The Grateful Dead: The History of a Folk Story

by Gordon Hall Gerould

Dr. Wünsche gives as subsidiary types stories where a princess wishes the magic water for herself, and, when her two brothers fail to return with it, goes on a quest which results in obtaining the water and releasing the enchanted brothers; where a mother and son are the chief actors; where a bird, or fruit, or the water of death is substituted for the water of life; and where thankful beasts appear. All of these elements and more appear in the accessible variants, yet not all of them can be said rightly to represent The Water of Life as such. The basal traits of the story are much more simple than Dr. Wünsche would have us believe. They do not include, for example, the wonderful companions whom the hero finds nor the adventures with the enchanted princess, since these are in reality traits of originally separate themes, as will presently be shown.[10]

On the other hand, Cosquin’s outline seems to me defective in two ways. First, he does not recognize that there existed in the original theme some reward due the hero for his constancy and intelligence in the pursuit of his quest. A priori this conclusion would be expected from the general manner of folk-tales, and as a matter of fact it appears in all the versions which have come to my attention. The reward almost always takes the form of a princess, though the manner in which she is won varies very greatly. In the second place, Cosquin seems to regard The Golden Bird as a theme quite independent of The Water of Life.[11] This, I think, is to lose sight of the essential likeness between the two tales, despite their difference of introduction. As Dr. Wünsche notes,[12] not only a bird, but a fruit or the water of death may be substituted for the usual object of the quest. Indeed, certain variants have more than one of these magical forces.[13] To be sure, this superfluity of riches doubtless results from the fusion of subsidiary types, but none the less it points to the original unity of the central theme, which is all that I wish to suggest.

From this discussion we emerge with an outline of The Water of Life in something like the following form: A sick king has three sons, who go out to seek some magical water (or bird, or fruit) for his healing. The two older sons fall by the way into some misfortune due to their own fault; but the youngest, not without aid of one sort or another from beings with supernatural powers, succeeds in the quest and at the same time wins a princess as wife. While returning, he rescues his brothers, and is exposed by their envy and ingratitude to the loss of all he has gained (sometimes even of his life). In the end, however, he comes to his own either because the cure cannot be completed without him or because his wife brings the older princes to book.

This summary I should be unwilling to have considered as anything more than a tentative sketch, since a systematic study of the material may bring to light certain features which I have overlooked.[14] It will, however, serve its purpose here.

This simple form of The Water of Life is not that with which The Grateful Dead has combined. Indeed, the opinion that this union was secondary to that of The Grateful Dead with The Poison Maiden and The Ransomed Woman[15] is strengthened by the fact that it is found with both of these compound types, and that The Water of Life almost invariably appears in a somewhat distorted form. In point of fact, the latter tale seems to have lent itself with remarkable facility to combination with other themes. Thus it is frequently found mixed with The Skilful Companions[16] (both with and without The Grateful Dead), The Lady and the Monster,[17] and The Thankful Beasts.

The reason for the existence of the compounds just mentioned is not far to seek. With The Skilful Companions[18] there is a ready point of contact in the hero’s need for aid in the accomplishment of his quest, another in the circumstance that three or more companions set out together with a common end in view, and still another in the fact that a maiden is rescued by them. To The Lady and the Monster, at least in those variants where The Grateful Dead appears, The Water of Life has the necessary approach in the rôle of the lady herself. As for The Thankful Beasts, their appearance at opportune moments when the heroes of folk-tales need assistance is too frequent to require justification in any particular case. It is with such combinations as these, intricate and involved, that many variants of The Grateful Dead are found joined. Sometimes one element, sometimes another, predominates, so that the threads which unite them are hopelessly snarled. Sometimes The Water of Life is lost in the entanglement, or only appears as a distorted trait, while The Skilful Companions or The Lady and the Monster come out more clearly. Through this labyrinth we must painfully take our way, exercising what caution we can. The present guide recognizes the danger of losing the road and does not pretend to more than a rough and ready knowledge of the wilderness. Accordingly, he undertakes only to conduct the curious wayfarer by the least difficult of the paths that traverse it.

Let us first consider the tales into which The Poison Maiden and The Ransomed Woman do not enter, which have only The Grateful Dead + The Water of Life or some kindred theme. These include Maltese, Polish, Hungarian I., Rumanian II., Straparola II., Venetian, Sicilian, Treu Heinrich, and Harz II. They are as widely different in their characteristics as in their sources.

Maltese has the following form: The three sons of a king successively go out in search of a bird, the song of which will make their father young. The elder two lose their all by gambling with a maiden in a palace by the way. The youngest brother pays four thousand pounds sterling to bury properly a man who has been dead eight months. He is warned against the maiden by a ghost, and so wins all from her (by using his own cards), thus rescuing his brothers. When he comes to the castle, the ghost again appears, and tells him to take the bird that he finds in a dirty cage. On the way back he is thrown overboard from the steamboat by his brothers, but is saved by the ghost, who appears in the form of a rock with a tree on it. He is rescued by another steamer, and comes home in rags, where he is recognized by the bird, which has hitherto refused to sing. The brothers are banished.

According to the Polish story, a poor scholar pays his all for the burial of a corpse lying maltreated by the way. Later he goes to sleep under an oak, and on awaking finds his purse full of gold. He is robbed of this while crossing a stream, by some scoundrels who cast him into the water; but he is rescued by the ghost of the dead man, who appears in the form of a plank and gives him the power of turning himself into a crow, a hare, or a deer. He becomes a huntsman to a king, whose daughter lives on an inaccessible island. In her castle is a sword with which a man could overcome the greatest army. When war threatens, the king offers the princess to any man who can obtain the sword. By means of his power of metamorphosis the hero carries her a letter and wins her love. When he exhibits his magical powers, she cuts off a bit of the fur, or a feather, from each creature into which he turns. With the sword he then starts back to court, but on the way he is shot by a rival and robbed of the sword and a letter from the princess. He lies in the way in the form of a dead hare till the war is ended and the rival is about to marry the princess, when he is revived and warned by the ghost. At court he is recognized by the princess, who proves his tale by having him turn into various shapes and fitting the samples which she has taken.

In Hungarian I. a soldier gave all he had to an old beggar, who in turn gave him the power to change at will into a dove, a fish, or a hare. He took service with a king, and one day was sent back to the castle for a magic ring. There he met the princess, and exhibited to her his powers of metamorphosis, permitting her to pull two feathers, take eight scales, and cut off his tail. While running back to the king in the form of a hare, he was shot by an envious comrade, who took the ring and was rewarded. The hero was restored to life by the old beggar, and returned to the castle, where he was brought to the princess. She succeeded in proving the truth of his story by means of the feathers, the scales, and the tail, which she had so fortunately preserved.