Praline. La planteuse de cumin, contes du Liban. 2004.
- Gay-Para, Praline. “Les Soeurs de Blanche-Neige.” 2009.
- Patai, Raphael. Arab Folktales from Palestine and Israel. 1998. pp. 217-22.
AFRICA
North Africa
Amna and her stepmother (Amna et sa marâtre): An Arabic tale from Algeria.
- Carnoy, Henri. La Tradition vol. 20, 1906. No. 1, pg. 5. "Amna et sa Maratre."
- Delarue, Paul. L'amour des Trois Oranges et autres contes folkloriques des Provinces de France. 1947. p. 44.
- Aceval, Nora. L'Algérie des contes et légendes : Hauts plateaux de Tiaret. 2003.
- Westermann, Diedrich. The Shilluk people, their language and folklore. 1912. No. 84, pp. 205-207.
- El Koudia, Jilali. Moroccan Folk Tales. 2003. No. 9, pp. 53-63.
- Tatar, Maria. The Fairest of Them All: Snow White and 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. p. 188.
- El-Shamy, Hasan. Tales Arab Women Tell and the Behavioral Patterns They Portray. no. 8.
- Raufman, Ravit. Fairy Tales and the Social Unconscious: The Hidden Language. 2017. pg. 124.
- Israeli Folktale Archive no. 6766, recorded in 1965.
- Dan, Ilana. "The Innocent Persecuted Heroine: An Attempt at a Model for the Surface Level of the Narrative Structure of the Female Fairy Tale". Patterns in Oral Literature, edited by Heda Jason and Dimitri Segal, Berlin, New York: De Gruyter Mouton, 2011, pp. 13-30. "Rumanah."
- Schwartz, Howard. Miriam's Tambourine: Jewish Folktales from Around the World. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988. pp. 67-78. "Romana."
- Rush, Barbra. The Book of Jewish Women's Tales. "The Pomegranate Girl."
- Frankel, Ellen. The Jewish Spirit. 1997.
- Kimmel, Eric A. Rimona of the Flashing Sword. 1995. (Retelling.)
- Rivière, Joseph. Collection de contes et chansons populaires, Volume 4. 1882. No. 6, p. 215.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Lang, Andrew. The Grey Fairy Book. 1900. "Udea and Her Seven Brothers."
- Stumme, Hans. Märchen und Gedichte aus der Stadt Tripolis in Nordafrika. 1898.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Laoust, Emile. Etude sur le dialecte berbere du Chenoua. 1912.
Compare Syair Bidasari and related Indian tales.
- Schwarz, Howard. Leaves from the Garden of Eden. 2010. pp. 62-65. Collected from Flora Cohen.
- Tatar, Maria. The Fairest of Them All: Snow White and 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. p. 194.
- Raufman, Ravit. "Red as a Pomegranate. Jewish North African versions of Snow White." Fabula. Vol. 58, issue 3/4, Nov. 2017. pp. 294-318. (mentioned)
- Schely-Newman Esther: 1990. Zin el Gamra: The North African Snow White. In: Jerusalem Studies in Jewish Folklore (1990) 11–12 (Hebrew: 76–101). Written in Hebrew.
West Africa
The Beautiful Daughter: West Africa. Heroine "Maria" is aided by robbers, awoken by the love interest’s daughter.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Nassau, Rev. Robert Hamill. Fetichism in West Africa. 1904. P. 377.
- Tatar, Maria. The Fairest of Them All: Snow White and 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. p. 138ff.
- Calame-Griaule, Genevieve. Contes tendres, contes cruels du Sahel nigérien. 2002.
- Itinerances... en pays peul et ailleurs. Societe des Africanistes, II, pp. 63-78, repris dans Calame Griaule, 1987.
Central Africa
The Favored Daughter: a story from the Mpongwe people of Gabon. The heroine is named Ilambe. Possibly a fragment; the story ends with Ilambe's death, and her interment in a coffin suspended in the air.
- Nassau, Robert Hamill. Batanga tales. 1915.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
East Africa
The Most Beautiful Woman in the World: Swahili. A Sultan's wife is vain, talks to the sun and moon, but her daughter surpasses her beauty. She abandons her newborn daughter, Amina, but Amina is saved and grows up in the house of the jinns. Her mother learns of her survival and tries to kill her and eventually gives her poisoned shoes. The jinns put Amina into a jeweled box and throw it into the sea, where a sultan's son and a merchant's son find and argue over it. The merchant's son gets it and marries the box. When he finally manages to open it, he takes off Amina's shoes and she comes back to life.
- Baker, E. C. "Swahili Tales, II (Concluded)." Folklore. 38(3). 1927. no. 16, pp. 272-305.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Junod, Henri A. Life of a South African Tribe vol. II: Mental Life. 1962. pp. 266-275.
AMERICAS
Blanca Flor ("White Flower")
- Ocasio, Rafael (2021). Folk Stories from the Hills of Puerto Rico. Rutgers University Press. pp. 29–41.
- Ocasio, Rafael (2021). Folk Stories from the Hills of Puerto Rico. Rutgers University Press. pp. 29–41.
- Pino-Saaverdra, Yolando, ed. Folktales of Chile. Rockwell Gray, ed. Folktales of the World. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967.
- Tatar, Maria. The Fairest of Them All: Snow White and 21 Tales of Mothers and Daughters. 188.
- Rael, Juan. Cuentos Espanoles de Colorado y de Nuevo Mejico. 1957. pp. 254-56.
- Robe, Stanley L. Mexican Tales and Legends from Los Altos. 1970. No. 96, 359-60 (In Spanish, with English summary.)
- Fortier, Alcée. Louisiana Folk-Tales. Memoirs of the American Folk-Lore Society. Vol. 2. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Company. 1895. pp. 56-61.
- Philip, Neil. Stocking of Buttermilk: American Folktales.
- Reneaux, J. J. Cajun Folktales.
Sleeping Beauty (Type 410)
These are stories in which a princess falls into a magic sleep, but there is no jealous stepmother plot. Despite the usual title for this tale type, I would not classify Charles Perrault's original, longer Sleeping Beauty as this story; instead, it is a literary French version of Snow White, complete with a jealous mother figure and sympathetic executioner. However, the Grimms' version of Sleeping Beauty (Briar Rose) lacks the jealous mother figure, and thus falls into Type 410.
Blandin de Cornoalha: a medieval romance.
Brunhild: Iceland. She appears in Iceland's Eddas and in the German epic Nibelungenlied, from the 1200s. The hero Siegfried rides through a wall of flames and awakens her with a kiss on the forehead.
The Demon Is At Last Conquered By the King’s Son: India. The hero comes across a demon's house. The demon has a daughter who he keeps in a room, covered by a sheet. When he places a stick at her head and another at her feet, she dies, and when he switches the stick, she revives for the night. The hero rescues her.
The Glass Coffin (Der gläserne Sarg): Germany. A tailor's apprentice, wandering in the woods, found a glass chest containing a beautiful maiden who begged him to let her out. He did so and learned that she had been imprisoned in the coffin and her brother had been turned into a stag by a sorcerer whom she refused to marry. With the tailor's arrival, all the sorcerer's magic was undone.
This story does not involve an enchanted sleep but has been lumped in with the Snow White or Sleeping Beauty type. The Grimms pulled it directly from a 1728 novel, Das verwöhnte Mütter-Söhngen by Sylvanus.
The Petrified Mansion: India
Wadiah: Palestine
Blandin de Cornoalha: a medieval romance.
Brunhild: Iceland. She appears in Iceland's Eddas and in the German epic Nibelungenlied, from the 1200s. The hero Siegfried rides through a wall of flames and awakens her with a kiss on the forehead.
The Demon Is At Last Conquered By the King’s Son: India. The hero comes across a demon's house. The demon has a daughter who he keeps in a room, covered by a sheet. When he places a stick at her head and another at her feet, she dies, and when he switches the stick, she revives for the night. The hero rescues her.
- Stokes, Maive. Indian Fairy Tales. 1879. no. XXIV.
- Jahn, Ulrich. Volksmärchen aus Pommern und Rügen l, Norden/Leipzig 1891.
- Schmidt, Bernhard. Griechische Marchen, Sagen und Volkslieder. 1877. No. 6, "Die verzauberte Königstochter oder der Zauberthurm."
The Glass Coffin (Der gläserne Sarg): Germany. A tailor's apprentice, wandering in the woods, found a glass chest containing a beautiful maiden who begged him to let her out. He did so and learned that she had been imprisoned in the coffin and her brother had been turned into a stag by a sorcerer whom she refused to marry. With the tailor's arrival, all the sorcerer's magic was undone.
This story does not involve an enchanted sleep but has been lumped in with the Snow White or Sleeping Beauty type. The Grimms pulled it directly from a 1728 novel, Das verwöhnte Mütter-Söhngen by Sylvanus.
- Grimm, Jacob and Wilhelm. Household Tales. Margaret Hunt, translator. London: George Bell, 1884.
- SurLaLune blog post
- Supplemental Nights to the Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6. 1901. pg. 380.
- Basset, René. Contes populaires d’Afrique. 1903. No. 36. "Le Prince Amoureux."
- Spitta-Bey, Guillame. Contes Arabes Modernes: Recueillis Et Traduits. 1883.
- Kasevich, Vadim Borisovich, and Yuri Mikhailovich Osipov. Сказки народов Бирмы (Tales of the peoples of Burma). 1976. No. 71.
- Grimm. Kinder- und Hausmärchen, 1st ed., vol. 1 (Berlin: Realschulbuchhandlung, 1812), no. 50, pp. 225-29.
- "Little Briar-Rose," on SurLaLune, with the Grimms' notes.
The Petrified Mansion: India
- Bradley-Birt, Francis. Bengal Fairy Tales. London: John Lane, 1920.
- Starostina, Aglaia. "Chinese Medieval Versions of Sleeping Beauty." Fabula 52(3-4). 2012.
- Pino-Saaverdra, Yolando, ed. Folktales of Chile. Rockwell Gray, ed. Folktales of the World. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967.
- Thompson, Stith, ed. One Hundred Favorite Folktales. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1974.
- Pitré, Giuseppe. The Collected Sicilian Folk and Fairy Tales of Giuseppe Pitré. Volume 1. Jack Zipes and Joseph Russo, editors. New York: Routledge, 2008.
Wadiah: Palestine
- Patai, Raphael, editor and translator. Arab Folktales from Palestine and Israel. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1998. pp. 239-43.
- Starostina, Aglaia. "Chinese Medieval Versions of Sleeping Beauty." Fabula 52(3-4). 2012.
The Fruitful Sleep
While on an adventure, a hero encounters a sleeping woman. He either rapes her and conceives a child, or leaves some token with her, so that she seeks him when she wakes up. Often, someone else claims to be the hero or tries to get rid of him. Here, the sleeping princess is not usually the first focus of the story, but an adventure that the main character comes across.
There's a lot of overlap with Sleeping Beauty, but the enchanted sleep is not usually the focus. The story is more centered around the hero's exploits, and the heroine's eventual search for him.
The Accursed Garden: Austria. The sleeping woman is described as a "white maiden."
See also "The Water of Life," no. 97, in the same collection. The maiden is not sleeping in this variant, but her role is the same.
There's a lot of overlap with Sleeping Beauty, but the enchanted sleep is not usually the focus. The story is more centered around the hero's exploits, and the heroine's eventual search for him.
The Accursed Garden: Austria. The sleeping woman is described as a "white maiden."
- Vernaleken, Theodor. In the Land of Marvels: Folk-tales from Austria and Bohemia. 1884. no. 52.
- John Francis Campbell, Popular Tales of the West Highlands, "The Brown Bear of the Green Glen"
- Groome, Francis Hindes, Gypsy Folk Tales, 1899. No. 43.
- Vernalaken, Theodor. In the Land of Marvels: Folk-tales from Austria and Bohemia. 1884. no. 53.
- Curtin, Jeremiah. Myths and Folk-lore of Ireland. Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1890.
- Calvino, Italo. Italian Folktales. no. 100, p. 366.
- Lang, Andrew. The Crimson Fairy Book. 1903.
- Groome, Francis Hindes. In Gypsy Tents. 1881. pg. 299. "An Old King and his Three Sons in England."
- Groome, Francis Hindes, Gypsy Folk Tales, 1899. No. 55.
- Jacobs, Joseph. More English Fairy Tales, 1894, "The King of England and his Three Sons." Although drawing from Groome's account, Jacobs erased any mentions of the characters being Roma.
See also "The Water of Life," no. 97, in the same collection. The maiden is not sleeping in this variant, but her role is the same.
- Grimm, Jacob and Wilhelm. Household Tales. Margaret Hunt, translator. London: George Bell, 1884. no. 111.
- Calvino, Italo. Italian Folktales. George Martin, translator. New York: Pantheon Books, 1980.
- Kasevich, Vadim Borisovich, and Yuri Mikhailovich Osipov. Сказки народов Бирмы (Tales of the peoples of Burma). 1976. No. 163.
- Groome, Francis Hindes, Gypsy Folk Tales, 1899. No. 26.
The Supplanted Bride / The Needle Prince (Type 437)
Originally identified as AT 437. It was later made a subsection of AT 894 (The Ghoulish Schoolmaster and the Stone of Pity), but the plots are often very distinct. They seem to have been conflated based only on a final scene where a persecuted woman tells her story to a stone.
A woman must awaken an enchanted prince by keeping vigil for a set amount of time, removing needles from his body, filling buckets full of tears, fanning him, or some other task. She is almost finished when another woman completes her vigil, wakes the prince, and takes her place as a false bride. The heroine is forced to act as a servant, but manages to tell her life story and marry the prince.
Some ideas, such as the sleeping-needle, connect to Sleeping Beauty. It also has elements of The False Bride and Cupid and Psyche.
The Dead Man's Palace (Il palazzo dell'Omo morto): Italy.
The Sleeping Prince; or, The Knife, the Cord, and the Stone: Greece. A princess watches a sleeping prince for three months, three weeks, and three days in order to awaken him, but a maid replaces her at the moment when he wakes up. The princess is made a servant while the maid marries the prince. The princess manages to tell her story, to a knife, a cord and a stone and when the prince overhears her, he punishes the false servant and marries the girl who actually broke his curse.
Ngana Fenda Maria: Angola. The heroine cuts her finger while cutting sugar cane. She seeks out a man named Vidiji Milanda who is beautiful like the white sugarcane and red blood. She finds him in a deathlike sleep and must fill twelve jugs with tears to wake him. When she is almost done, she sleeps while her slave finishes the final jug, but the slave takes her place and marries the man. Fenda Maria is forced to live as a slave, but the husband finds out the truth after he hears her telling her story to household objects.
The Dead Prince and the Talking Doll: India.
A woman must awaken an enchanted prince by keeping vigil for a set amount of time, removing needles from his body, filling buckets full of tears, fanning him, or some other task. She is almost finished when another woman completes her vigil, wakes the prince, and takes her place as a false bride. The heroine is forced to act as a servant, but manages to tell her life story and marry the prince.
Some ideas, such as the sleeping-needle, connect to Sleeping Beauty. It also has elements of The False Bride and Cupid and Psyche.
- Goldberg, Christine. "The Knife of Death and the Stone of Patience."
The Dead Man's Palace (Il palazzo dell'Omo morto): Italy.
- Calvino, Italo. Italian Folktales. No. 32.
- Giambattista Basile, Il Pentamerone; or, The Tale of Tales. 1634.
- Lurie, Alison. Clever Gretchen and Other Forgotten Fairytales. "The Sleeping Prince."
- Delarue, Paul. Incarnat, Blanc et Or et autres contes méditerranéens. 1955.
The Sleeping Prince; or, The Knife, the Cord, and the Stone: Greece. A princess watches a sleeping prince for three months, three weeks, and three days in order to awaken him, but a maid replaces her at the moment when he wakes up. The princess is made a servant while the maid marries the prince. The princess manages to tell her story, to a knife, a cord and a stone and when the prince overhears her, he punishes the false servant and marries the girl who actually broke his curse.
- Megas, Georgios A. Folktales of Greece. 1970. p. 70.
- Stuart-Glennie, John. Greek Folk Poesy: Folk prose. The survival of paganism. 1896. "The Sleeping Prince, or the Knife, the cord, and the Stone." pg. 40.
- Gonzenbach, Laura. Sicilianische Märchen. vol. 1. 1870. No. 11, p. 59.
- Zipes, Jack. The Robber with a Witch's Head: More Stories from the Great Treasury of Sicilian Folk and Fairy Tales Collected by Laura Gonzenbach. 2005. No. 27, p. 139.
Ngana Fenda Maria: Angola. The heroine cuts her finger while cutting sugar cane. She seeks out a man named Vidiji Milanda who is beautiful like the white sugarcane and red blood. She finds him in a deathlike sleep and must fill twelve jugs with tears to wake him. When she is almost done, she sleeps while her slave finishes the final jug, but the slave takes her place and marries the man. Fenda Maria is forced to live as a slave, but the husband finds out the truth after he hears her telling her story to household objects.
- Heiner, Heidi Anne, editor. Sleeping Beauties: Sleeping Beauty and Snow White Tales From Around the World. 2010.
- Chatelain, Héli. Folk-tales of Angola: Fifty Tales, with Ki-mbundu Text, Literal English Translation, Introduction, and Notes, Volume 1. 1894. (Includes two versions.)
- Artin Pacha, S. E. Yacoub. Contes populaires inédits de la vallée du Nil. 1895. No. 3.
The Dead Prince and the Talking Doll: India.
- Sharma, Narinder. A Flowering Tree And Other Oral Tales From India. No. 12.
- Noy, Dov. Folktales of Israel. 1963. No. 48, p. 117.
- Stokes, Maive. Indian Fairy Tales. 1879. No. 23.
- Dorson, Richard M. Folktales Told Around the World. pp. 238-242.
- Kúnos, Ignácz. Turkish Fairy Tales and Folk Tales. 1905. No. 28, pp. 188-195.
- Lorimer, D. L. R. and Lorimer, E. O. Persian Tales. 1917. No. 5.
Miscellaneous Tales
These tales include similarities to Snow White or Sleeping Beauty, but don't fully fit into those categories.
Anthia and Habrocomes: an Ancient Greek novel by Xenophon of Ephesus; 2nd century AD. In Ephesus, the incredibly beautiful Anthia (flower) is in love with Habromes. She has two slaves, Leucon (white) and Rhode (rose). They travel to Egypt to avoid a bad omen, but are captured by pirates, and in the course of events different people fall in love with them. A woman who falls for Habrocomes orders that Anthia be taken into the woods and killed, but the executioner takes pity on her and sells her into slavery instead. Anthia is taken in by robbers, whose leader also wants to marry her. She falls into despair, thinking her beloved Habrocomes is dead, and takes poison from a beggar which she believes will kill her. It doesn't work and she wakes up in her tomb after the funeral. Meanwhile, oddly enough, Habrocomes is reminded of his wife when he meets a man who keeps his dead wife's mummified body with him all the time. Anthia and Habrocomes are eventually reunited. In Fairytale and the Ancient World, Graham Anderson suggests that this was a pragmatic adaptation of a Snow White-esque tale.
The Beautiful Girl: an ancient African tale type. A striking young girl draws attention due to her beauty. The other girls her age grow jealous (sometimes because they ask herdboys which one is the most beautiful and she is the one named). They take her out into the wilderness, where they abandon her usually in a well or a pit. The girl sings for help until someone hears and frees her, and she is returned to her parents. While trapped underground, the girl is in a liminal state and symbolic death not unlike Snow White's deathlike sleep. Sigrid Schmidt suggested that this story represents an African form of Snow White predating the influence of the European fairy tale.
See also "The Juniper Tree."
Cymbeline: A play by Shakespeare, produced before at least 1611. In one of the many plotlines, Princess Imogen, who has a treacherous stepmother, is forced to flee court to avoid death (although the prospective killer is actually Imogen’s husband, tricked into believing she’s been unfaithful). She takes medicine originally purchased by her stepmother as part of a murder plot, which turns out to actually put her into a temporary coma.
Chundun Rajah: India. A princess marries a prince who is dead during the day and comes back to life at night. As in other Indian tales, she breaks his curse by recovering the sacred necklace that contains his life.
Ethna the Bride: Ireland. Ethna falls into a trancelike sleep and can't be woken, because her spirit has been taken to the land of fairies to be Finvarra's bride. Her human husband frees her by taking off her girdle and burning it.
Elements similar to Snow White: the lady’s coloring, her seven brothers, the coffin of precious metals, the apparent death, and the waking to be with her lover.
Longoloka, le père envieux: Mozambique. A man named Longoloka looks in a mirror and asks whether he or his wife's unborn child is more beautiful. The mirror responds that it's the child, who has a star on his forehead. When the boy gets older, Longoloka kills him. His wife gives birth again to another beautiful child, but this son escapes Longoloka.
The Seven Sleepers: A story from Christian and Islamic tradition, of a group of young men who, during religious persecutions about 250 AD, hide in a cave outside Ephesus. They fall asleep and come out three hundred years later. The story dates back to at least the 400s.
Snaefrid: Norway. Snaefrid, Snjófríðr, or snow-fair, was the wife of King Harald. When she died, she remained as rosy and beautiful as she had been in life. The king believed she would come back to life and sat by her bier for three years, until his wise advisors told him to have her body moved and re-dressed. When this was done, the decay became immediately obvious.
(Untitled story): a Scottish Gaelic story from South Uist. Like “Lasair Gheug” and other Scottish Gaelic tales, this story combines elements of Snow White with the tale type of “The Maiden Without Hands.” The stepmother accuses the princess of killing three greyhound pups and breaking candlesticks. The king takes the princess to the wilderness, mutilates her, and lets her go. She comes to the home of three cursed princes, and has two sons by the most handsome prince. An old woman heals her, and she goes home to restore her father to health. The stepmother is executed.
Anthia and Habrocomes: an Ancient Greek novel by Xenophon of Ephesus; 2nd century AD. In Ephesus, the incredibly beautiful Anthia (flower) is in love with Habromes. She has two slaves, Leucon (white) and Rhode (rose). They travel to Egypt to avoid a bad omen, but are captured by pirates, and in the course of events different people fall in love with them. A woman who falls for Habrocomes orders that Anthia be taken into the woods and killed, but the executioner takes pity on her and sells her into slavery instead. Anthia is taken in by robbers, whose leader also wants to marry her. She falls into despair, thinking her beloved Habrocomes is dead, and takes poison from a beggar which she believes will kill her. It doesn't work and she wakes up in her tomb after the funeral. Meanwhile, oddly enough, Habrocomes is reminded of his wife when he meets a man who keeps his dead wife's mummified body with him all the time. Anthia and Habrocomes are eventually reunited. In Fairytale and the Ancient World, Graham Anderson suggests that this was a pragmatic adaptation of a Snow White-esque tale.
The Beautiful Girl: an ancient African tale type. A striking young girl draws attention due to her beauty. The other girls her age grow jealous (sometimes because they ask herdboys which one is the most beautiful and she is the one named). They take her out into the wilderness, where they abandon her usually in a well or a pit. The girl sings for help until someone hears and frees her, and she is returned to her parents. While trapped underground, the girl is in a liminal state and symbolic death not unlike Snow White's deathlike sleep. Sigrid Schmidt suggested that this story represents an African form of Snow White predating the influence of the European fairy tale.
See also "The Juniper Tree."
- Schmidt, Sigrid. "Snow White in Africa" , vol. 49, no. 3-4, 2008, pp. 268-287.
- "Of the Pretty Girl and the Seven Jealous Women." Nigerian folktale. World of Tales website.
Cymbeline: A play by Shakespeare, produced before at least 1611. In one of the many plotlines, Princess Imogen, who has a treacherous stepmother, is forced to flee court to avoid death (although the prospective killer is actually Imogen’s husband, tricked into believing she’s been unfaithful). She takes medicine originally purchased by her stepmother as part of a murder plot, which turns out to actually put her into a temporary coma.
Chundun Rajah: India. A princess marries a prince who is dead during the day and comes back to life at night. As in other Indian tales, she breaks his curse by recovering the sacred necklace that contains his life.
- Frere, Mary. Old Deccan Days. 1868. XX. Chundun Rajah
- D. L. Ashliman, translation.
- Ernst Ludwig Rochholz, Schweizersagen aus dem Aargau, vol. 1 (Aarau: Druck und Verlag von H. R. Sauerländer, 1856), no. 222, p. 312. "Tod der Sieben Zwerge."
Ethna the Bride: Ireland. Ethna falls into a trancelike sleep and can't be woken, because her spirit has been taken to the land of fairies to be Finvarra's bride. Her human husband frees her by taking off her girdle and burning it.
- Lady [Jane Francesca Elgee] Wilde. Ancient Legends, Mystic Charms, and Superstitions of Ireland (Boston: Ticknor and Company, 1888), pp. 42-45.
Elements similar to Snow White: the lady’s coloring, her seven brothers, the coffin of precious metals, the apparent death, and the waking to be with her lover.
- Child, Francis James. The English and Scottish Popular Ballads. 1882-1898. 96A: The Gay Goshawk.
- Grimm. The Juniper Tree.
Longoloka, le père envieux: Mozambique. A man named Longoloka looks in a mirror and asks whether he or his wife's unborn child is more beautiful. The mirror responds that it's the child, who has a star on his forehead. When the boy gets older, Longoloka kills him. His wife gives birth again to another beautiful child, but this son escapes Longoloka.
- Junod, Henri A. Nouveaux contes ronga. 1898. p. 55.
- Jacobs, Joseph. English Fairy Tales. 1890.
- Corazzini, Francesco. I Componimenti minore della litteratura popolare nei principali dialetti. Benevento, 1877. Pp. 435-439.
- Cox, Marian Roalfe. Cinderella 155.
The Seven Sleepers: A story from Christian and Islamic tradition, of a group of young men who, during religious persecutions about 250 AD, hide in a cave outside Ephesus. They fall asleep and come out three hundred years later. The story dates back to at least the 400s.
Snaefrid: Norway. Snaefrid, Snjófríðr, or snow-fair, was the wife of King Harald. When she died, she remained as rosy and beautiful as she had been in life. The king believed she would come back to life and sat by her bier for three years, until his wise advisors told him to have her body moved and re-dressed. When this was done, the decay became immediately obvious.
- Murphy, G. Ronald. The Owl, the Raven, and the Dove: The Religious Meaning of the Grimms' Magic Fairy Tales. 2002.
- Snorri Sturluson, Heimskrinla or The Lives of the Norse Kings.
(Untitled story): a Scottish Gaelic story from South Uist. Like “Lasair Gheug” and other Scottish Gaelic tales, this story combines elements of Snow White with the tale type of “The Maiden Without Hands.” The stepmother accuses the princess of killing three greyhound pups and breaking candlesticks. The king takes the princess to the wilderness, mutilates her, and lets her go. She comes to the home of three cursed princes, and has two sons by the most handsome prince. An old woman heals her, and she goes home to restore her father to health. The stepmother is executed.
- Campbell, John Francis. Popular Tales of the West Highlands. Vol. 3. 1862. p. 421-422.
- Fraser, Joy. "A Study of Scottish Gaelic Versions of ‘Snow-White’." Scottish Studies, 34, p. 60. Appendix A has a transcription of Campbell’s notes, which include details not in the published version.
- Shelton, A. L. Tibetan Folk Tales. 1925.
- Calvino, Italo. Italian Folktales. no. 111.
Sources
For a different kind of enchanted sleep: D. L. Ashliman's Sleeping Hero Legends
©2015-2020 by Writing in Margins
- Böklen, Ernst. Sneewittchenstudien, vols. 1-2.
- Zipes, Jack, ed. The Golden Age of Folk and Fairy Tales: From the Brothers Grimm to Andrew Lang. 2013.
For a different kind of enchanted sleep: D. L. Ashliman's Sleeping Hero Legends
©2015-2020 by Writing in Margins