Distribution and variants The motif of the wife of supernatural origin (in most cases, a swan maiden) has universal appeal, appearing in the oral and folkloric traditions of every continent. The
swan is the typical species, but they can transform into "
geese, ducks,
spoonbills, or
aquatic birds of some other species".
ATU 402 ("The Animal Bride") group of folktales is found across the world, though the animals vary. The Italian fairy tale "
The Dove Girl" features a dove. There are the
Orcadian and
Shetland selkies, that alternate between seal and human shape. A Croatian tale features a she-wolf. The wolf also appears in the folklore of Estonia and Finland as the "animal bride", under the tale type ATU 409, . In Africa, the same motif is shown through buffalo maidens. In addition, according to American folklorist
William Bascom, in similar narratives among the
Yoruba and the
Fon the animal wife is an
African buffalo, a
gazelle, a
hind, sometimes a
duiker or
antelope. In East Asia, it is also known for featuring maidens who transform into various bird species. Russian professor
Valdemar Bogoras collected a tale from a
Yukaghir woman in
Kolyma, in which three
Tungus sisters change into "female geese" to pick berries. On one occasion, the character of "One-Side" hides the skin of the youngest, who cannot return to goose form. She eventually consents to marry "One-Side". In a tale attributed to the Toraja people of Indonesia, a woman gives birth to seven crabs, which she throws into the water. As time passes, the seven crabs find a place to live and take on their disguises to assume human form. On one occasion, seven males steal the crab disguises of the seven crab maidens and marry them. A second one is close to the Swan maiden narrative, only with
parakeets instead of swans; the hero is called Magoenggoelota and the maiden Kapapitoe.
Europe In a 13th-century romance about
Friedrich von Schwaben (English: "Friedrich of Suabia"), The knight Friedrich hides Princess Angelburge's clothing, who came to bathe in a lake in dove form.
Western Europe In a tale from
Brittany, collected by
François-Marie Luzel with the title
Pipi Menou et Les Femmes Volantes ("Pipi Menou and the Flying Women"), Pipi Menou, a shepherd boy, sees three large white birds descending near a
étang (a pond). When the birds approach the pond, they transform into nude maidens and begin to play in the water. Pipi Menou sees the whole scene from the hilltop and tells his mother, who explains they are the daughters of a powerful magician who lives elsewhere, in a castle filled with jewels and precious stones. The next day, he steals one of their clothes, but she convinces him to give it back. He goes to the castle, the flying maiden recognizes him, and they both escape with jewels in their pouches.
Southern Europe Portuguese writer
Theophilo Braga collected a Portuguese tale named
O Príncipe que foi correr a sua Ventura ("
The Prince Who Wanted to See the World"), in which a prince loses his bet against a stranger, a king in disguise, and must become the stranger's servant. A beggar woman with a child informs the prince that there is a tank in a garden where three doves come to bathe. He should take the feathery robe of the last one and withhold it until the maiden gives him three objects. A tale from
Tirol tells of Prince Eligio and the Dove-Maidens, who bathe in a lake. In another tale, from Tirol, collected by Christian Schneller (German:
Die drei Tauben; Italian:
Le tre colombe; English: "The Three Doves"), a youth loses his soul in a gamble to a wizard. A saint helps him and gives him information about three doves that perch on a bridge and change into human form. The youth steals the clothing of the wizard's youngest daughter and promises to take him to her father. She wants to help the hero convert to Christianity and abandon her pagan magic.
Spain In a
Basque tale collected by
Wentworth Webster (
The Lady Pigeon and her Comb), the destitute hero is instructed by a "Tartaro" to collect the pigeon garment of the middle maiden, instead of the youngest. In the
Andalusian variant,
El Marqués del Sol ("The Marquis of the Sun"), a player loses his bet against the Marqués and must wear out seven pairs of iron shoes. In his wanderings, he pays the debt of a dead man and his soul, in gratitude, informs him that three white doves, the daughters of the Marqués in avian form, will come to bathe in a lake. In a variant collected by folklorist
Aurelio Macedonio Espinosa Sr. in
Granada, a gambling prince loses a bet against a dove (the Devil, in disguise), who says he should find him in "Castillo de Siete Rayos de Sol" ("The Castle of Seven Sunrays"). A helping hermit guides him to a place where the three devil's daughters, in the form of doves, come to bathe. The prince should steal the garments of the youngest, named
Siete Rayos de Sol, who betrays her father and helps the human prince. In an
Asturian tale collected by , the youngest of three brothers works with a giant, who forbids him to open a certain door. He does and sees three dove maidens alighting near the water, becoming women and bathing. The youth tells the giant about this event, and his employer suggests he steal the feather of the one he set his sights on. He takes the feather of one of the dove maidens, marries her, and gives her feather to his mother to keep. Hispanist Ralph Steele Boggs classified it as type 400*B (a number not included in the revision of the international index at the time).
Northern Europe In the Danish tale
The White Dove, the youngest prince, unborn at the time, is "sold" by his elder brothers in exchange for a witch's help in dissipating a sea storm. Years later, the witch upholds her end of the bargain and takes the prince under her tutelage. As part of his everyday chores, the witch sets him with difficult tasks, which he accomplishes with the help of a princess, who the witch enchanted to become a dove.
Central Europe A compilation of Central European (Austrian and
Bohemian) folktales lists four variants of the Swan Maiden narrative: "The Three White Doves"; "The Maiden on the Crystal Mountain"; "How Hans finds his Wife", and "The Drummer". Theodor Vernaleken, in the German version of the compilation, narrated in his notes two other variants, one from St. Pölten and the other from Moldautein (modern day
Týn nad Vltavou, in the
Czech Republic).
Eastern Europe In the Slavic fairy tale
King Kojata or
Prince Unexpected, the twelve royal daughters of King Kostei take off their goose disguises to bathe in the lake, but the prince hides the clothing of the youngest. In the Czech tale
The Three Doves, the hero hides the three golden feathers of the dove maiden to keep her in her human state. Later on, when she disappears, he embarks on an epic quest to find her. In a
Serbian tale collected by
Vuk Karadzic and translated as
Die Prinz und die drei Schwäne ("The Prince and the Three Swans"), a prince loses his way during a hunt and meets an old man who lives in a hut. He works for the older man and has to watch over a lake. On the second day of his job, three swans alight near the lake, take off their birdskins to become human maidens, and bathe. The next day, the prince steals their swan skins and hurries back to the older man's hut. The three swans beg for their birdskins back; the older man returns only two of them and withholds the youngest's skin. He marries the prince to the swan girl, and they return to his father's kingdom. One day, the swan wife asks her mother-in-law for her garments back; she puts them on and flies away to the Glass Mountain. The prince returns to the older man, the king of the winds, and is directed to the Glass Mountain. He climbs it and meets an older woman in a hut. Inside the hut, he must identify his wife from a group of 300 similarly dressed swan women. Later, he is forced to do chores for the older woman, which he does with his wife's help.
Russia In the Russian fairy tale
The Sea Tsar and Vasilisa the Wise, or
Vassilissa the Cunning, and The Tsar of the Sea, Ivan, the merchant's son, was informed by an old hag (possibly
Baba Yaga, in some versions) about the daughters of the
Sea Tsar who come to bathe in a lake in the form of
doves. In another translation,
The King of the Sea and Melania, the Clever, and
The Water King and Vasilissa the Wise, there are twelve maidens in the form of
spoonbills. In another transcription of the same tale, the maidens are pigeons. In another Russian variant, "Мужик и Настасья Адовна" ("The Man and Nastasya Adovna"), collected by , a creature jumps out of a well and tells a man to give him the thing he does not know he has at home (his newly born son). Years later, his son learns about his father's dealings and decides to travel to "Hell" ("Аду" or "Adu", in Russian). He visits three old women who give him directions to reach "Hell". The third old woman also informs him that in a lake, thirty-three maidens, the daughters of "Adu", come to bathe, and he should steal the clothing of Nastasya Adovna. In a tale from
Perm Krai with the title "Иванушка и его невеста" ("Ivanushka and his Wife"),
Ivanushka loses his way from his grandfather in the forest, but eventually finds a hut. He takes shelter with an older man for the night, and the next day, the older man gives directions, but Ivanushka disregards them and finds a lake where maidens are bathing. The maidens leave the water, turn into ducks, and depart. Ivanushka goes back to the older man, and he advises him to steal the duck maiden's garments. Ivanushka does that and takes the girl for wife. She eventually retrieves her duck garments, bids Ivanushka to find her in a land beyond 30 realms, then flies away.
Ukraine In a "Cossack" (
Ukrainian) tale,
The Story of Ivan and the Daughter of the Sun, the peasant Ivan obtains a wife in the form of a dove maiden whose robe he stole when she was bathing. Some time later, a nobleman lusts after Ivan's dove maiden wife and plans to get rid of the peasant. In another
Ukrainian variant that begins as tale type ATU 402, "The Animal Bride", akin to Russian
The Frog Princess, the human prince marries the frog maiden Maria, and both are invited to the tsar's grand ball. Maria takes off her frog skin and enters the ballroom as a human, while her husband hurries home and burns it. When she comes home, she reveals that the prince's curse will soon be lifted, says he needs to find Baba Yaga in a remote kingdom, and then vanishes in the form of a cuckoo. He meets Baba Yaga, and she points to a lake where 30 swans will alight, his wife among them. He hides Maria's feather garment, they meet again, and Maria tells him to follow her into the undersea kingdom to meet her father, the Sea Tsar. The tale ends like tale type ATU 313, with the three tasks.
Hungary A Hungarian tale ("Fisher Joe") tells of an orphan who catches a magical fish that reveals itself to be a lovely maiden. A second
Magyar tale, "Fairy Elizabeth", is close to the general swan maiden story, only dealing with pigeon-maidens instead. In a third tale,
Az örökbefogadott testvérek ("The adoptive brothers"), the main protagonist, Miklós, dreams that the Queen of the Fairies and her handmaidens come to his side in the form of swans and transform into beautiful women. In the Hungarian tale
Ráró Rózsa, the king promises his only son to a devil-like character who rescues him from danger. Eighteen years pass, and it is time for the prince to fulfill his father's promise. The youth bides his time in a stream and awaits the arrival of three black
cranes, the devil's three daughters in disguise, to fetch the garments of the youngest. In another tale,
Tündér Ilona és Argyilus ("Fairy
Ilona and Argyilus"), Prince Argyilus (
hu) is tasked by his father, the king, with discovering what has been stealing the precious apples from his prized apple tree. One night, the prince sees thirteen black ravens flying to the tree. As soon as he captures the thirteenth one, it transforms into the beautiful golden-haired Fairy Ilona. A variant of the event also happens in
Tündér Ilona és a királyfi ("Fairy Ilona and the Prince"). In the tale
A zöldszakállú király ("The Green-Bearded King"), the king is forced to surrender his son to the devil king after it spares the man's life. Years later, the prince comes across a lake where seven wild ducks with golden plumage left their skins on the shores to bathe in the form of maidens. In the tale
A tizenhárom hattyú ("The Thirteen Swans"), collected by Hungarian journalist
Elek Benedek, after his sister was kidnapped, Miklós finds work as a cowherd. On one occasion, when he leads the cows to graze, he sees thirteen swans flying about an apple tree. The swans, then, change their shapes into twelve beautiful maidens and the Queen of the Fairies.
Albania In an Albanian-Romani tale, ''O Zylkanôni thai e Lačí Devlék'i'' ("The Satellite and the Maiden of Heaven"), an unmarried youth goes on a journey to find work. Some time later, he enters a dark world. There, he meets by the spring three
partridges that take off their animal skins to bathe. The youth hides the garment of one of them, who begs him to give it back. She wears it again and asks him to find her where the sun rises in that dark world.
Caucasus Region In an Azerbaijani variant, a prince travels to an island where birds with copper, silver, and gold wings bathe and marries the golden-winged maiden. In an Armenian variant collected from an Armenian-American source (
The Country of the Beautiful Gardens), a prince, after his father's death, decided to stay silent. A neighbouring king, who wants to marry him to his daughter, places him in his garden. There, he sees three colorful birds bathing in a pool, and they reveal themselves as beautiful maidens.
Latvia According to the Latvian Folktale Catalogue, tale type ATU 400 is titled
Vīrs meklē zudušo sievu ("Man on a Quest for the Lost Wife"). In the Latvian tale type, the protagonist finds the bird maidens (swans, ducks, doves) alighting near a lake to bathe, and steals the youngest's wings. In a
Latvian folktale, a female named
Laima (possibly the Latvian goddess of fate) loses her feathered wings by burning. She no longer becomes a swan and marries a human prince. They live together in the human world and even have a child, but she wants to become a swan again. So her husband throws feathers at her, she regains her bird form and takes to the skies, visiting her mortal family from time to time.
Lithuania In another Lithuanian variant published by Fr. Richter in the journal
Zeitschrift für Volkskunde with the title
Die Schwanfrau ("The Swan Woman"), a count's son, on a hunt, sights three swans, who talk among themselves that whoever is listening to them may help them break their curse. The count's son comes out of a bush and agrees to help them by fighting a giant and breaking the spell a magician cast on them.
Northern Eurasia In a tale from the
Samoyed people of Northern Eurasia, an older woman tells a youth about seven maidens bathing in a lake in a dark forest. English folklorist
Edwin Sidney Hartland cited a variant where the seven maidens arrive at the lake in their reindeer chariot. Whatever their origin, scientist
Fridtjof Nansen reported that, in these tales, the girls lived "in the air or in the sky". Philosopher
John Fiske cited a Siberian tale wherein a Samoyed man steals the feather skin of one of seven swan maidens. In return, he wants her help in enacting his revenge on seven robbers who killed his mother. In another version of this tale, still sourced from the Samoyed and translated by , the seven men have kidnapped the sister of a Samoyed man, and the protagonist steals the garments of a woman from the sky to ensure her help. In a tale attributed to the
Tungus of
Siberia, titled ''Ivan the Mare's Son
(Russian: "Иван Кобыльников сын") - related to both Fehérlófia and Jean de l'Ours'' -, a mare gives birth to a human son, Ivan. When he grows up, he meets two companions also named Ivan: Ivan the Sun's Son and Ivan the Moon's Son. The three decide to live together in a hut made of wooden poles and animal skins. For two nights, after they hunt in the forest, they come home and see the place in perfect order. On the third night, Ivan, the Mare's Son, decides to stay awake and discovers that three
herons descending to the ground and taking off their feathers and wings to become maidens. Ivan, the Mare's Son, hides their bird garments until they reveal themselves. Marfida, the heron maiden, and her sisters marry the three Ivans, and the three couples live together. The rest of the story follows the tale type ATU 301, "The Three Stolen Princesses": the hero's descent into the underworld, the rescue of the maidens, betrayal by companions, and return to the upper world on an eagle. In a
Mongolian tale,
Manihuar (Манихуар), a prince on a hunt sees three swans take off their golden crowns and become women. As they bathe in a nearby lake, he takes the golden crown of one of them, so she can't turn back into her bird form. He marries this swan maiden, named Manihuar. When the prince is away, his other wives threaten her, and Manihuar, fearing for her life, convinces her mother-in-law to return her golden crown. She turns back into a swan and flies back to her celestial realm. Her husband goes on a quest to bring her back.
Yakut people In an
olonkho (epic narrative of the
Yakut or Sakha people) titled
Yuchyugey Yudyugyuyen, Kusagan Hodzhugur, obtained from
Olonhohut ('storyteller', 'narrator') Darya Tomskaya-Chayka, from
Verkhoyansk, Yuchugey Yudyugyuyen, the elder of two brothers, goes hunting in the
taiga. Suddenly, he sees 7
Siberian cranes coming to play with his young brother, Kusagan Hodzhugur, distracting him from his chores. The maidens possibly belong to the
Aiy people, good spirits of the Upper World in Yakut mythology. When they come a third time, the elder brother, Yuchugey, disguises himself as a woodchip or a flea and hides the bird skin of one of the crane maidens. They marry. One day, she fools her brother-in-law, regains her magical crane garment, and returns to the Upper World. Hero Yuchugey embarks on a quest to find her, receiving help from a wise older man. Eventually, he reaches the Upper world and finds his wife and a son in a
yurt. Yuchugey burns his wife's feathers; she dies, but is revived, and they return to the world of humans. This narrative sequence was recognized as very similar to a folk tale. Variants of the Yakut tale "Үчүгэй Үɵдүйээн" (Russian: "Хороший Юджиян") were collected in the northern part of the
Republic of Sakha and show great resemblance among them. According to Russian scholarship, Yakut professor Dmitry Kononovich (D. K.) Sivtsev-Suorun Omolloon based himself on the international classification put forth by
Antti Aarne in 1910 and later expanded by other folklorists, and classified these Yakut narratives as type 400C, "Муж возвращает убежавшую жену" ("Man goes after his runaway wife"): the bird maiden (a
stork or Siberian crane maiden) wears its featherskin and escapes; man goes after her in the sky; she dies, but he resurrects her.
West Asia . The tale of the swan maiden also appears in the Arab collection of folktales
The Arabian Nights, a tale inserted in the narrative of
The Queen of the Serpents. In a second tale, the story of Hasan of Basrah (Hassan of Bassorah), the titular character arrives at an oasis and sees the bird maidens (birds of paradise) undressing their plumage to play in the water. Both tales are considered to contain the international tale of the Swan Maiden. In another Middle Eastern tale, a king's son finds work with a giant in another region and receives a set of keys to the giant's abode, being told not to open a specific door. He disobeys his master and opens the door; he soon sees three pigeon maidens take off their garments to bathe in a basin. In a
Metawileh tale reported in the
Palestine Exploration Quarterly, Shâtir Hassan, son of a merchant, pursues a bird-girl named Bedr et Temâm (translating as 'full moon'), daughter of the King of the Jân. The report described the tale as a version of the "Swan maiden" tale.
South Asia A story from South Asia also narrates the motif of the swan maiden or bird-princess:
Story of Prince Bairâm and the Fairy Bride, in which the titular prince hides Ghûlab Bânu's clothing, the dove-maiden.
Central Asia In a
Tuvan tale,
Ösküs-ool and the Daughter of Kurbustu-Khan, poor orphan boy Ösküs-ool seeks employment with powerful khans. He is tasked with harvesting their fields before the sun sets or before the moon sets. Nearly finishing both chores, the boy pleads to the moon and the sun not set for a little longer, but time passes. The respective khans think they never finished the job, berate and whip him. Some time later, while living on his own, the daughter of Khurbustu-khan comes from the upper world in the form of a swan. The boy hides her clothing, and she marries him, now that she is stranded on Earth. Some time later, an evil Karaty-khan demands that the youth produces a palace of glass and an invincible army of iron men for him - feats that he accomplishes thanks to his wife's advice and with help from his wife's relatives.
Africa According to scholar
Denise Paulme, in African tales, the animal spouse (a
buffalo or an
antelope) marries a human male already married to a previous human wife. The man hides the skin of the supernatural spouse, and she asks him never to reveal her true name. When the husband betrays the supernatural wife's trust, the animal wife takes her skin back and returns to the wilderness with her children. Variants collected in
Cape Verde by
Elsie Clews Parsons (under the title
White-Flower) show the hero plucking the feather from the duck maiden to travel to her father's house. In a
Kabylian tale collected by ethnologist
Leo Frobenius, titled
Die Taubenfrauen ("The Dove Maidens"), a young hunter journeys and meets two women who invite him to live with them as their brother. One day, two doves land near their house and become maidens. They turn the man to stone, turn back into doves, and fly away. The next time they land, the hunter's adopted sisters hide the dove garments and golden jewellery of one of the dove maidens, in return for changing their brother back. The dove maiden does. The sisters give the garments to the hunter. The dove-maiden marries the hunter and bears him a son. Some time later, he wants to visit his mother in his home village. He takes his dove-wife and son. The hunter gives his mother the dove-wife's belongings and explains that she must never let her leave the house and must hide the garments and jewellery. One day, the dove maiden goes out for a bit, and a harvester becomes entranced by her beauty. The man tells the dove-wife she must marry him. The dove-wife begs her mother-in-law to give her belongings so she may escape. After getting the garments, she turns into a dove, takes her son, and flies over to the village of Wuak-Wuak. The hunter returns home and goes after her. He fools three people fighting over magical objects, steals them, and teleports to Wuak-Wuak. There, he finds his wife and son, but his dove-wife explains the whole village only has females, and if they see him, her sisters will devour him.
Oceania and Pacific Ocean The character of the swan maiden (and her variants) is spread among the many traditions of
Oceania and the
Pacific Ocean, such as in Micronesia. In this region, the bird maiden may be replaced for a sea creature, such as a fish, a
porpoise, a dolphin (in
Yap and
Kei Islands), or a
whale (in
Puluwat and
Satawal). At least 33 variants have been collected from
Papua New Guinea, published in the local newspaper
Wantok Niuspepa in a section on traditional tales. Sometimes the swan garment is replaced by a
cassowary skin or a
bird-of-paradise. For instance, the tale of
The Cassowary Wife was stated by anthropologist
Margaret Mead to be the local version of the Swan maiden. American anthropologist
Donald Tuzin collected and published a tale from the Ilahita
Arapesh: long ago, there was only one man. One day, he walks about and hears sounds coming from a nearby pond. He sees a group of cassowaries come to the water, taking off their animal skins and becoming human women. The man hides the leader of the cassowaries' clothing, named Nambweapa'w, in a short bamboo tube. The cassowary women play and bathe in the pond until afternoon, when they leave, gather their animal skins, and turn back into cassowaries, except for their leader. The man takes Nambweapa'w to his house and marries her. They have many children, both male and female. Their youngest child, a boy, cries a lot, so his father takes out the cassowary skin to frighten the boy into silence. The next day, the little boy shows his mother the cassowary skin, she puts it back, and runs back to the forest, abandoning her human family. The tale continues with the adventures of the cassowary woman's sons, as an origin myth of the Arapesh. Professor Sir
James George Frazer mentioned a tale from the
Pelew Islands (Palau) in the Pacific about a man who married a
shapeshifting maiden by hiding her fish tail. They had a daughter, and on one occasion, they found her fish tail and returned to the ocean soon after. In a tale from
Kairiru Island with the title
Stori Bilong Taim Bipo: The Dolphin Woman, a group of women are cutting bushes to make a garden. Suddenly, heavy rain begins to fall, and the women return to their village. Once they are gone, a school of dolphins appears, takes off their dolphin "bodies" and become human women to finish the work on the garden, then return to the sea as dolphins. Some time later, a man goes to the garden to wait for the rain, and sees the dolphins come out of the water and become women. He hides the dolphin skin of one of them; after the others are gone, the man takes the dolphin woman home and marries her. She bears him two children. One day, she is ready to return to the sea and tries to get her sons to go with her by turning them into dolphins with saltwater. In another version, the man is named Mutabau. This second tale was reported by Michael French Smith, told by a man named Valentine Wamuk, a descendant of Mutabau. In a tale from
Losap,
Chuuk, with the title
The Island of the Dolphin Girls, a chief's son named Anoun Farrang from the Lugenfanu clan is sailing on a canoe with other men, when their canoe is approached by a pod of dolphins (who are really girls in delphine skin). One of the dolphins hits Anoun with her tail, and he falls overboard, forgotten by his fellow men. With his magic powers, he can dive underwater until he reaches a small island with a pool in its middle. Anoun hides behind a bush and sees a pod of dolphins coming to shore, jumping into the pool, taking off their skins, and becoming girls. While they play and splash water, Anoun takes the dolphin skin from one of them. The girls take back the skins, change into dolphins, and return to the sea, leaving only one girl on the island. Anoun comes to her and gives back her dolphin skin. The girl's pod returns and catches Anoun's human scent, and, convinced by their friend, agrees to let the boy live with them. Some time later, Anoun begins to miss his human home, and the pod swims with him back to the surface.
Americas Indigenous peoples In a tale of the Musquakie people, some male youths bathe and play in the water while some beautiful girls approach them. One of the male youths gets one of the girls, and the others, frightened, turn into black-headed ducks and fly away. Some tales from the
Algonquins also tell of a young, unmarried hunter who approaches a lake where otherworldly women come to bathe to acquire a supernatural spouse. In a tale of the
Cochiti people, a
coyote (possibly the
Coyote of legend) helps a youth in getting a wife: one of three pigeon girls who bathe in a lake. In a variant, the coyote leads the youth to three dove maidens. In a tale from the
Tewa, collected by
Elsie Clews Parsons, the youth Powitsire hunts a deer, which suggests the boy find a wife and reveals that three duck girls come to bathe in a nearby lake. In a second Tewa story (a retelling, in fact), the son of the cacique wishes to travel to the Land of Parrots to obtain a parrot. His mission is successful, and he returns home with a "Parrot Girl" that helps him on the homeward journey. When he arrives at his parents' house, the Parrot Girl becomes a beautiful human girl and marries him. Charles Frederick Hartt claimed that a tale from the "Paitúna" contains a version where the bird maiden is a parrot. A human male finds her and becomes the mother of a new tribe. Researchers Darwin Hanna and Mamie Henry collected a
Nlaka'pamux tale from teller
Annie York, which they translated as
The Country Divided. In this tale, a couple lives in
Quilchena with their child. After the father dies, the widowed mother raises her son and teaches him everything a father would. When he is old enough, his mother tells him that he must travel a great distance to find a mate. One day, while he is resting, he hears a song and goes to look for its source. He then finds a group of women flying down to a clearing, taking off their clothes and wings, praying for a bit, then entering a nearby body of water to swim. Soon after, the women put on the wings and clothes again and flew to the sky. The next day, the youth surprises the women just as they are taking flight and grabs the youngest woman's clothes. The youth covers her with a deerskin and brings her home to his mother, where she will live with him as his wife. Folklorist
Lewis Spence registered a tale from the Canaris Indians from the province of Canaribamba, in Quito. In this tale, titled
The Bird Bride, two brothers survive a flood and take shelter atop a mountain named Huacaquan until the water recedes. They return to the lands and build a house for themselves. They leave the house to gather herbs, and when they return home, they find that their food has been prepared for them. The pair decides to spy on whoever is cooking their food. The next time this happens, two birds, one "Aqua" and the other "Torito" (which Spence calls "quacamayo birds"), alight near the house and become maidens. The elder brother spies on them, but lets them escape. Ten days later, the younger brother takes his chances on the bird-maidens, closing the door on the younger maiden to trap her in the house. The maiden lives with the brothers and gives birth to six sons and daughters, the ancestors of the Canaris.
Eskimo: The Goose Wife Pacific Northwest South America: The Vulture Wife German ethnologue locates the story of the
Vulture Wife in
Guyana and northern South America, among the Warrao, Arawak, Camaracoto, Taulipang,
Makushi, Carib, and the Caliña of
Suriname. In a tale from Guyana,
The man with a vulture wife, a young hunter comes across a large house where people are playing sports and dancing to music. In reality, they were vultures that shed their skins to decorate the place. The youth becomes entranced by one of the maidens and captures her. Their marriage is not a happy one, and the tale ends on a darker note. A similar tale is attested from the
Warao people, in Venezuela. Dutch cartographer
Claudius de Goeje transcribed a tale from the
Arawak, about a
medicine man named
Makanahoro. In this tale, Makanahoro disguised himself as a carrion deer to attract vultures. He manages to capture a female
king vulture who has taken off her vulture plumage and makes her his wife. Some time later, Makanahoro goes with his wife to visit her family in the sky, but his in-laws test his mettle by forcing him to complete tasks. Makanahoro accomplished the tasks (as described in the account) with the help of animals. De Goeje reported similar tales from nearby indigenous populations: the
Kaliñas, the
Macusis, the Warau (Warao), the
Taulipangs, the
Tembes, and the
Chané-
Chriguanos. In a more detailed version, the vulture father-in-law is named Anuanima and he is identified as the ruler of this race that lives in the sky. German ethnologist
Theodor Koch-Grunberg collected a version of the Vulture Wife from the Taulipangs (also known as Taurepang, a subgroup of the
Pemon people). In this story, which he titled
Der Besuch im Himmel ("A Visit to Heaven"), after a war between rival tribes, Kuyalakog and Palawiyang, only a man named Maitchaule (in another translation, Maitxaule) survives. He dreams of a beautiful woman and captures the daughter of the vulture king. He brings her home and orders her to become a woman. Maitchaule goes hunting, fishing, and harvesting vegetables and fruit. While he is away, the vulture turns into a woman and does the chores, but when the man comes home, she turns back into a vulture. One day, Maitchaule discovers her human form and convinces her to live with him as if they were husband and wife. Time passes, and the vulture wife wants to visit her vulture family. The vulture wife returns with her two brothers and takes her human husband to visit her father-in-law, the vulture-king called Kasanapodole. The vulture-king introduces his son-in-law and orders him on difficult tasks: first, to dry out the Kapöpiakupö Lake in two days; second, to build a house on a rock; third, to build a bench with two heads. While in Heaven, Maitchaule is helped by small animals in his tasks. Koch-Grunberg published a version from the Tembé people, which he titled
Die Tochter des Königsgeiers ("The King Vulture's Daughter"): some king vultures shed their feathers to bathe in a lake. A human man builds a hunting lodge and waits for the vulture women to return the next day. When the vulture women return, the man hides the vulture feathers from the woman and takes her as his wife. They have a son. Some time later, the vulture wife wants to visit her family and fashions makeshift wings for her human husband and son from Janiparana leaves. With one of her feathers, she turns the leaves into vulture feathers, and the three fly to the skies. They pass by the house of the Sun and the house of the Moon and reach the King Vulture's house. Later, the King Vulture orders his son-in-law to carve a large canoe in one day; then, the next day, to block a river and bring him the Trahira fish (which are alligators); and lastly to raze a forest to the ground. John Bierhorst summarized a tale from the Camaracoto, in Guyana: the protagonist is a culture hero named Maichak. He uses rotten meat bait to draw the vultures in hopes of making contact with their chief, but he attracts the vulture chief's daughter, who becomes a woman. The vulture woman takes Maichak to the vulture realm, and their chief agrees to accept the human as his son-in-law, on the condition that he fulfill three tasks: catch all the fish in a lake, build a house on a ledge, and carve a shaman's bench. With the help of animals, Maichak fulfills the tasks.
Walter Roth published a tale from the Warao, from Guyana, which he titled "The Man with a Vulture Wife", the middle of three brothers, who is a good hunter, finds a gathering of people in a house in the forest. These people are dancing and playing the
makuari on their instruments, but in reality, they are vultures who have taken off their feathers. The next day, the hunter returns to that same spot, intent on getting one of the women as his wife. He sneaks behind one girl and grabs her as the people, the house, and everything disappear. The girl agrees to be the man's wife, provided he does not thrash her. They live together, and, strangely, the girl does not eat the meat as soon as it is brought home, waiting until the next day. However, the man beats her on three different occasions, despite his previous promise. The girl lends her vulture feathers to her husband so he can visit his father-in-law. Some time later, the man's wife notices that her daughter-in-law is strange, and the man keeps beating his wife. Fed up with her human husband's behaviour, she turns back into a vulture and flies back to the vulture realm. The human husband tries to catch her in mid-flight, to no avail, and misses his wife so much so that he returns to the spot in the forest where the house once stood. Roth also published two other Guyanese tales. In the first, from the Arawak, titled
How the Birds Obtained their Distinctive Markings, the man marries a vulture wife and visits his father-in-law in the vulture realm. He spends some time there, but after a while, he begins to miss his earthly home and wishes to return to visit his mother. In another, titled
The Medicine-Man and the Carrion Crows, the protagonist is a medicine man named Makanauro, who captures a vulture woman in human form and marries her. American anthropologist
Charles Wagley collected a tale from the
Tenetehara people which he titled
The man who married the vulture. In this tale, a Tenetehara man brings home a female king vulture (
Gypagus papa) and raises it. Time passes, and the man sighs over the lack of a wife and wishes the bird could become one. He goes to the garden, returns at night, and sees a meal prepared for him. This situation occurs many times, and he discovers that the vulture takes off the feather garments, becomes a woman, and cooks his food. He enters the house and hides the vulture's feather garment. The (now human) vulture explains she wanted to be kind and good to him now that she is grown. They marry. Later, he wishes to visit her relatives, but she warns him against it, since her father, the vulture king, is a dangerous creature. He insists, and she takes him to the vulture realm. Once there, the vulture king orders his human son-in-law to perform tasks for him: to build a canoe in one day (done by woodpeckers); to clear a garden in one day (again done by the woodpeckers), and to start a fire in the middle of the clearing. In the third task, a spider protects the human until the fire burns. Then the Tenetehara man asks the hawks for help against his father-in-law.
Latin America In two
Argentinian variants,
Las tres palomas hijas del diablo ("The three pigeon daughters of the devil") and
Blanca Flor, the prince is a gambler who bets and loses against a devil antagonist. To find the devil's house, a donor tells him he should steal the garments of the three daughters of the devil, who come to bathe in the form of doves.
Mexico In a Mexican tale,
Blanca Flor ("White Flower"), the youth Juan loves to gamble and wins the devil's favor to grant him unbeatable luck for the period of five years. When the date is due, the youth must find the devil "in the Plains of Berlín at the
Hacienda of Qui-quiri-qui". He goes on a pilgrimage and asks three hermits (the king of fishes, the king of animals of the earth, and the king of birds of the air) for their location. The eagle, answering its sire's question, knows where it is. The eagle carries Juan to the Plains of Berlín and informs him that three doves, the devil's three daughters, will come to bathe. In a tale collected by John Bierhorst from a
Yucatec Mayan source titled
The Bird Bride, something is destroying his father's fields, and he tasks his three sons to guard it. A little toad appears to all three brothers and begs for some food, but only the youngest agrees to share his. The little toad and the youth discover the culprit: a bird - an enchanted maiden - comes to eat in the cornfield. The toad disenchants the maiden, and she marries the youth.
Brazil In a tale collected by
Sílvio Romero in Rio de Janeiro (
Cova da Linda Flôr), a king gambles with another monarch. He loses everything and consults with a hermit on how to proceed. The hermit advises killing a special kind of bird from which a piece of paper will drop with instructions: three princesses, daughters of the monarch, in the form of ducks, bathe in a lake, and the king should take the duck skin of the youngest (whose name is Cova da Linda Flôr).
Marco Haurélio, contemporary writer and folklorist, collected two versions in Brazil wherein the hero steals the bird-maiden's clothes:
Guime e Guimar (Guime e Guimar), published in the book
Contos Folclóricas Brasileiros (Brazilian Folk Tales), in which the princess is enchanted in a paw, and
Guimar e Guimarim (Guimar and Guimarim), published in the book
Vozes da Tradição (Voices of Tradition), both classified under type 313A in the
Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index (The Girl as Helper in the Hero's Flight).
Non-bird maidens Despite the near universality of the tale of the swan maiden (or maiden who transforms into any other kind of bird), there are tales where the human male still holds the maiden's garments. Still, the narrative does not mention whether she transforms. In a tale titled
The Iron Eagle, a young hunter reaches the sandy shores on the edge of a forest. He then sees three maidens arriving in a flash of light to take a bath "in the golden sunrise". The hunter steals their clothing, unaware that one of the maidens is "The Daughter of the Sun". In exchange for her garment back, she will grant one out of four wishes.
Western Europe The tale of the swan maiden is believed to be attested in
Lady Featherflight, a tale obtained from an English storyteller (an old aunt). Lady Featherflight helps the hero against her
giant father and both escape (ATU 313
The Magical Flight).
Emmanuel Cosquin collected a French tale titled
Chatte Blanche (English: "White Cat"), where the hero Jean is informed that "Plume Verte", "Plume Jaune" and "Plume Noir" come to bathe in the lake in the Black Forest, and is tasked with getting the robes of "Plume Verte". On his comments on the English fairy tale
Lady Featherflight, W. W. Newell commented that in the French counterpart of the story,
La Plume Verte (English: "The Green Feather"), the name is an indication of her status as bird-maiden. A similar occurrence appears in a fairy tale from
Brittany,
La Demoiselle en Blanc ("The Lady in White"), collected by
Paul Sébillot: the young man sees three human maidens bathing, and nearby there are three dresses, a white one, a gray one, and a blue one. It has been noted that the tale contains a nearly identical episode of the maidens bathing, instead of the bird-maidens. In another Brittany tale, collected by François-Marie Luzel,
Barbauvert, ou Le Prince qui Joua la Tête et la Perdit ("Green Beard, or The Prince that gambled his head and lost it"), Prince Charles, son of the king of France, gambles and loses a bet against Barbauvert. The man asks the prince to find his castle. Charles meets a hermit who tells him that three maidens will come in three golden chairs and will descend near a lake. One of them is Koantic, the youngest daughter of the Green Beard, who will help the prince with her father's tasks. In the Irish tale
Yellow Lily, the son of the king of Erin gambles his head against the cruel Giant of Loch Lein and must travel to the giant's castle after losing the bet. During his travels, he meets an older woman in a hut who informs him that the three daughters of the giant, Blue Lily, White Lily, and Yellow Lily, will come to bathe in a nearby lake, and that he should steal the garments of the youngest, Yellow Lily. In another Irish tale, ''The King's Son in Erin and the King of Green Island'', collected by Jeremiah Curtin and later published by Séamus Ó Duilearga, the king's son is defeated by a small grey man. He orders him to find his castle in Green Island within a year and a day. After a long journey, an eagle directs him to the three daughters of the king of Green Island and steals the bracelet of the youngest of them. He returns it to her; they fall in love, and she agrees to help him with his father's tasks.
Northern Europe In a
Norwegian variant, a stranger named "the ninth Momorius" helps the hero, and he has to find his house as payment. The hero meets one of Momorius's sons and is directed to his youngest sister, who lives by a lake. When he arrives, the hero steals Momorius's daughter's clothes and asks for her help. Norwegian folklorist
Reidar Thoralf Christiansen recognized that the stealing of the sister's clothes was "clearly a much worn down use of the Swan-maiden incident".
Francisco Maspons y Labrós collected a Catalan variant titled
Lo castell del Sol ("The Castle of the Sun"), where a young count bets and loses his wealth and must find his way to "The Castle of the Sun". Not knowing of its location, he is helped by an old lady and her sons, who tell of a lake where three maidens come to bathe. When escaping from her family, the count calls his wife "
Rosa florida".
Central Europe In an Austrian (Tirol) tale collected by Joseph and Ignaz Zingerle,
Der gläserne Berg ("The Glass Mountain"), a forester's son, while hiding in the bushes, sees three maidens bathing and fetches their cloaks. Later, the maidens arrive at his house and ask for their garments back. He returns to two of the maidens, retaining the youngest and marrying her. The couple lives quite happily until, one day, the husband forgets to lock the cabinet where he hid her cloak, and she finds it. The maiden writes him a note saying that, if he loves her, he should seek her in "The Glass Mountain". In a
Swiss tale from Unterengadin,
Der Glasberg oder Das Glasschloss ("The Glass Mountain or the Glass Castle"), a youth and his widowed mother live in a house in the woods. One day, he is cutting some wood when he sees ten flying maidens alighting near a lake and taking off their wings to bathe. The youth is astonished by such a sight. The next day, he watches the scene and convinces himself the maidens are real, intending to take the youngest as his wife. The third time, he digs a hole and hides in it to steal the maiden's wings as soon as she descends. He is successful, and the maiden is presented to his mother as his wife. He hides the clothing in a locked compartment and gives the key to his mother, but one day she forgets to lock it. So the maiden regains her wings and tells the old woman that her son should find her "in the Glass Mountain". The youth, now inconsolable, goes on a quest to get her back. He visits the abode of the Moon, the Sun, and the Wind and obtains their help. He finally reaches the Glass Mountain and meets his mother-in-law, who asks him to perform three tasks, the last of which is to recognize his wife from her nine identical sisters. He is also successful. Soon after, the pair escapes from the Glass Mountain (ATU 313, "The Magic Flight") and returns home.
Eastern Europe In a Polish tale by A. J. Gliński,
O nahajce wykonajce, butachsamoskokach, czapce niewidce, i ogórze miedzianej ("The Princess of The Brazen Mountain"), the hero is a prince who steals the titular princess's pair of wings and proposes to her. On their wedding day, she is given back the wings and flies back to the Brazen Mountain. In a tale collected by
Francis Hindes Groome (
The Witch) from a Polish-Gypsy source, the prince dreams of a place where lovely maidens were bathing. He decides to travel the world to find this place. He does so and hides the wings of the youngest maiden. After his wife escapes, he follows her to her family's home and must work for her sorcerous mother. In the Russian folktale
Yelena the Wise, the titular princess and her maid, both with wings, were imprisoned by a six-headed serpent until Ivan, the soldier, accidentally released them. Ivan informs the six-headed serpent of her escape, and the monster says the princess is cunning. Hot on her trail, he uses a flying carpet to reach a beautiful garden with a pond. Soon after, Yelena and her maid arrive and take off their wings to bathe. In a
Wallachian tale collected by Arthur and Albert Schott,
Der verstoßene Sohn, a youth shoots a raven, which falls in the snow. The striking image makes the boy long for a bride "of white skin, red cheeks and hair black as a raven's feathers". An old man tells him of such beauty: three "Waldjungfrauen" ("forest-maidens") will come to bathe in the lake, and he must secure the crown of one of them. He fails twice, but succeeds in his third attempt. The youth and the forest maiden live together for many years; she bears him two sons, but during a village celebration, she asks for her crown back. When she puts on her head, she begins to ascend in flight with their two children and asks her husband to find them. In a Ukrainian tale from
Bukovina, titled "Жінка, що мала крила" ("The Woman Who Had Wings"), a youth named Petryk lives with his father and hunts in the woods. One day, he stops to rest by a meadow and sees three winged maidens descend from the skies, take off their wings to dance in the meadow, and fly back to the skies. Petryk tells his father he fell in love with the winged maiden. His father advises him to go to the meadow early, dig out a hole to hide in, and wait for the maidens to come; when they doff their wings, Petryk is to steal the pair that belongs to the youngest of them - the one that Petryk fell in love with. Petryk follows his father's advice and fetches her wings, while her companions fly away to the skies. Petryk takes her wings home and locks them up in a chest. The winged maiden marries Petryk and gives birth to a son. Some time later, during a wedding celebration in the village, the winged maiden dances and impresses the crowd, and says she can dance even better if she has her wings. The guests accost Petryk and ask him to bring his wife's wings. He relents and gives his wife the wings; she puts them on, dances, and grabs her son to fly away from the village. Petryk begins to search for his wife and son. After wearing out some pairs of shoes, he finds three brothers quarreling over their father's inheritance, an invisible cap, a pair of boots, and a banyak. He uses the boots to reach his wife's hut in a distant forest, and meets his son Mykhailo just outside his mother's hut.
Greece Von Hahn also collected similar stories from
Ioannina and
Zagori, and called the swan maiden-like character "Elfin".
Asia In a tale collected from a
Dagur source, in China, a man tells his three sons of a dream he had: a white horse that appeared, circled the sun, and vanished into the sea. His sons decide to find this horse. The youngest succeeds in capturing the horse, but it says it will feel lonely away from its home, so the horse decides to bring one of his sisters with him. The youth and the horse await at the beach for the arrival of ten fairies, who take off their clothes to play in the sea. Soon enough, the youth seizes the clothing of the youngest. In a tale collected in the
Konkani language,
The Bird Princess and the Boy, a king with seven sons asks them a question: who are they most afraid of? The older six boys answer: "the king", which pleases him. When the youngest says he most fears God, the king whips him eight times and abandons him in the forest. The boy wanders about and reaches an old lady's cottage. He works as a goatherd and is warned not to go beyond the garden. He disobeys and sees a lake where two princesses are bathing, their dresses that allow them to fly cast off nearby. He steals the dress of one of them, but the maiden regains it. On the second day, he manages to steal the clothing of the second one and hide beneath the house floor. A king dies, and three elephants carry the crown to the boy. He marries the flying princess. When the old lady dies, the princess finds the magical clothing and flies back to her kingdom. On his way there, the boy rescues frogs, mongooses, and flies, whose help he uses to fulfill three tasks before winning back his wife. In a tale from the
Jibbali language of
Oman, translated as
A Man and His Jinn Wife, a man has a plantation of date palms that bear fruit, but someone has stealing them. He consults with a medicine man who advises him to hide among the bushes and wait for three "girl ghosts" who will come, doff their clothes, and take a dip in the well, so he should steal their clothes and choose the one he likes best. The man follows his advice, and on that same night, three girls come to the plantation. He steals the garments of one of them. The trio asks for them back; he returns two of them and keeps the third, making the third girl his wife. He later goes back to his mother's home and asks her to hide his wife's clothes. One day, while the man is away, there is a celebration in the village, and the girl asks her mother-in-law for the garments back so she can dance with the women, but she refuses. The local ruler orders her to fetch the garments, which she does; the girl puts them on and flies away. As her son returns home, the woman tries to fool her son into believing his wife died, but relents and tells him the truth. The man consults with the medicine man again, who tells him to prepare three she-camels (white, red, and black), and feed them for three years. The man also marries his three sisters to three jinn brothers-in-law, then sets out towards the sunrise in search of his wife. He passes by the houses of his three brothers-in-law and gains from each of them a tuft of hair for him to burn and summon them in case he needs any help. Finally, he reaches his wife's village in the land of the jinn and meets her. She is surprised to see him there and bids him return; otherwise, her family will kill him, but he insists on staying, so she hides her human husband. The jinn girl tricks her father into making a vow to protect her, and she introduces them to each other. The man declares he will only leave the land of jinn with his wife, and his father-in-law orders him on three tasks: to drink up a whole lagoon, carry up a mountain a goblet of oil and not spill any drop, and lastly eat up three camels. The man burns the tufts of hair from his brothers-in-law, who come to his aid and fulfill the tasks for him. At last, the man returns home with his jinn wife.
Africa In an Algerian tale,
La Djnoun et le Taleb, the
taleb Ahmed ben Abdallah arrives at the edge of a lake and sees a beautiful
Djnoun bathing in the water. He soon notices the "dove-skin" of the maiden and hides it. They marry and raise a family with several children. One day, one of their children finds their mother's magical garment and delivers it to her.
America North America In a tale collected from the
Sahaptin, a boy becomes poor. Later, he plays cards with a Black storekeeper. The boy wins the Black man's store and livestock. He then bets himself: if he loses, he becomes the boy's servant. The Black man wins back the store and the livestock,
and the boy as his servant, but the Black man dismisses him and tells the boy to go to a place across the river. An old woman stops him from crossing the river and tries to help the boy by "ask[ing] different things": the dishes, the spoons, the cat, the rooster and the geese. The woman translates what the geese have informed: the boy must seek some bathing maidens and secure the "blue-green garters" of the last bathing girl. J. Alden Mason collected a tale from the
Uintah Utes from
Whiterocks, Utah, with the title ''Nṍwintc's adventure with the Bird-Girls and their people''. In this tale, a man named Nṍwintc wanders in the wilderness and tries to hunt a deer, but the animal pleads for its life and tells the hunter about a nearby lake where two women are bathing. Nṍwintc goes to verify the deer's story and finds two women "that looked something like birds", one yellow, the other green, and steals their garments. Both women want their garments back, and Nṍwintc returns them. They play and frolic for the night, then go to sleep, but, since the women pretend to be asleep, they sneak off in the dead of night. The next morning, Nṍwintc goes after them; on the way, he meets some boys who give him eagle-feathers and a veil that grants invisibility. Nṍwintc first meets the green girl and her family, who want to get rid of him and impose trials on him. The human hunter prevails, marries the green girl, and they have a daughter. Nṍwintc, however, wants to visit the yellow girl and meets her family, and a similar event happens to him. Nṍwintc also marries the yellow girl, and they have two sons. Eventually, both families meet. Anthropologist
Robert H. Lowie collected a tale from the
Shoshone with the title
The Supernatural Wife: a human hunter (Ute) tries to kill a deer, but the animal pleads for its life and directs the hunter to a lake where two women are bathing, one with a red dress, and the other with a white dress. The human hunter meets the maiden in white garments, and she gives him a ring. They lie together for the night, and the next morning, the couple finds themselves in a nice house. A white man sees the house and the woman and reports to the town governor, who conspires with the white man to kill the Ute and take his house and his wife. The governor, then, imposes impossible tasks on the Ute hunter: to get the blood of a soldier, the ''yaɣa'pwa'tu'' (tears of the birds), and to bathe in boiling water. With his wife's help, he triumphs over the governor. However, one day, the woman asks her Ute husband not to call her "Piñon-cones-on-the-ground-woman", but the man forgets and calls her that. She disappears the next morning, and he goes after her. On the road, he steals three objects from two girls and a boy: a club, a woman's leggings, and a hat - all sent by his wife. He finds his wife at her mother's house, and his mother-in-law forces him to do chores. The woman, however, convinces her Ute husband to escape from the house.
Central America In a Jamaican tale,
Jack and the Devil Errant, the protagonist Jack loses a bet against the titular Devil Errant and is ordered to find him in three months. An older man helps him by saying that the Devil Errant's three daughters will come to bathe in a lake, but he should steal only the clothing of the youngest. In another Jamaican tale, with a heavy etiological bent and possibly starring the legendary trickster hero
Anansi, the protagonist, a young man, defeats a "headman" (an African king), and the youth's nurse warns him that the king may be planning a trap. The nurse, then, advises the youth that he should take "the river-road" and reach a stream where the king's youngest daughter will be bathing. He steals the clothing twice: the first time, the youth lies that a thief was nearby; the second time, that a gust of wind blew them away. A tale was collected in 1997 from a 65-year-old Belizean storyteller, Ms. Violet Wade, that focuses on the maiden's father's backstory. In this story,
Green Seal, an orphaned prince becomes king, rescues a princess, and marries her. Years later, they have three daughters (one of whom is Green Seal), to whom the king, a wizard, teaches magic. The three maidens fly to a river to bathe, and a poor boy, Jack, steals Green Seal's clothes. They agree to marry, but first, Jack must perform tasks for her father. ==The celestial maiden or heavenly bride==