The Grateful Dead: The History of a Folk Story

by Gordon Hall Gerould

The Grateful Dead and The Poison Maiden.

One of the most prevalent types of The Grateful Dead is that in which it has combined with The Poison Maiden, a theme almost world-wide in distribution and application. From the time of Benfey and Stephens[1] the connection between the two themes has been regarded as vital. Though Hippe recognized that the stories were perhaps originally independent,[2] he took the compound as his point of departure and derived all other forms from it. As will be seen in the course of our study, such a filiation is exceedingly improbable, if the essential features of The Grateful Dead and The Poison Maiden be closely examined. Hippe went wrong, I should say, in failing to differentiate between what traits belong to the former and what to the latter theme.

As a matter of fact, The Poison Maiden exists in a cycle of its own. Any doubt about this and any necessity of studying the theme in detail here is removed by the valuable monograph of Wilhelm Hertz, Die Sage vom Giftmädchen,[3] in which the literature of the subject has been marshalled with masterly skill. Starting with the stories of how a maiden, who had been fed with snake-poison, was sent to Alexander the Great from India by an enemy, and how the plot to kill the emperor through her embraces was foiled by the cunning of Aristotle,[4] Hertz shows[5] that the central idea of the tale is the belief that a man could be killed by sexual connection with a woman who had been nourished on poison. In most of the variants, to be sure, it is the bite of the woman that is venomous, while in others it is her glance or her breath; but these are natural modifications. Without following the study into details, the important fact to remember is that there has existed from early times a tale relating how a man was saved by a watchful friend on his bridal night from a maiden whose embraces were certain death.[6] With this in mind we can safely proceed to a consideration of the variants of The Grateful Dead which have similar features.

Twenty-four of the stories in my list fall into this category, viz.: Tobit, Armenian, Gypsy, Siberian, Russian I., II., III., and IV., Servian II., III., and IV., Bulgarian, Esthonian II., Finnish, Rumanian I., Irish I., II., and III., Breton I., Danish III., Norwegian II., Simrock X., Harz I., Jack the Giant Killer, and Old Wives’ Tale. All but three of them[7] are folk-tales, a fact that considerably simplifies the discussion.

According to the apocryphal story, Tobit buries by night the dead who lie in the street. He is thrown into prison, and later becomes blind and poverty-stricken. He sends his son Tobias to his brother Gabael for the return of a loan. The youth is accompanied by the angel Raphael in disguise, who calls himself Azarias. On the journey Tobias catches a fish and preserves the heart, liver, and gall at the bidding of his companion. When they arrive at their journey’s end, the angel, as go-between, asks Gabael’s daughter Sara in wedlock for Tobias, though seven men have died while consummating their marriage with her. By burning the heart and liver of the fish at the command of the angel, and by prayer, Tobias escapes; for the demon Asmodeus is driven out of the maiden and bound by Raphael. With his bride and companion Tobias goes home, where he cures Tobit’s blindness by means of the gall of the fish. After being offered half of the wealth that he has brought the family, Raphael explains his identity and disappears.

This variant is peculiar in that the father does the good action, while the son is chiefly rewarded. Indeed, it is the son whose life is saved from the possessed woman whom he marries. Moreover, the grateful dead is replaced by an angel, who indeed commends Tobit for his good deed, but is certainly a substitute for the ghost. Obviously Tobit with such peculiarities as these cannot be regarded as the general source of the widespread folk-tale. At the same time we must not forget that it has been, perhaps, the best-loved story in the Apocrypha,[8] and that its influence on details of the narrative may be looked for almost anywhere in Christendom.

In the Armenian story from Transcaucasia[9] a man finds a corpse hanging in a tree and being beaten by his late creditors. The man pays the debt and buries the body. Some years later he becomes poor. A rich man offers him in marriage his daughter, with whom five bridegrooms have already met death on the wedding night. While thinking over the proposition, he is approached by a man who offers to become his servant for half of his future possessions, and counsels him to marry the woman. On the night of the marriage the servant stands with a sword in the chamber, cuts off the head of a serpent that comes from the bride’s mouth, and pulls out its body. Later he asks for his share of his master’s gains. When he is about to split the woman through the middle, a second snake glides from her mouth. The servant then says that he is the ghost of the corpse long ago rescued, and disappears. Here the story appears in a very normal form, except that the hero is not taking a journey at the time of his kind deed, and that he waits several years for his reward. Moreover, the second snake appears to be due to reduplication.

In Gypsy a youth gives his last twelve piasters for the release of a corpse, which is being maltreated by Jews. The ghost of the dead man follows him and promises to get him a bride if he will share her with him. The youth consents and marries a woman whose five bridegrooms have died on the wedding night. The companion keeps watch in the chamber and cuts off the head of a dragon that comes from the bride’s mouth. Later he demands his half of the woman, and takes a sword to cut her asunder, when she screams and disgorges the dragon’s body. The ghost then explains the situation and disappears.[10]

With the Siberian variant some very important modifications enter. A soldier buys a picture of the Saviour from a peasant and maltreats it. A merchant’s son then buys it out of reverence and takes it to his mother. Later he helps an old man on a raft and goes with him to market. There he meets the daughter of a priest and, by the advice of his friend, marries her. When the old man strikes her with a whip, she splits open, and the devil comes out. She is put together again by the mysterious companion, and accompanies them home, where the old man asks for a division of the gains they have made together. Again he divides the woman. After she has been burned, she is found living and purified. Then the old man says that he is God and departs.

This tale, found among the Turkish race of southern Siberia, has transformed the opening incident altogether. For the burial of the corpse it substitutes a good deed, which is entirely different from the original trait. Yet it is evident that we have to do with The Grateful Dead, after all, since the divine image is rescued from senseless contumely and God himself appears in the rôle of the thankful ghost. It is evident also that the theme is combined with The Poison Maiden. Though we do not hear of any misadventures of other men with the priest’s daughter, the marvels which attend her purification indicate the danger in which the hero stood.