The little myrtle

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The little myrtle ( Neapolitan original: La mortella ) is a fairy tale ( AaTh 652 A). It is in Giambattista Basile 's Pentameron collection as the second story of the first day (I, 2). Felix Liebrecht wrongly translated the blueberry branch .

content

A woman prays for a child, even if it is a myrtle, which she also receives and happily pots. A prince likes the plant so much that he buys it and puts it by his window. She comes to his bed at night as a fairy and disappears until he ties her hair and sees her beauty in the light. A servant has to water them and make the bed when he goes hunting. Seven jealous women dig a passage into the room, pull the bell, whereupon the fairy appears, and cut it up. The servant flees and the prince complains bitterly. But the fairy grows again. The women are buried in a sewer according to their own judgment, only the innocent youngest receives the servant.

Remarks

The myrtle grows in the Mediterranean area, is a houseplant, but also an erotic symbol. Candlelight does not have a fatal effect here as in II, 9 The bolt and V, 4 The golden trunk , first female curiosity. Basile's lust for ridicule reaches its climax when the prince returns - "but just ring the bell and look ... He could have hit the bell with the hammer - the fairy pretended to be deaf." This is followed by pathetic complaints that life has "puked him up", the accursed hunt chases him away from all comfort, and much more. In Pitrès' Sicilian and Tuscan collection, Rudolf Schenda compares Rosamarina and no. 6 La mela , respectively , in Cirese / Serafini's Tradizioni orale non cantate p. 144. Clemens Brentano reworked it as The fairy tale of the lady of myrtle in Italian fairy tales . On the freak Grimm's Hans mein Igel , on the plant also The Carnation , One-Eye, Two-Eyes and Three-Eyes . The punishment according to his own judgment, perhaps after 2 Sam 12.7  EU , remained a popular fairy tale ending, as in Die Gänsemagd .

literature

  • Giambattista Basile: The fairy tale of fairy tales. The pentameron. Edited by Rudolf Schenda. CH Beck, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-406-46764-4 , pp. 33–41, 518–519, 575–576 (based on the Neapolitan text of 1634/36, completely and newly translated).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Giambattista Basile: The fairy tale of fairy tales. The pentameron. Edited by Rudolf Schenda. CH Beck, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-406-46764-4 , p. 39 (based on the Neapolitan text of 1634/36, completely and newly translated).
  2. ^ Giambattista Basile: The fairy tale of fairy tales. The pentameron. Edited by Rudolf Schenda. CH Beck, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-406-46764-4 , pp. 575-576 (based on the Neapolitan text of 1634/36, completely and newly translated).