3. Tale Type
“ATU: The White Serpent’s Flesh. Contrary to warning, a servant (cook) eats the
flesh of a white serpent (from the king’s pot), whereupon he understands the
speech of animals...When he is accused of stealing a ring this knowledge
enables him to prove his innocence. By overhearing the conversation of ducks
he learns that one of them has swallowed the queen’s ring that fell from the
window. He orders the duck to be slaughtered, the ring is found, and he is
saved...This Type is usually found in combination with type 554” (Uther, 370).
“ATU 554: The Grateful Animals. This miscellaneous type comprises various
tales dealing with helpful deeds of grateful animals. In numerous tales the type
occurs only as episode. Most of the variants present the following basic
structure: A man while travelling meets three animals (from air, water, and
earth) who are in trouble. because he rescues them, they promise to help him
if needed. Later he falls in love with a princess whose father sets three
impossible tasks for him to accomplish. With the help of the grateful animals
he succeeds on three successive days...and wins the princess.” (Uther, 324)
4. Where Are Versions Found?
ATU 673 has documented versions from the
following areas/ethnic groups: Finnish, Estonian,
Latvian, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Scottish,
Irish, French, German, Czech, Slovakian,
Slovene, Serbian, Polish, Byelorussian,Ukrainian,
Turkish, Mari, Georgian, Saudia Arabian,
Chinese, and Brazilian
5. Motifs
B217.1.1. Animal languages learned
from eating serpent.
N451. Secrets overheard from animal
(demon) conversation.
B571. Animals perform tasks for
man./H982. Animals help man perform
task.
B582.2. Animals help hero win
princess.
H1333.3.1.1. Quest for magic apple.
D1905.2. Apple divided and eaten as
love charm.
http://cakelurking.blogspot.com/2012/06/grimm-tales-posh-grounds.html
6. The Historical-
Reconstructional
School
Certain elements of this story may
reflect pre-Christian Germanic beliefs.
The sacrifice of the hero’s horse to
ravens reflects equine sacrifice to the
chief Norse god, Odin, who is served
by ravens who act as messenger-
spies. The learning of animal language
by consuming a serpent relates to
actions of Sigurd, who consumed the
heart of the dragon, Fafnir and could
then understand the language of birds.
http://www.craftycelts.com/Jewelry/Clasps/Norse_Raven_Cloak_Clasp.html
7. Ideological
The Grimms believed that by collecting
and publishing folktales they were helping
to preserve the German past. This was
especially important in the face of the
French conquest of Europe under
Napoleon Bonaparte. The brothers felt
their collection of fairy tales supported
their German Idealist values by
contributing to a shared sense of history
and language that unified the German
people. The elevation of servant to royal
status and the invocation of ancient
German motifs may have appealed to the
Grimms.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dorothea_Viehmann.JPG
8. Functional
The Grimms’ themselves espoused
their fairy tale collection as tool for
moral teaching. The hero of “The White
Snake,” in helping the fish, ants, and
ravens, shows “compassion and
humility” (Tatar, 89) and is thus able to
overcome a lack of class status.
The story also reinforces the preferred
characteristic of women, docility, in
framing the princess as an oppositional
figure whose “arrogance” must be
overcome.
“The White Snake” may also express
some wish/ideal fulfillment in that
someone of the servant class is able to
subsume the ability and ultimately the
position of royalty.
http://etc.usf.edu/clipart/52200/52219/52219_spindle.htm
9. Psychoanalytical
Freudian:
Snakes represent male genitalia. The hoarding of the white snake
may represents the patriarch’s desire to be the soul bearer of
male procreative power. The servant’s desire to taste the snake
represents the Oedipal desire of the son to take the place of the
father.
The golden apples represent breasts; the princess eats the apples
and embraces the feminine nurturing principle by accepting
marriage
Jungian:
“The horse-sacrifice signifies a renunciation of the world”
(Hannah, 103).
Ants represent unconscious impulses that can aid the hero when
he gives into them.
10. Structural
The hero of “The White Snake”
functions as his own donor and
dispatcher, having taken and eaten of
the white snake without permission.
He also chooses to leave home
without being expelled or set on any
particular quest. These are not part of
the “sphere of action of the hero”
according to Propp.
The grateful animals “begin as
donors...then become [the hero’s]
helpers” (Propp)
The king/princess operates in the
characteristic sphere of action:
assigning of difficult tasks, marriage.
http://cakelurking.blogspot.com/2012/06/grimm-tales-posh-grounds.html
11. Contextual
Contextual theory is difficult to apply to
historic text collections, because there was
no way of recording the performance itself.
Many scholars have identified the telling of
tales by women performing domestic work.
The Grimms often invited storytellers into
their home specifically for the purpose of
recording their stories.
“The White Snake” may have been
contributed to the collection by the
daughters of the German, aristocratic
house of Von Haxthausen or the
bourgeois, Huguenot Hassenpflugs.
http://www.zeno.org/nid/20004257596
12. Reference List
Dorson, Richard. 1972. Introduction: concepts of folklore and folklife studies. In Folklore
and folklife: an introduction, ed. R. Dorson. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Paradiz, Valerie. 2005. Clever maids: the secret history of the Grimm fairy tales.
New York: Basic Books.
Propp, Vladimir. 1968. Morphology of the folktale. 2nd ed. Translated by Laurence Scott.
Revised and Edited by Louis A. Wagner. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Tatar, Maria. 2003. The hard facts of the Grimms’ fairy tales. 2nd ed. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
Thompson, Stith. 1955-58. Motif-index of folk-literature: a classification of narrative elements in
folktales, ballads, myths, fables, mediaeval romances, exempla, fabliaux, jest-books, and local
legends. Revised and enlarged edition. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana
University Press.
Uther, Hans-Jörg, and Folklore Fellows. 2004. The Types of International Folktales: a
Classification and
Bibliography, Based on the System of Antti Aarne and Stith Thompson. FF Communications no.
284-286. Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia, Academia Scientiarum Fennica.
Zipes, Jack, trans. and ed. 2003. The complete fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm. New York:
Bantam Books.
