The Grateful Dead: The History of a Folk Story

by Gordon Hall Gerould

The obscurity of motivation in this tale makes apparent the extensive revision that it has undergone. The introduction is nowhere else found combined, as far as I know, with the stories of our cycle. The characteristics of The Poison Maiden are sufficiently evident in the conclusion; but there seems to be no way to account for the peculiar form of demonic possession, together with the actual division of the woman, except by supposing, with Dutz,[22] that the variant has lost the part concerning the burial of the dead man. If this be true, the story belongs in the category where it is here placed.

The Finnish variant[23] presents difficulties of a somewhat different sort. A merchant’s son, to whom it has been foretold that he will marry a three-horned maiden, goes abroad to escape this fate. There he sees the corpse of a debtor hanging nailed to a church wall, and insulted by the passers-by. He expends all but nine silver kopecks in rescuing the body, and turns homeward. He is joined by a companion, who makes the money last three days, and on the fourth arranges for him to marry the three-horned daughter of a king. On the wedding night the helper brings the hero fresh-cut twigs. By beating the maiden with these her blood is purified, the horns drop off, and she becomes very beautiful.

No new material is here introduced; but the handling is considerably changed, and the narrative abridged. The woman in the case is three-horned instead of possessed by snakes, nor is there any hint of harm to the bridegroom. A reminiscence of the division of the woman, though not of the dowry, appears in the beating which the ghostly companion gives her, whereby she is freed from her horns and made very beautiful. The variant appears to be weakened by frequent retelling.

Rumanian I. is more striking, since it has undergone both revision and addition. The only daughter of an emperor wears out twelve pairs of slippers every night, until her father offers her hand and the heirship of the kingdom to any man who can explain this extraordinary and costly habit. Many men of high birth and low make the attempt unsuccessfully. Meanwhile, a certain peasant, whose servant had died when his year of service was but half ended, had placed the body in a chest under the roof in revenge for his disappointment. The new servant had discovered this, and had given the corpse the rites due the dead, as far as permitted by his master. When he departs at the end of his year of service, the dead man comes from the earth, thanks him, and proposes that they swear on the cross to be brothers. So they do, and go on together till they come to an iron wood. The vampire breaks off a twig, and casts it to the earth in the place where the emperor’s daughter comes at night with the sons of the dragon. When she appears, she sees the broken twig, and is afraid. So she goes to the copper wood, where she sees another twig broken by the vampire, and hastens on to the place where the sons of the dragon dwell. It is in going so far that she wears out her slippers. When she comes to the place, and is about to sit down at table, she drops her handkerchief. The vampire, who has followed her from the copper wood in the form of a cat, takes it away, as he does also the spoon that falls from her hand and the ring that falls from her finger. He goes back to the copper wood with them, and explains everything to his friend. The latter takes them to the emperor and wins the lady.

This curious tale has several elements which make it difficult to classify. As far as the kindness to the dead goes, the matter is simple. Instead of an agreement between the companions to divide their gains, however, an oath of brotherhood is introduced. This is probably a local substitution, since it has long been a custom of the Slavs of the south to swear brotherhood on the cross,[24] but it necessitates the further loss of important features at the end of the narrative such as the saving of the bridegroom on the wedding night and the division of the maiden (or some modification of that feature) by the vampire. Indeed, the heroine is rather enchanted than possessed. The whole series of acts by which she is freed introduces traits into the narrative which we have hitherto met only in Esthonian II. Were it not that they are repeated in all the other members of the group save Breton I., which we have still to consider, there would be considerable doubt about placing this variant under the category of The Grateful Dead + The Poison Maiden. As it is, we can with security say that this and the following versions belong here. They have simply modified the normal form by the addition of certain elements from another theme.

The three Irish versions all have this form. In Irish I. a king’s son, while hunting, pays five pounds to the creditors of a dead man, so that he may be buried. Later the prince kills a raven, and declares that he will marry only that woman who has hair as black as the raven, skin as white as snow, and cheeks as red as blood upon the snow.[25] On his way to find her he meets a red-haired youth, who takes service with him for half of what they may gain in a year and a day. The youth obtains for him from various giants by threats of what his master will do[26] horses of gold and silver, a sword of light, a cloak of darkness, and the slippery shoes. When they come to the castle of the maiden, he helps the Prince to keep over night a comb and a pair of scissors in spite of enchantment, and he obtains at her bidding the lips of the giant enchanter, which are the last that she has kissed. He then tells the prince and the maiden’s father to strike her three times, when three devils come from her mouth in fire. So the prince marries her, and is ready at the end of a year and a day to divide his child[27] at the servant’s command. But the latter explains that he is the soul of the dead man, and disappears.

Irish II. differs little except in details from the above. The king of Ireland’s son sets forth to find a woman with hair as black as the raven, skin as white as snow, and cheeks as red as blood. Ten pounds of the twenty which he takes with him he pays to release the corpse of a man on which writs are laid. He meets a short green man, who goes with him for his wife’s first kiss; and he comes upon a gunner, a man listening to the growing grass, a swift runner, a man blowing a windmill with one nostril, and a strong man, all of whom accompany him for the promise of a house and garden apiece. After various adventures in the castles of giants, they arrive in the east, where the prince’s lady dwells. She says that her suitor must loose her geasa from her before she can marry him. With the help of the short green man he gives her the scissors, the comb, and the King of Porson’s head, which she requires. He is then told to get three bottles of healing water from the well of the western world. The runner sets out for them, and is stopped and put to sleep by an old hag on the way back; but the earman hears him snoring, the gunman sees him and wakes him up, and the windman keeps the hag back till he returns. Finally the strong man crushes three miles of steel needles so that the prince can walk over them. Thus the bride is won. The short green man claims the first kiss, and finds her full of serpents, which he picks out of her. He then tells the youth that he is the man who was in the coffin, and disappears with his fellows.

In Irish III. three brothers set out from home with three pounds apiece. The youngest gives his all to pay a dead man’s debts to three giants. He shares his food with a poor man, who offers to be his servant, saying that the corpse was his brother, and had appeared to him in a dream.[28] Jack the servant frightens the first giant into giving up his sword of sharpness, the second giant his cloak of darkness, and the third giant his shoes of swiftness. The two Jacks come to the castle of a king, whose daughter has to be wooed by accomplishing three tasks. Jack the servant follows the princess in the cloak of darkness to the demon king of Moróco and rescues her scissors. Next day Jack the master runs a race with the king and beats him because shod with the shoes of swiftness. That night Jack the servant goes again to the demon king and cuts off his head with the sword of sharpness, thus accomplishing the third task. So Jack the master marries the princess.

These three variants make evident the nature of the foreign material in Esthonian II. and Rumanian I. The whole sub-group, indeed, has in combination with The Grateful Dead + The Poison Maiden important elements from the themes of The Water of Life and The Lady and the Monster. These features will be considered in detail in a later chapter,[29] when we study the general type The Grateful Dead + The Water of Life. For the present it is enough to indicate how the addition has affected the type with which we are immediately concerned.

Of the three Irish tales, the first two have best preserved the characteristics of the compound as found in Asia and Eastern Europe. Irish I. has all the essential features of Armenian and Gypsy,—for example, the burial, the agreement to divide what is gained, and the removal of the evil things by which the woman is possessed. To be sure, the latter are devils, not serpents, and the woman is beaten, not divided. Yet the division appears in another form, since the hero is ready to share his child with the red-haired man, a trait connected with the theme of Amis and Amiloun.[30] Irish II. is in some respects more changed, and in some respects less, than Irish I. The agreement to divide is changed to a promise that the green man shall have the first kiss of the bride. On the other hand, the serpents in the woman’s body are retained, a trait which is very primitive and very important in enabling us to identify the position of these variants. Irish III. has lost most of the typical features of the compound. Kennedy’s evidence shows that Jack the servant is to be regarded as really the thankful dead; but the agreement to divide the gains and the removal of the demons or serpents have entirely disappeared under pressure from the secondary theme, the essential idea of which is the accomplishment by the hero of certain unspelling tasks. In conjunction with the other two variants, however, the position of Irish III. is clear.