205 Fun Facts About Fairy Tales

The Brothers Grimm published the first volume of their Children's and Household Tales in which year?

The collection grew from 86 stories to more than 200 across seven editions; the last, in 1857, is the version most people know.

Which massive scholarly project did the Grimms begin in 1838 and leave unfinished at their deaths?

The Grimms began the Deutsches Wörterbuch, a German dictionary, in 1838; other scholars completed it only in 1961. Jacob also gave his name to Grimm's law.

Charles Perrault's 1697 collection of Cinderella, Puss in Boots and Sleeping Beauty carried what subtitle?

The 1697 frontispiece read Contes de ma mère l'Oye, Tales of Mother Goose; the formal title was Histoires ou contes du temps passé, avec des moralités.

Hans Christian Andersen was born in 1805 in which Danish city?

Andersen was born in Odense, on the island of Funen, in 1805; he left for Copenhagen at 14 hoping to become an actor.

The term 'fairy tale' (conte de fées) was coined in the late 17th century by which French writer?

Madame d'Aulnoy titled her 1697 collection Les Contes des fées, giving the genre its name; Straparola and Basile had written such tales in Italy earlier.

Cinderella is tale type 510A in which standard folk-tale catalogue, named for three scholars?

Finnish folklorist Antti Aarne published it in 1910; Stith Thompson expanded it in English and Hans-Jörg Uther revised it in 2004.

What steals the sandal of Rhodopis in Strabo's tale, the earliest known Cinderella story?

In Strabo's Geography an eagle snatches Rhodopis's sandal and drops it in the lap of the Egyptian king, who searches the country for its owner.

Which three elements did Perrault add to Cinderella that were not in earlier versions?

Perrault's 1697 Cendrillon introduced the pumpkin coach, the fairy godmother and the glass slippers; Basile's 1634 Cenerentola already had the stepmother, stepsisters and a lost slipper.

In the Grimms' 1812 first edition of Snow White, who was the villain who wanted the girl dead?

In the 1812 text Snow White's own mother orders her death; the 1819 edition changed her to a stepmother. The huntsman must bring back the girl's lungs and liver.

How is the wicked queen punished at the end of the Grimms' Snow White?

The punishment takes place at Snow White's wedding; Disney's 1937 film, the studio's first feature, dropped it.

The seven dwarfs were first given individual names in what?

The 1912 Broadway play by Jessie Braham White named them Blick, Flick, Glick, Snick, Plick, Whick and Quee; the Grimm tale, number 53, leaves them anonymous, and Disney chose new names in 1937.

In Basile's 'Sun, Moon, and Talia' (1634), the first literary Sleeping Beauty, what makes the heroine sleep?

A splinter of flax lodges under Talia's fingernail and she falls as if dead; Perrault and the Grimms changed it to a spindle, and the Grimm sleep lasts a hundred years.

In Perrault's original Little Red Riding Hood, what happens after the wolf eats the girl?

The Grimms added the huntsman who cuts the wolf open and fills its belly with stones.

How do Red Riding Hood and her grandmother kill the second wolf in the Grimm tale?

Grandmother has Red Riding Hood pour the water she boiled sausages in into the trough; the wolf, lured by the smell, slides off the roof and drowns in it.

The witch's house in Hansel and Gretel is described in the Grimm tale as made of what?

The Grimm text says the house was built of bread, roofed with cake and had windows of clear sugar; the gingerbread house is a later embellishment.

As the Brothers Grimm revised Hansel and Gretel between 1810 and 1850, how did they shift the blame for abandoning the children?

From a mother to a stepmother, one associated with the witch, as the tale grew longer and more Christian in tone; the brothers probably heard it in 1809 from Dortchen Wild's family.

In the Grimms' revised 1857 ending, how does Rumpelstiltskin meet his end after his name is guessed?

He drives his right foot into the ground up to his waist and rips himself apart pulling on the left; researchers trace the tale back some 4,000 years.

The English cousin of Rumpelstiltskin, collected by Joseph Jacobs in 1890, is called what?

Tom Tit Tot appears in Jacobs's English Fairy Tales (1890), where the girl must guess the imp's name; Whuppity Stoorie is the Scottish version and Gilitrutt the Icelandic one.

In the Grimms' Rapunzel, which plant does the pregnant wife crave from the witch's garden?

Rapunzel is the German name for rampion, the salad green the wife craves; the French Persinette and the Italian Petrosinella are likewise named for parsley.

In the Grimms' 'The Frog King, or Iron Henry', how does the princess break the spell?

The kiss is a later invention; the tale's full title is 'The Frog King, or Iron Henry' after the prince's faithful servant.

In Puss in Boots, the cat claims his master, a miller's youngest son, is a nobleman with what title?

Puss tells the king his master is the Marquis of Carabas, an invented title; the eldest brother got the mill, the middle one the donkey and the youngest only the cat.

Perrault's Bluebeard is a wealthy man with what habit?

His latest wife is saved by her brothers after her sister Anne watches from the tower; the forbidden room and bloodstained key are the tale's famous motifs.

Which French novelist first wrote down Beauty and the Beast in 1740?

Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve published La Belle et la Bête in 1740 in her collection La Jeune Américaine et les contes marins; her novel-length version gave Beauty and the Beast elaborate back-stories.

The ogre's cry 'Fee-fi-fo-fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman' comes from which tale?

The giant roars it in Jack and the Beanstalk as Jack hides in his castle; Jack had traded the family cow for the magic beans that grew to the sky.

In Robert Southey's original 1837 'Story of the Three Bears', who breaks into the bears' house?

Southey's intruder was an impudent old woman, and the bears were three bachelors; she became a girl called Silver-Hair in 1849 and Goldilocks only in 1904.

'Not by the hair of my chinny chin chin' first appeared in print in 1886 in whose collection?

James Halliwell-Phillipps printed the tale in his Nursery Rhymes and Nursery Tales (1886); Joseph Jacobs's 1890 English Fairy Tales, crediting Halliwell, gave it its best-known form.

According to the Hamelin chronicle, how many children followed the Pied Piper out of the town in 1284?

The earliest account, in the Lüneburg manuscript, records that 130 children born in Hamelin were led away on 26 June 1284; on the street they left by, music and dancing are forbidden by tradition.

Antoine Galland added Aladdin to the Arabian Nights after hearing it from a storyteller from which city?

Hanna Diyab, a Maronite from Aleppo, told Galland the story in Paris in 1709; Aladdin and Ali Baba, absent from the Arabic manuscripts, are called the 'orphan tales'.

In Andersen's original mermaid tale, what does the sea witch take in exchange for giving her legs?

The sea witch cuts out the little mermaid's tongue as payment, taking her beautiful voice; every step on her new legs feels like treading on knives.

At what age is a mermaid in Andersen's tale first allowed to swim to the surface?

Each sister may rise to the surface on her fifteenth birthday; the grandmother explains that mermaids live about 300 years but lack the immortal soul the heroine longs for.

The Ugly Duckling turns out to be what kind of bird?

The duckling grows into a swan; published in 1843, the tale is often read as Andersen's account of his own awkward youth.

In The Emperor's New Clothes, who finally says out loud that the emperor is wearing nothing?

A small child cries out that the emperor has nothing on; Andersen adapted a medieval Spanish tale in which the invisible cloth exposed men who were not their fathers' true sons.

Andersen's princess proves herself by feeling a pea through how many mattresses and featherbeds?

It appeared in Andersen's very first booklet of tales in May 1835 and became the 1959 Broadway musical Once Upon a Mattress with Carol Burnett.

In Andersen's The Snow Queen, what does the troll's magic mirror do?

The mirror shrinks everything good and magnifies the bad and ugly; when it shatters, splinters lodge in Kai's eye and heart. The story was published in December 1844.

Besides The Tinderbox and The Princess and the Pea, which tale was in Andersen's first 1835 fairy-tale booklet?

Little Claus and Big Claus appeared in the 61-page booklet of May 1835 alongside Little Ida's Flowers; The Little Mermaid and The Emperor's New Clothes followed in the third instalment in 1837.

Which Neapolitan writer's 1634 collection contains 'La Gatta Cenerentola', the first Western Cinderella?

Giambattista Basile's Pentamerone (1634–36) also holds the first full Sleeping Beauty and Petrosinella, a Rapunzel ancestor; 'Cenerentola' comes from the Italian for ash or cinder.

The Chinese Cinderella tale of Ye Xian was written down by Duan Chengshi around which year?

Duan Chengshi recorded Ye Xian in his Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang around 860, in the Tang dynasty, centuries before any European version.

At which university did the Brothers Grimm study law?

Both brothers read law at the University of Marburg under Friedrich Carl von Savigny; Jacob was born in 1785 and Wilhelm in 1786, and they later taught at Göttingen and Berlin.

From whom did the Brothers Grimm gather most of the tales in Kinder- und Hausmärchen?

From educated urban friends: the Wild family and other middle-class acquaintances in Kassel supplied many, and Dortchen Wild, whom Wilhelm married, contributed to Hansel and Gretel.

In the Grimms' The Wolf and the Seven Little Kids, where does the youngest kid hide?

The wolf swallows six kids but misses the youngest, hidden in the clock case; the kid leads the mother goat to the sleeping wolf, whose belly is filled with stones.

In the Grimms' Aschenputtel, which birds blind the stepsisters at the wedding in a coda added in 1819?

The same white doves had helped her sort lentils; the sisters had already cut off a toe and a heel to fit the slipper.

Perrault's Sleeping Beauty was later retold by the Grimms under what German title?

Dornröschen, 'little briar rose', takes its name from the thorn hedge that grows around the sleeping castle; the Grimms had the tale from the Hassenpflug family, who knew Perrault's version.

Andersen's tale in which a one-legged tin figure loves a paper ballerina is called what?

In The Steadfast Tin Soldier (1838) the soldier melts in the stove into a little tin heart beside the burnt ballerina; it ranks among Andersen's most famous tales with The Little Match Girl.

The word 'fairy' ultimately derives from a Latin word meaning what?

Fairy comes from Latin fata, 'fate' (the plural of fatum); it reached English via Old French faerie, and the same root gives 'fay'.

In folklore, which metal is traditionally a charm against fairies?

Open iron scissors left by a cradle were thought to stop fairies swapping the baby.

In fairy lore, what is a changeling?

The 1895 killing of Bridget Cleary in Ireland followed accusations that she was one.

The wings on fairies in Victorian paintings are actually what, according to folklorists?

The tiny, winged, flower-dwelling fairy is largely a 19th-century artistic creation.

The 1917 Cottingley Fairies photographs were taken by two cousins near which English city?

Cottingley is a village near Bradford in West Yorkshire; Elsie Wright was 16 and Frances Griffiths 9 when they took the pictures, and they admitted the fakery only in 1983.

Which author used the Cottingley photographs in a 1920 Strand Magazine article on fairies?

Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes and a committed spiritualist, wrote the December 1920 Strand article and believed the pictures were genuine.

How did the Cottingley girls create their fairies?

Elsie copied the dancing fairies from illustrations in Princess Mary's Gift Book.

Why is Tinker Bell called 'Tinker'?

Barrie made her 'an actual tinker of the fairy folk'; her speech is the sound of a tinkling bell.

In the original stage productions of Peter Pan, how was Tinker Bell represented?

A small mirror off-stage reflected a circle of light from a powerful lamp.

In Spain and Hispanic America, the tooth fairy's job is done by what kind of animal?

Ratoncito Pérez, a little mouse, collects children's teeth in Spain and Hispanic America; France has a tooth mouse too, La Petite Souris.

According to Delta Dental, the average US tooth-fairy payout per tooth in 2023 was about how much?

Delta Dental's annual poll put the 2023 average at $6.23 a tooth, a record; the same survey found $1.30 in 1998, so the fairy has outpaced inflation.

The Sugar Plum Fairy rules the Land of Sweets in which 1892 ballet?

The Nutcracker premiered in St Petersburg in December 1892; the Sugar Plum Fairy's dance is famous for Tchaikovsky's use of the newly invented celesta.

The aos sí, a supernatural race comparable to fairies, belong to the folklore of which country?

They are said to live in the mounds and forts that dot the Irish landscape.

In the Grimms' The Juniper Tree, what does the murdered boy come back as?

The stepmother kills the boy and cooks him in a stew; his sister buries his bones under the juniper tree, and he rises as a singing bird that drops a millstone on the stepmother.

In the Arabian Nights, Scheherazade tells her stories to which king?

King Shahryar had been executing each new bride after one night; Scheherazade's unfinished stories keep her alive for 1,001 nights. Shahzaman is his brother.

Which lyricist pitched the idea of Disney's Aladdin to Jeffrey Katzenberg?

Howard Ashman, lyricist of The Little Mermaid, proposed Aladdin to Katzenberg in 1988 with a treatment and songs; he died in 1991, before the film's 1992 release.

Who directed the 2019 live-action Aladdin?

Guy Ritchie directed the 2019 remake, with Mena Massoud as Aladdin and Will Smith as the Genie; it grossed more than $1 billion worldwide.

Alexander Afanasyev, the 'Russian Grimm', published roughly how many folk tales?

Afanasyev's Narodnye russkie skazki appeared in eight instalments between 1855 and 1863 and holds nearly 600 tales, one of the largest folk-tale collections in the world.

What is the name of Ali Baba's greedy brother?

Cassim, Ali Baba's greedy brother, forgets the password 'Open Sesame' inside the cave and is killed by the thieves; the slave-girl Morgiana later foils their plots.

How many 'Coloured' Fairy Books did Andrew Lang and his wife publish?

The full series ran to 25 collections with 798 stories in all.

Baba Yaga is famous for flying around in what?

Baba Yaga rides in a wooden mortar, steering with a pestle and sweeping her tracks with a broom; she lives in a hut on chicken legs.

The Irish banshee heralds what event?

Her name means 'woman of the fairy mound'.

Whose 1756 abridgement of Beauty and the Beast became the standard retelling?

Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont cut Villeneuve's long 1740 novel to a short moral tale in her 1756 Magasin des enfants, and hers is the version most retellings follow.

Who wrote the screenplay for Disney's 1991 Beauty and the Beast?

Linda Woolverton wrote the screenplay; Kirk Wise and Gary Trousdale directed and Howard Ashman wrote the lyrics. She later scripted Maleficent (2014).

Who played the Beast opposite Emma Watson in 2017?

Dan Stevens, known from Downton Abbey, played the Beast through motion capture; Luke Evans was Gaston and Josh Gad LeFou, and the film grossed more than $1.2 billion.

In Andersen's The Wild Swans, what must Elisa weave the shirts from to free her brothers?

Elisa gathers stinging nettles from churchyards, crushes them barefoot into flax and knits the shirts in silence; the youngest brother keeps a swan's wing because his shirt lacked a sleeve.

The Brothers Grimm were born in which German town?

Jacob was born in Hanau in 1785 and Wilhelm there in 1786; the family moved to Steinau in 1791, and the boys were later schooled in Kassel.

The Scottish brownie is a household spirit that expects what offering by the hearth?

A brownie works at night for a bowl of milk or cream left by the hearth; a gift of clothes or any insult drives it from the house forever.

In the Grimms' The Girl Without Hands, who demands the miller's daughter in exchange for riches?

The miller unknowingly promises the Devil what stands behind his mill, his daughter; when her purity foils the Devil, her father chops off her hands, and a king later gives her silver ones.

Charles Perrault led which faction in the 17th-century French literary quarrel?

Perrault championed the Moderns, arguing in Le Siècle de Louis le Grand (1687) and the Parallèle des Anciens et des Modernes that his own age surpassed antiquity; Boileau led the Ancients.

In Perrault's Cinderella, what does the fairy godmother turn into the coachman?

The godmother picks the rat with the finest whiskers from the trap and turns him into a coachman; six mice become horses and six lizards become footmen.

Disney's 1950 Cinderella followed which string of commercial failures?

Pinocchio, Fantasia and Bambi all lost money on first release after World War II closed the European markets; Cinderella's 1950 success restored the studio's finances.

Who played Cinderella in Kenneth Branagh's 2015 film?

Lily James, then known from Downton Abbey, played Ella opposite Richard Madden's prince, with Cate Blanchett as the stepmother and Helena Bonham Carter as the fairy godmother.

The Slavic household spirit Domovoy has been compared to which Roman deities?

The Penates were guardians of the Roman household and its store-room; the domovoy likewise protects the home and is said to live behind the stove.

Storyteller Dorothea Viehmann, a key Grimm source, learned many tales where?

Viehmann grew up at her father's tavern, the Knallhütte near Kassel, where travellers told stories; her Pierson ancestors were Huguenots who had fled France.

'East of the Sun and West of the Moon' was collected by which Norwegian pair?

Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe published it in Norske Folkeeventyr (1841–44); it is an animal-bridegroom tale, ATU 425A, with a white bear as the enchanted prince.

In Ella Enchanted, what 'gift' curses Ella at birth?

The fairy Lucinda's gift of obedience forces Ella to obey any order she is given; Gail Carson Levine's 1997 novel won a Newbery Honor.

In Enchanted (2007), Giselle falls in love with a man of what profession?

Giselle falls for Robert Philip, a Manhattan divorce lawyer played by Patrick Dempsey; Amy Adams played the princess pushed out of Andalasia into New York.

Ever After (1998) sets Cinderella in which era?

Ever After places Danielle, played by Drew Barrymore, in 16th-century Renaissance France, with Leonardo da Vinci as a character and Anjelica Huston as the stepmother.

In Bill Willingham's comic Fables, the exiled characters live in which New York community?

The Fables live in Fabletown, a hidden enclave in Manhattan, with Bigby Wolf as sheriff and Snow White as deputy mayor; non-human Fables live upstate at the Farm.

As of 1991, roughly how many fairy forts survived in Ireland's countryside?

Fairy forts are the remains of ringforts and other early dwellings; surveys have counted between 30,000 and 40,000 across Ireland, and folklore warns against disturbing them.

The fairy godmother figure has roots in which mythological beings?

The fairies who bless the newborn in Sleeping Beauty descend from the three Fates, who attended births in Greek myth and spun, measured and cut the thread of each life.

Which mushroom is nicknamed the 'fairy ring champignon' for the rings it makes on lawns?

Marasmius oreades, the fairy ring champignon, is the commonest ring-former on lawns and is edible; Amanita muscaria is the red-and-white fly agaric of fairy-tale illustrations.

'Fractured Fairy Tales' was a segment of which cartoon show?

Fractured Fairy Tales, narrated by Edward Everett Horton, was a segment of Rocky and His Friends and The Bullwinkle Show (1959–64), alongside Dudley Do-Right and Peabody's Improbable History.

Disney's Frozen was loosely inspired by which Andersen tale?

Frozen (2013) grew out of Disney's long-stalled attempts to adapt The Snow Queen; Elsa's icy powers echo the queen, and her kingdom of Arendelle is trapped in eternal winter.

Which Victorian fantasy pioneer mentored the author of Alice in Wonderland?

George MacDonald, a Congregational minister and author of Phantastes, urged Carroll to publish Alice after the manuscript was read to his delighted children.

Straparola's collection with some of Europe's first printed fairy tales is called what?

Straparola's Le piacevoli notti, The Facetious Nights, appeared in Venice in 1550–53 and includes an early Puss in Boots; the Pentamerone is Basile's later Neapolitan collection.

In Perrault's Les Fées, what comes out of the rude sister's mouth whenever she speaks?

In Les Fées (1697), often called Diamonds and Toads, a fairy rewards the kind sister with flowers and jewels at every word and curses the rude one with toads and snakes.

In the TV series Grimm, what are the mythological creatures called?

The creatures are Wesen, German for 'beings', seen in their true form only by Grimms like Portland detective Nick Burkhardt; the show ran on NBC from 2011 to 2017.

In Perrault's Donkeyskin, what did the king's prized donkey produce?

The king's donkey dropped gold coins instead of dung; the princess demands its skin as an impossible price before fleeing her father's proposal of marriage.

Grimms' Fairy Tales is listed by UNESCO in what register?

The Grimms' annotated personal copies of Kinder- und Hausmärchen, held in Kassel, were inscribed on UNESCO's Memory of the World documentary-heritage register in 2005.

Which composer's opera Hänsel und Gretel premiered in 1893?

Engelbert Humperdinck's Hänsel und Gretel premiered in Weimar on 23 December 1893, conducted by Richard Strauss; the tale is KHM 15 in the Grimm collection.

Who played Hansel in the 2013 film Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters?

Jeremy Renner played Hansel and Gemma Arterton Gretel in Tommy Wirkola's 2013 action film, which turned the siblings into adult bounty hunters.

What falls on Henny Penny's head, convincing her the sky is falling?

An acorn drops on Henny Penny's head and she sets off to tell the king the sky is falling; Americans know the tale as Chicken Little.

Hoodwinked! (2005) retells Little Red Riding Hood in what style?

Hoodwinked! plays the tale as a police procedural, each witness retelling events Rashomon-style to frog detective Nicky Flippers; Anne Hathaway voiced Red.

The seductive Scandinavian huldra hides which tell-tale feature?

The huldra is beautiful from the front but hides an animal's tail, usually a cow's, beneath her skirt; some versions give her a back like a hollowed-out tree.

Which musical, opened on Broadway in 1987, weaves together several Grimm tales?

Into the Woods has music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and a book by James Lapine.

Robert Bly's 1990s book Iron John, based on the Grimm tale, inspired what?

Iron John: A Book About Men (1990) became the key text of the mythopoetic men's movement, with its retreats and drumming; it spent 62 weeks on the New York Times best-seller list.

Italo Calvino's 1956 collection Italian Folktales contains how many tales?

Calvino selected and rewrote 200 tales from every region of Italy for Fiabe italiane (1956), and acknowledged Propp's Morphology of the Folktale as an influence.

The 1734 tale 'Jack Spriggins and the Enchanted Bean' appeared in which collection?

Round About Our Coal-Fire, or Christmas Entertainments (1734) printed the earliest known version of Jack and the Beanstalk; Joseph Jacobs's 1890 retelling is the one usually reprinted.

Who directed the 2013 film Jack the Giant Slayer?

Bryan Singer directed Jack the Giant Slayer, a 2013 Warner Bros. fantasy starring Nicholas Hoult as Jack and Ewan McGregor as the knight Elmont.

Where was folklorist Joseph Jacobs, who popularised English fairy tales, born?

Joseph Jacobs was born in Sydney in 1854 and moved to England to study at Cambridge; he published English Fairy Tales in 1890.

The Scottish kelpie is a shape-shifting spirit that usually appears as what?

The kelpie usually takes the form of a horse that lures riders onto its back and drags them into the water; almost every Scottish loch and river was said to have one.

In King Thrushbeard, why does the princess mock the young king?

She says his pointed chin looks like a thrush's beak, earning him the name Thrushbeard; she is then married off to a beggar-minstrel who is the king in disguise.

Which Monty Python member wrote the screenplay for Labyrinth (1986)?

Terry Jones wrote the screenplay for Jim Henson's Labyrinth, though it was heavily revised; David Bowie played Jareth the Goblin King opposite Jennifer Connelly.

In later Irish folklore, leprechauns took up what trade?

They also gained a hidden pot of gold at the rainbow's end.

What number is Little Red Riding Hood in the Aarne–Thompson classification?

Little Red Riding Hood is type 333, 'The Glutton', in the Aarne–Thompson–Uther index; the German title is Rotkäppchen, Little Red Cap.

Which German collector, born in Weimar in 1801, rivalled the Grimms with his own tale books?

Ludwig Bechstein, born in Weimar in 1801, trained as an apothecary before becoming librarian at Meiningen; his Deutsches Märchenbuch (1845) outsold the Grimms for decades.

In the Arabian Nights, Prince Husain buys a magic carpet in which Indian city?

Prince Husain buys the carpet in Bisnagar, the city of Vijayanagara, in the tale of Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Paribanou; it carries its rider anywhere in an instant.

Who was originally attached to direct Maleficent before Robert Stromberg?

Tim Burton was attached to direct in 2010 but left the project; Robert Stromberg, Oscar-winning production designer of Avatar and Alice in Wonderland, made his directing debut with Maleficent (2014).

Melusine, the water spirit, is usually a serpent or fish from where down?

Melusine is a woman from the waist up and a serpent or fish below, a secret she hides on Saturdays; the House of Lusignan and the counts of Luxembourg claimed descent from her.

Morgan le Fay is an enchantress from which legendary cycle?

Morgan le Fay belongs to the King Arthur cycle, first named in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Vita Merlini; she is often depicted as Arthur's half-sister.

In the Grimms' Frau Holle, what happens on earth when Mother Holle shakes her featherbed?

Mother Holle tells the girl to shake the bed until the feathers fly, for then it snows on earth; the diligent girl goes home showered in gold, the lazy one in pitch.

The Nordic nisse or tomte expects which favourite food each yuletide?

The nisse expects a bowl of porridge with a pat of butter on Christmas Eve; it wears a red cap, does house and stable chores, and takes revenge if forgotten.

Oberon first appears as a fairy king in a chanson de geste about which hero?

In the 13th-century chanson de geste Huon de Bordeaux, the fairy king Auberon, dwarfish but very handsome, helps the hero on his mission to Babylon; Shakespeare later borrowed the name.

Tolkien's essay 'On Fairy-Stories' began as a 1939 lecture at which university?

Tolkien delivered On Fairy-Stories as the Andrew Lang Lecture at the University of St Andrews on 8 March 1939; it was published in 1947 in Essays Presented to Charles Williams.

In the TV series Once Upon a Time, the fairy-tale characters live in which fictional seaside town in Maine?

Storybrooke's secret is discovered by Emma Swan's son Henry; the action alternates with a fantastical world where fairy tales happen.

Which formula traditionally closes a German fairy tale?

German tales end 'und wenn sie nicht gestorben sind, dann leben sie noch heute', and if they haven't died they're living still; 'snip, snap, snout' is the Norwegian closer.

The Arabian Nights' frame story probably comes from which Persian work?

The title means 'A Thousand Tales'.

Pan's Labyrinth is set in Francoist Spain in the summer of which year?

Pan's Labyrinth (2006) is set in summer 1944, five years after the Civil War ended, as Ofelia's stepfather Captain Vidal hunts Maquis guerrillas in the mountains.

The Panchatantra's title means what in Sanskrit?

Pancha-tantra means 'Five Treatises', five books of animal fables teaching statecraft; it is the most frequently translated literary work of India and reached Europe via Arabic.

In the Norwegian tale De tre bukkene Bruse, what lives under the goats' bridge?

A troll under the bridge threatens each of the three goats in turn; the two smaller ones send him on to the biggest, who butts him into the river.

The Pied Piper of Hamelin appears in the writings of which poet, besides Goethe and the Grimms?

Robert Browning's 1842 poem The Pied Piper of Hamelin fixed the story in English; Goethe's ballad Der Rattenfänger (1803) and the Grimms' Deutsche Sagen also told it.

The name Pinocchio may derive from a Tuscan word for what?

In Tuscan, pinocchio is a pine nut, from pino, pine, fitting a wooden puppet; Collodi, pen-name of Carlo Lorenzini, published the book in 1883.

In Disney's Pinocchio, what three qualities must Pinocchio prove to become a real boy?

The Blue Fairy tells Pinocchio he must prove himself brave, truthful and unselfish to become a real boy; Jiminy Cricket serves as his conscience.

Pixies are thought to be concentrated in the moorlands of which two English counties?

Pixies belong to the moors of Devon and Cornwall, Dartmoor and Bodmin especially, where they are said to dance and wrestle at night and lead travellers astray.

In Shrek 2, Prince Charming is the son of which character?

In Shrek 2 (2004) Prince Charming, voiced by Rupert Everett, is the Fairy Godmother's son, whom she schemes to marry to Fiona; he returns as the villain of Shrek the Third.

Puck's most famous prank in A Midsummer Night's Dream gives Nick Bottom the head of what?

Puck gives Nick Bottom the head of an ass, and the enchanted Titania falls in love with him; Puck is also called Robin Goodfellow.

In Straparola's version of Puss in Boots, the cat is secretly what?

The boy she helps is named Costantino, from Bohemia.

The Grimms' Rapunzel developed from Persinette, a 1698 tale by whom?

Charlotte-Rose de La Force published Persinette in 1698; the Grimms took the story via a German translation, and Basile's earlier Italian version was Petrosinella.

Who directed the 2011 film Red Riding Hood starring Amanda Seyfried?

Catherine Hardwicke, director of Twilight, made Red Riding Hood (2011) with Amanda Seyfried as Valerie; Leonardo DiCaprio's company Appian Way produced it.

The rusalka of Slavic folklore is usually associated with what?

Water is her element, which is why she resembles the mermaid in modern pop culture.

Selkies shapeshift between human form and what animal?

The word comes from the Scots for seal.

Shrek was loosely based on a 1990 picture book by whom?

Steven Spielberg bought the rights in 1991.

How many voyages does Sinbad the Sailor make?

He hails from Baghdad in the early Abbasid era.

A precursor to Sleeping Beauty appears in which 14th-century French romance?

Perceforest, a vast 14th-century Arthurian prose romance, includes the story of Troylus and Zellandine, a princess who sleeps through her own pregnancy; it predates Basile's version by some 300 years.

Disney's 1959 Sleeping Beauty cost about how much, a record for the studio then?

It took nearly a decade to make.

Snow-White and Rose-Red derives from an older tale called what?

Wilhelm Grimm expanded Caroline Stahl's short tale The Ungrateful Dwarf (1818), adding the bear who turns out to be a prince; it entered the collection in 1837.

The 1823 first English translation of the Grimms' Sneewittchen used what title?

Edgar Taylor's German Popular Stories (1823), the first English translation of the Grimms, called the tale Snow-drop, with illustrations by George Cruikshank.

Who plays the Evil Queen in Disney's 2025 Snow White?

Gal Gadot played the Evil Queen opposite Rachel Zegler's Snow White in Marc Webb's 2025 live-action remake.

What is the name of the evil queen in Snow White & the Huntsman?

Queen Ravenna, played by Charlize Theron, is the villain of Snow White and the Huntsman (2012); Regina is the queen in Once Upon a Time.

Where did Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs premiere in December 1937?

Snow White premiered at the Carthay Circle Theatre in Los Angeles on 21 December 1937; it cost about $1.5 million and earned over $8 million on first release.

Stardust (2007) is based on a novel by which author?

Neil Gaiman's 1999 novel Stardust was filmed by Matthew Vaughn in 2007; Tristan crosses the wall into the realm of Stormhold to catch a fallen star.

What record did Tangled reportedly set among animated films on its 2010 release?

Tangled's production cost was reported at around $260 million, making it the most expensive animated film ever at the time; Glen Keane had first proposed a Rapunzel film in 2001.

The Bloody Chamber, a 1979 collection of reworked fairy tales, contains how many stories?

The Bloody Chamber holds ten stories, opening with the title novella, a retelling of Bluebeard; the collection won the Cheltenham Festival Literary Prize in 1979.

Which four animals set out to become the Town Musicians of Bremen?

A donkey, a dog, a cat and a rooster, all too old for their masters, head for Bremen but settle in a robbers' house they frighten empty; they never reach the city.

Which director made 2005's The Brothers Grimm with Matt Damon and Heath Ledger?

Terry Gilliam directed The Brothers Grimm (2005), which reimagines Jacob and Wilhelm, played by Heath Ledger and Matt Damon, as travelling con artists staging fake hauntings.

The Company of Wolves (1984) was adapted from a story by which writer?

Angela Carter adapted her own werewolf retelling of Red Riding Hood with director Neil Jordan for The Company of Wolves (1984).

How many elves help the shoemaker in the Grimm tale?

Two little naked elves come each night and sew the shoes; the shoemaker and his wife make them tiny clothes, and the elves dance away for good. The German title is Die Wichtelmänner.

The Emperor's New Clothes closed which series of Andersen booklets in April 1837?

The third booklet of Eventyr, fortalte for Børn, Fairy Tales Told for Children, appeared on 7 April 1837 with The Little Mermaid and The Emperor's New Clothes, closing the first series.

To which monarch did Edmund Spenser dedicate The Faerie Queene?

Spenser dedicated The Faerie Queene (1590–96) to Elizabeth I, who appears in it as Gloriana, the Faerie Queene herself; she granted him a pension of £50 a year.

What are the names of Timmy Turner's fairy godparents?

Cosmo and Wanda are Timmy Turner's fairy godparents in Nickelodeon's The Fairly OddParents, which ran for ten seasons and 172 episodes between 2001 and 2017.

The Grimms got The Fisherman and His Wife from which painter?

The painter Philipp Otto Runge wrote down The Fisherman and His Wife and The Juniper Tree in Pomeranian Low German, and the Grimms printed his versions almost unchanged.

Which tale is traditionally number 1 in the Grimm collection?

Its full title is The Frog King, or Iron Henry.

The Gingerbread Man first appeared in print in 1875 in which American publication?

The Gingerbread Man first appeared in St. Nicholas Magazine in May 1875; its anonymous author said a girl from Maine had told the story to her children.

In The Golden Goose, what is the youngest son called?

Dummling, the despised youngest son, shares his ash-baked cake and sour beer with a little grey man, who rewards him with the golden goose.

What is the name of the talking horse in The Goose Girl?

Falada, the princess's talking horse, is beheaded, and its head nailed over the town gate still speaks to her; the tale came to the Grimms from Dorothea Viehmann.

Which Oscar Wilde story collection contains The Selfish Giant?

The Selfish Giant appeared in The Happy Prince and Other Tales, published in May 1888; A House of Pomegranates (1891) was Wilde's second fairy-tale collection.

Von dem Machandelboom, one of the Grimms' darkest tales, is also known by what alternative name?

Von dem Machandelboom is The Juniper Tree, also translated as The Almond Tree; it is told in Low German and mixes murder, cannibalism and biblical symbolism.

On what night is The Little Match Girl set?

The story is set on the last evening of the year, New Year's Eve, bitterly cold and snowy; in the match flames she sees a stove, a roast goose and a Christmas tree.

Who voiced Ursula in Disney's 1989 The Little Mermaid?

Pat Carroll voiced the sea witch Ursula, whose look was modelled on the drag performer Divine; Jodi Benson voiced Ariel and Buddy Hackett the seagull Scuttle.

Who plays Ariel in the 2023 live-action The Little Mermaid?

Halle Bailey played Ariel in Rob Marshall's 2023 remake, with Melissa McCarthy as Ursula and Javier Bardem as King Triton.

Who sculpted Copenhagen's Little Mermaid statue, unveiled in 1913?

Edvard Eriksen sculpted the bronze, commissioned by brewer Carl Jacobsen and unveiled in August 1913; it is just 1.25 metres tall and has been beheaded by vandals more than once.

Andersen's The Nightingale is set in which country?

Andersen set The Nightingale (1843) at the court of the Emperor of China; a jewelled mechanical bird nearly replaces the real one, which returns to sing Death away from the emperor's bed.

In The Princess Bride, what is the villainous prince's name?

Prince Humperdinck is the villain of William Goldman's story, which Goldman adapted for the screen from his own novel.

The Princess and the Frog is set in which city?

The Princess and the Frog (2009) is set in 1920s New Orleans, where waitress Tiana dreams of opening her own restaurant and Dr Facilier works voodoo in the French Quarter.

What ATU type number is The Princess and the Pea?

The Princess and the Pea is ATU type 704, 'The Princess on the Pea', a test-of-true-nobility tale that Andersen said he had heard as a child.

What is the name of the vain girl in Andersen's The Red Shoes?

Karen, vain about her red shoes, is cursed to dance without stopping until an executioner cuts off her feet; the shoes dance away with them.

In The Six Swans, the princess must stay silent for how many years?

She must stay silent for six years while sewing six shirts of star-flowers; she is nearly burned at the stake before the last shirt frees her brothers.

Tchaikovsky's ballet The Sleeping Beauty premiered in 1890 at which theatre?

The Sleeping Beauty premiered at the Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg on 15 January 1890, choreographed by Marius Petipa to Tchaikovsky's score.

In The Snow Queen, who gives Gerda the reindeer that carries her north to Lapland?

The little robber girl, who had seized Gerda with her bandit band, frees her and lends her own reindeer; the prince and princess had earlier given Gerda a golden coach.

In the Grimms' The Star Money, what do the falling stars turn into?

The orphan girl gives away her bread and every garment; the stars then fall as hard, bright silver coins, and she finds herself in a new linen shift.

Why does the Steadfast Tin Soldier have only one leg?

He was the last of 25 soldiers cast from one spoon.

In The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, Princess Kaguya comes from where?

Kaguya-hime was sent from the Moon and returns there at the tale's end, leaving the emperor an elixir of immortality; the 10th-century story is the oldest surviving monogatari.

In The Tinderbox, how many magic dogs does the soldier command?

The soldier commands three magic dogs, with eyes as big as teacups, mill-wheels and the Round Tower of Copenhagen; striking the tinderbox summons them.

The Twelve Dancing Princesses' closest analogue is which Scottish tale?

In the Scottish tale Kate Crackernuts, published by Andrew Lang in 1889, a sick prince is forced to dance every night inside a fairy hill; Kate breaks the spell.

What does the Brave Little Tailor squeeze to seem to wring water from a stone?

The tailor squeezes whey out of a soft cheese as if it were a stone; he then tosses a bird into the air to outdo the giant's stone-throw.

In Andersen's The Wild Swans, how many brothers does the princess rescue?

Elisa's eleven brothers were turned into swans by their stepmother the queen; by day they fly as swans and by night regain human form.

How can the seven young goats recognise their real mother?

The wolf disguises his voice and paws.

The Norwegian goats' name 'Bruse' was rendered into English as what?

George Webbe Dasent's 1859 Popular Tales from the Norse turned 'De tre bukkene Bruse' into 'The Three Billy-Goats Gruff', and the name stuck.

Thumbelina is born from what?

A witch gives the childless woman a barleycorn; it grows into a tulip-like flower from which tiny Thumbelina emerges, to sleep in a walnut-shell cradle.

The History of Tom Thumb, published in 1621, was notable for what?

Richard Johnson's 1621 chapbook The History of Tom Thumb is regarded as the first fairy tale printed in English; Tattershall in Lincolnshire claims his grave.

The earliest known record of the tooth fairy tradition appeared in which newspaper in 1908?

A 1908 'Household Hints' column by Lillian Brown in the Chicago Daily Tribune suggested a 'tooth fairy' leaving five cents under the pillow; Esther Watkins Arnold's 1927 playlet followed.

In Scandinavian folklore, some trolls are said to turn to stone when exposed to what?

Sunlight turns trolls to stone in Scandinavian lore, as it does in Tolkien's The Hobbit; odd rock formations are sometimes explained as petrified trolls.

What secret helper does Vasilisa the Beautiful receive from her dying mother?

Feed the doll and it does Vasilisa's chores.

Vladimir Propp's Morphology of the Folktale was first published in Russian in which year?

Propp's Morfologiya skazki appeared in Leningrad in 1928; the 1958 English translation brought it to Lévi-Strauss, Barthes and the structuralists.

Wilhelm Grimm married Dortchen Wild in 1825. What was her father's trade?

The brothers went on living under one roof.

What is the Latin name for the will-o'-the-wisp?

Ignis fatuus, 'foolish fire', is the Latin name for the will-o'-the-wisp, the ghostly marsh light blamed on fairies leading travellers astray.

In Disney's Wish (2023), what is the name of the kingdom's sorcerer-ruler?

King Magnifico, voiced by Chris Pine, rules Rosas and hoards its people's wishes in Disney's Wish (2023); Amaya is his queen and Valentino is Asha's goat.

Momotarō, the Japanese folk hero, was born from what?

A giant peach gives him his name, which translates as Peach Boy.

Urashima Tarō is carried to the Dragon Palace on the back of what?

Urashima rescues a sea turtle, which carries him to the Dragon Palace beneath the sea; when he returns at least 100 years have passed, and opening the box he was given turns him old.

Bruno Bettelheim, who wrote on the psychology of fairy tales, taught at which university after 1973?

After retiring from the University of Chicago in 1973, where he had run the Orthogenic School, Bettelheim moved to California and taught at Stanford; The Uses of Enchantment appeared in 1976.

Which fairy tale is the source of the idiom 'to spin straw into gold'?

In Rumpelstiltskin the miller boasts his daughter can spin straw into gold, and the imp does it for her at a price; the phrase now means making something valuable from nothing.

The trickster Anansi's name comes from the word for 'spider' in which language?

Anansi is the Akan word for spider; the tales spread from Ghana to the Caribbean and Suriname with the slave trade, where he is sometimes called 'Aunt Nancy'.

Jamaican Maroons introduced Anansi stories to which West African country?

Jamaican Maroons deported via Nova Scotia in 1800 carried the spider tales to Sierra Leone; in Suriname, Curaçao and Aruba he appears under names such as Kompa Nanzi.

Who invented the ex-slave narrator Uncle Remus to retell Br'er Rabbit stories for white readers?

Joel Chandler Harris published Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings in 1880, framing the Br'er Rabbit tales he had heard from enslaved people on a Georgia plantation.

Aristotle and Herodotus both record that the fabulist Aesop lived as a slave on which Greek island?

Samos is where his masters were Xanthus and then Iadmon; he was later freed and, per tradition, met his end at Delphi.

Scholar Ben Edwin Perry, compiler of the Perry Index, called Aesop's link to which king 'literary fiction'?

Plutarch had claimed Aesop came to Delphi on a diplomatic mission for Croesus, but the dates do not reconcile.

Fabulist Jean de La Fontaine was born in 1621 in which French town?

La Fontaine was born in Château-Thierry in Champagne in 1621, where his father was a master of waters and forests; at 26 he inherited the post and married 14-year-old Marie Héricart.

Which tale joins White Snake, Butterfly Lovers and Lady Meng Jiang as China's Four Great Folktales?

The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl, lovers parted by the Milky Way who meet once a year on a bridge of magpies, completes the Four Great Folktales and underlies the Qixi Festival.

How many Jātaka tales of the Buddha's past lives are in the Theravada collection gathered around 500 CE?

The Theravada Jātaka collection holds 547 tales, part of the Pāli Canon's Khuddaka Nikāya; scenes from them were carved on the railings of the Bharhut and Sanchi stupas.

Elias Lönnrot compiled Finland's Kalevala while working as what in the Kainuu region?

Lönnrot served as district health officer, the physician at Kajaani in Kainuu, collecting runo songs on long journeys; the 1849 Kalevala runs to 22,795 verses in fifty runos and inspired Tolkien.