The true fairy-tales | smebro's Blog

http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext00/pntmn10.txt

So today I read half of an Ebook called the Pentamerone, it’s by Giambattista Basile.

It is a mix of horror and gore.

None of the fairy-tales you hold dear are as you remember them. They all come from darker origins, some are outright horror stories where the baddy (From modern perspective) wins the battle.

Puss in boots never had boots.

Cinderella actually had 6 wicked step-sisters, 

and it was a special plant she had (A fairy plant, a common element in these old tales) from which she gained her wish of going to the ball.  

Her name wasn’t changed to Cinderella, it was changed to Cannetella. She used the magic of the plant to craft a gown so that she might attend the ball. In this older version there was not just one ball, there was a week of lavish Balls which Cannetella attended, and each night the King saw her and was overcome by her beauty. But here is the major difference… the king is her father! He is turned on by his daughter, and so sends an attendant to follow her (She uses fairy magic each time, usually throwing riches of various sorts to halt the attendant). 

I won’t ruin the ending, it involves an ogre and a trap… but here is the moral lesson

     "He who stumbles and does not fall,

     Is helped on his way like a rolling ball."

So take from that what you will, Cinderella’s origins are a little more complicated then I thought.

There are plenty more, the closest to the original that I’ve read so far would be the old version of puss-in-boots, the only difference I can recall from my child-hood version is that in this older version there are no boots.

All the stories have moral lessons, some better then others . Here’s a view of old-time racism

"Embrace me then," said Nella, "for I am the

fire of your heart." But the Prince seeing the dark hue of her face

answered, "I would sooner take you for the coal than the fire, so

keep off--don't blacken me." Whereupon Nella, perceiving that he

did not know her, called for a basin of clean water and washed her

face. As soon as the cloud of soot was removed the sun shone

forth; and the Prince, recognising her, pressed her to his heart and

acknowledged her for his wife. Then he had her sisters thrown into

an oven, thus proving the truth of the old saying--

     "No evil ever went without punishment."

Anyways, just ranting. These truer fairy-tales are far more interesting then the sugary versions we tell now.