Once Upon A Time… (the fairytales and folklore thread)

man russians go hard with their fairytales.

Also is it ok to assume that the sisters of Prince Ivan have also been learning magic from their husbands, because if I had a magic bird husband i would def want to learn from him.

 

it is *amazing* how much easier it is to get things done once i've had something to eat. here's the rest!

So Ivan set forth again, and this time when he came to the castle of Koshchei the Deathless he did not stride into the great hall, but rather, climbed up the cliff, and climbed up the wall, and climbed up the tallest tower of the castle all the way to the very top, and in the tiniest room of the castle he found his wife, Maria Morevna, wrapped in iron chains until twenty horses could not have carried her, because Koshchei the Deathless did not want her breaking out and putting him in a barrel again. She was very angry with Ivan when he first appeared, but was sensible enough to keep her voice down so that Koshchei the Deathless could not hear her, and after Ivan apologized many times and promised that he would do everything in his power to rescue her, she forgave him, because, after all, someone who admits his mistakes and tries to fix them is worth keeping. They made a plan, then, that while Ivan went to Baba Yaga and got a horse and a sword from her, Maria Morevna would find out from Koshchei the Deathless how he could be killed.

So Ivan climbed back down the tower, and down the castle wall, and down the cliff, and went to find Baba Yaga, and when Koshchei the Deathless came to visit Maria Morevna to gloat over her, as he was in the habit of doing, she merely smiled at him until he was so angry that he asked her why she was smiling. "Oh, just thinking of how delightful it will be when my husband Prince Ivan comes and chops you into bits," said Maria Morevna.

"Ha!" said Koshchei the Deathless. "I have already chopped Prince Ivan into bits, and put him in a barrel and thrown him in the ocean as well! But even if I had not, it would do him no good to chop me into bits, for my life is not in my body!"

"Where is it then?" said Maria Morevna.

"It is inside a needle, which is inside an egg, which is inside a duck, which is inside a hare, which is inside a pike, which is inside a deer, which is locked inside a golden chest buried on the island of Buyan," said Koshchei the Deathless. "And I only tell you this because you are wrapped in so many iron chains that twenty horses could not carry you, and so I do not need to worry about you going and finding it."

"That is probably true," said Maria Morevna, and looked sad, but inside she was smiling as brightly as ever.

Meanwhile, Prince Ivan rode until he found the deepest forest he had ever seen, and in the middle of that forest, there was a clearing, and in that clearing there was a fence of stakes, and on every stake but one there was a skull. And in that fence there was a little hut, and the little hut was walking around on chicken legs, and Ivan knew that he had found the hut of Baba Yaga. He went up to the hut, and the hut knelt down for him, and he knocked politely on the door.

"Good evening, Grandmother," said he to Baba Yaga when she answered the door. "I have come to ask you for a horse and a sword, for without them I shall never be able to rescue my wife, Maria Morevna, from the giant Koshchei the Deathless."

"Very well, come in," said Baba Yaga. "You shall watch my herd of horses for three days, and if you complete this task for me you shall have your horse and your sword. But if you lose even a single horse from my herd, I shall have your skull for my fence."

Prince Ivan did not want his skull to sit on a stake in the middle of the deepest wood he had ever seen, but he also did not want to leave Maria Morevna locked in a tower and wrapped in iron chains, so he agreed. The next morning, when he woke up, the hut was by a mountain range, and by that mountain range there was a pasture, and in that pasture there was an uncountable herd of fine, spirited horses. "Remember, Prince Ivan, every single horse needs to be back in this pasture by sundown," said Baba Yaga. "Now, go and let them out, and take good care of them!"

So Prince Ivan went and let out the horses, and immediately they all ran into the mountains, scattering every which way as they went. Prince Ivan ran after them shouting, but could barely keep up with even a single horse. He searched the mountains until it was late, and then gave up and went back to have his skull put on Baba Yaga's fence.

But as he walked, soon enough a horse passed him, and then another and another, each followed by an eagle which flapped its wings and threatened with its talons, until every single horse was back in the pasture just before the sun sank. Baba Yaga looked at him suspiciously, but said nothing, and bid him go to sleep.

So it went for the next two days; the horses ran across wide plains, only to be chased home by falcons, and into deep woods, only to be chased home by ravens, and Prince Ivan thanked his lucky stars for his brothers-in-law.

At the end of the three days, Baba Yaga continued to look suspicious, but told Ivan he had done well, and bid him go to sleep and receive his reward in the morning. In the middle of the night, Ivan was woken up by the Raven King pecking at his ear. "You must go now, Ivan," said the Raven King. "Take the sword by the stove that Baba Yaga uses as a poker, and take the first horse you lay hands on, for if you wait until morning, her hut will be so far away from your homeland that you will never find your way back again before you die of old age. Baba Yaga keeps her bargains, but she also knows we helped you."

So Prince Ivan got up and got dressed, and took the sword by the stove, and took the first horse he laid hands on, for he had learned something about following advice. He rode and rode, until he came again to the castle of Koshchei the Deathless, and he left the horse by the cliff, and climbed again to the top of the tower where his wife, Maria Morevna, was chained. It was not quite dawn when he laid Baba Yaga's sword against those chains, and they burst asunder at a single touch, rattling and clanking on the floor. Ivan and Maria Morevna climbed down the tower, and down the castle wall, but they could hear Koshchei the Deathless stirring, awoken by the noise of the chains.

"You ride, and I'll fight," said Maria Morevna, and took the sword from Ivan once they had climbed onto the horse he got from Baba Yaga. "Now, go! Quickly, to the island of Buyan!"

So Ivan kicked the horse into a gallop and guided it around rocks and trees, and Maria Morevna watched carefully behind them, and soon enough there was a rider on the horizon behind them, and soon enough it was plain to see that this rider was Koshchei the Deathless, and he was very angry. His horse, as giant as he was, kicked up entire hills from its hooves as it ran, and it did not take long at all for him to catch up to Prince Ivan and Maria Morevna. He raised his sword, but with one blow Maria Morevna knocked it from his hand, and with a second she clove his skull in halves, right down to the chin, but the sword stuck in his jawbone and was pulled from her hand. "Ride faster!" said Maria Morevna to Prince Ivan. "It will not take him long to recover, and we still have far to go, and I can only delay him a little now!"

So Prince Ivan shouted at the horse until it ran even faster, but sure enough, before long Koshchei the Deathless was following them again. Maria Morevna threw her hairbrush behind them, and the bristles sprouted into a great forest, but Koshchei the Deathless pulled apart the trees and threw them behind him. She threw her comb, and the teeth turned into great sharp jagged rocks, but Koshchei the Deathless clambered up them and down them and over them, not caring how they cut. She threw her mirror, and it turned into a great wide lake, and Koshchei the Deathless stopped to drink it up.

At last they came to the island of Buyan, and there under a lone oak was a rusty old shovel. Prince Ivan started digging as quickly as he could, for Koshchei the Deathless was once again visible on the horizon. He came to a golden chest, and broke it open, and a deer leapt out and started running. Maria Morevna snatched up Prince Ivan's bow and loosed an arrow that caught the deer in the throat, and as it stumbled by the shore, a pike leapt out of the deer's mouth and started swimming away. It did not get far, however, before an eagle struck it and carried it back to shore. When it landed, a hare leapt out of its mouth and ran for the bushes, but a falcon stooped on the hare and broke its back, and when a duck leapt out of the hare's mouth, a raven was there to peck at it until, in its confusion, it fled right back to Prince Ivan. Prince Ivan seized the duck and squeezed it until an egg popped out, and Maria Morevna cracked the egg, and just as Koshchei the Deathless reached them they both picked up the needle and snapped it like a wishbone, and Koshchei the Deathless fell over dead.

So Prince Ivan and Maria Morevna rode back to her city on the horse that Prince Ivan got from Baba Yaga, and the Eagle King and the Falcon King and the Raven King went with them. And once they had gotten home safely, the bird-kings went and fetched their wives to come visit, and they all celebrated the return of Prince Ivan and Maria Morevna and chatted with each other long into the night. And when Prince Ivan and Maria Morevna had children of their own, they taught every single one of them to ask questions before sticking their noses into something, as well as how to ride and fight and command an army, and that is the way it should be.

 

....so is Maria Morevna a magician in addition to being a warrior-general-queen who can fight a giant on a moving horse?

 

I mean probably? Either that, or her military training got *really* *serious* about combat engineering. But yeah, she's just pretty much all around awesome.

 

So THAT'S what's buried on Oak Island! Mystery solved!

…I'm really curious how Maria got Koshchei into the barrel with the nine iron bands in the first place. Also I love her.

 

I do like how people seem to be... idk, sensible, aside from Ivan. Like, Koschei takes some VERY well thought out security measures, Maria is all around great, the bird kings are quite good at figuring out what needs to be done and doing it...

 

I mean, Koshchei does make the mistake of telling how he can be killed, but at least he doesn't make the mistake of *demonstrating* it like SOME people.

 

i mean yeah but to actually get to that weakness, you need to find an island that's only there some of the time, dig it up, then chase after game animals without losing track of which one is the important one.... it's pretty thorough!

 

I LOVE MARYA MOREVNA that's the fairytale of my childhood right there i'm so happy :')

 

aaaaa I LOVED this one
I got to read it in a beautifully illustrated book of russian fairy tales and it's SUCH A GOOD

 

This is amazing.

 

Eeee, I'm glad that article's still around. I read it years ago, when it was linked from Digger to explain where Ursula Vernon had gotten the inspiration for the Black Madonna one of the characters prays to.

 

https://tanuki-kimono.tumblr.com/tagged/japanese-folk-tales

this site is rad

 

DANGIT SEED I NEED TO ESSAY
(jk ily) (but oH GOSH I GOTTA BOOKMARK AND BE PATIENT)

 

This is my most recent favourite fairytale and I wish it was better known, though if it was I probably wouldn't like it as much. I really want to do a fanfic AU of it for something but none of my faves really seem to fit it.

 

im back w the Children of Lir, please excuse my strange brainbug fit from earlier wherein i deleted it for no good reason

http://irelandofthewelcomes.com/the-children-of-lir/ (here is original)

Spoiler

There's a king called Lir who rules over the sea. With his wife, Eva, he has four children: Aodh, Fionnula, and the twins Fiachra and Conn. Eva dies while the children arestill young. Lir remarries to Eva's sister, Aofie.

Aofie loves the kids until she decides instead "oh wait no I hate them they're stealing time I could be spending with Lir, how dare." So she takes the kids to a lake and turns. them. into. swans. See, if she kills the kids, their ghosts would haunt her forever, and she doesn't want that. So instead, she casts a spell that turns them into swans for 900 years. Part of the spell dictates that they will spend 300 years on Lake Derravaragh, 300 years on the Straits of Moyle, and then 300 years on the Isle of Inish Glora. The spell will only broken when they hear the ringing of a bell and St Patrick arrives to Ireland.

The spell left their voices, so the kids can still talk. They sing mournful songs about their terrible fate. Word gets back to their dad, who is pissed AF and banishes Aifoe "into the mist, and she was never seen again."

Lir spends the next 300 years with the kids on the Lake, listening to their songs and keeping them company and being a good dad. But then the 300 years are up and they have to leave to go to the next location. They spend 300 years facing fierce, bitterly cold and harsh storms, fighting and often failing to stay together, but they survive. Then comes the third location, the Isle of Inish Glora.

By this point, King Lir has died, and his once-glorious castle is in ruins. The kids hear the ringing of a bell, one of the first Christian bells in Ireland, and they follow that, seeking the sound they know will end their curse, and end their suffering. They find a holy man named Caomhog, who takes them in and cares for them.

Then comes in King Connacht, some jerk who's heard rumors of legendary magic swans with beautiful singing voices. When the swans don't want to go with him, he threatens Caomhog. But then the bell tolls again, and the curse breaks. The swans turn back to the children they were, and King Connacht ollies out. The children rapidly start to age, and Caomhog christens them before they die so that their legend and name can live on forever.

/Children of Lir

 

Anyone else know The Magic Fishbone? I always thought it was weird; the king works a regular office job, the queen had nineteen children in seven years, and the ending involves the marriage of a seven-year-old. Turns out Charles Dickens was attempting to write in the style of an actual seven-year-old for a kid's magazine, hence why the king acts like a normal dad.

 

@Aondeug

From Peter Berresford Ellis' "Celtic Myths and Legends"

and now i'm off to read your story about satire! ^^

 

It used to confuse me, when I was a wee smeet, that there was one story called The Children of Lir and another called The Children of Llyr and that they were not even remotely related.

 

Oh goody. Thank you for that. I've got an etymology I can track down too. Mentions Danu so we're...possibly off to a bad start? Possibly. The Danu thing being a matter of lack of textual evidence and Tuatha De Danann from Danu being shoddy grammar that wouldn't work. So some believe she was entirely constructed after the fact by the monks that transcribed the myths. To what end I don't know, but we made up Scota too and Irish was so fucking cool of a language it survived Babel.

though really the idea that the irish language is the combination of all the best bits of the chaos at babel is beautiful and wonderful

and i love you irish monks for making that story

thank you

EVEN IF I CRY ABOUT THE LINGUISTIC WORK.

Etymology looking: Ok so leprechaun comes from Irish leiprechán which comes from Old Irish luchorpán. So at the very least we are coming from a word that had the u vowel in it. The theories I am finding about the etymology point to it being a mashing of Old Irish lú (small) and corp (body). The ending -an points to corp being further diminutive from what I know of how Irish works. Lugh's name doesn't come from Old Irish lú though but from Old Irish Lugh or Lug. The g used to be distinctly sounded, but was lost over time leaving us with modern Lú. We also don't really know where lug came from or what it even means. The most common theory being that it comes from Proto-Indo-European leuk (light). This theory is questioned because of sound change shit that I can't really think of how to explain right now and I am fuzzy on it anyway? The basics though are that the PIE k did not undergo the change to ch and g in Old Irish like it did with the Brythonic languages, and entirely different branch of Celtic languages. The Gaelics/Goidelics don't show this shift, and you can see some other such differences between Brythonic and Gaelic Celtic languages based on if the q was maintained. This theory is why he was suspected of being a sun god by the Victorian English, though his lore lacks any real solar imagery. And in fact the solar imagery we find is related to women in Irish myth and folklore, namely Áine and Grian (grián with the fáda over the a meaning sun). It's been argued due to his epithet of Lonnbeimnech (fierce-striker) and folklore concerning thunderstorms being battles between him and his grandfather Balor that if his name does come from leuk then it's in relation to lightning.

Which is a bunch of words coming out to basically I find this kind of spotty and would need more evidence to the claim. I suppose it's still possible because roots get mixed up all the time and Irish has had some trouble with that regarding etymology. A lot of languages have though I'm more familiar with Irish etymology's troubles with it than, say, English's.