Scholarship acknowledges that the character of the "magic bird with glowing feathers" or with the golden plumage is known in the folklore of many peoples around the world, such as Russian “zhar-ptica”, Slovak “fire bird” and Armenian "Kush-Pari". It has been noted that the tale "is told in Middle East and in Europe", but its variants are present in traditions from the world over, including India, Indonesia and Central Africa, as well as North Africa, North, Central and South America. Swedish folktale collectors
George Stephens and
Gunnar Olof Hyltén-Cavallius suggested an Eastern origin for the story.
Literary history Scholars
Stith Thompson,
Johannes Bolte and
Jiří Polívka traced a long literary history of the tale type: an ancient version is attested in
The Arabian Nights. A story titled
Sagan af Artus Fagra is reported to contain a tale of three brothers, Carolo, Vilhiamo and Arturo of the Fagra clan, sons of the King of the Angles, who depart to India on a quest for the Phoenix bird to heal their father. It was published in an
Icelandic
manuscript of the 14th century. Swedish folktale collectors
George Stephens and
Gunnar Olof Hyltén-Cavallius listed Danish tale
Kong Edvard och Prints Artus, collected in 1816, as a story related to
Sagan of Artus Fagra. Dutch scholarship states that a Flemish medieval manuscript from the 11th century, ''
, is an ancestor of the ATU 550 tale type. In that vein, folklorist Joseph Jacobs also suggested the romance of Walewein'' as predecessor to "The Golden Bird" tale, albeit in regards to
an Irish variant of the type. Scholars
Willem de Blécourt and Suzanne Magnanini indicate as a literary version a tale written by Lorenzo Selva, in his
Metamorfosi: an illegitimate son of a king searches for the
Pistis, a plant with healing powers. Later, he is forced to seek the maiden Agape, a foreign princess from a distant land, and a winged horse to finish the quest. An almost immediate predecessor to the Grimms' tale was published in 1787, in an anonymous compilation of fairy tales. In this story,
Der treue Fuchs ("The loyal fox"), the youngest son of King Romwald, Prince Nanell, shares his food with a fox and the animal helps him acquire the Phoenix bird, the "bunte Pferdchen" ("colored horse") and the beautiful Trako Maid. The publisher was later identified as Wilhelm Christoph Günther (
de).
Oral versions Europe France A French version, collected by
Paul Sébillot in
Littérature orale de la Haute-Bretagne, is called ''Le Merle d'or
(The Golden Blackbird). Andrew Lang included that variant in The Green Fairy Book (1892). In The Golden Blackbird'', the gardener's son set out because the doctors have prescribed the golden blackbird for their ill father. The two older brothers are lured into the inn without any warning, and the youngest meets the talking hare that aids him only after he passes it by. The horse is featured only as a purchase, and he did not have to perform two tasks to win the Porcelain Maiden, the princess figure. Also, the hare is not transformed at the end of the tale. Another version, collected by
François-Marie Luzel, is called
Princess Marcassa and the Dreadaine Bird. There, the sick man is a king rather than a gardener, and the animal - a white fox in this variant - isn't the brother of the princess, but the
soul of a poor old man whom the prince, after being robbed by his older brothers, buries with the last of his money. The prince, while stealing the bird, impregnates the princess as she sleeps, and it's the child's insistence on finding his father which makes the princess follow him and reveal the truth.
Ireland An Irish variant of the type, published in 1936 (
Le roi magicien sous la terre), seems to contain the Celtic motif of "the journey to the Other World".
Southern Europe Galician ethnographer published a Galician tale titled
O Páxaro de Ouro, wherein the king owns an orchard where there is a tree with red Portuguese apples that are stolen by the titular golden bird. He is helped by a fox and completes the quest by obtaining a golden horse and a princess with golden hair. The "Istituto centrale per i beni sonori ed audiovisivi" ("Central Institute of Sound and Audiovisual Heritage") promoted research and registration throughout the Italian territory between the years 1968–1969 and 1972. In 1975 the Institute published a catalog edited by and Liliana Serafini reported 13 variants of type 550 across Italian sources, under the name ''La Ricerca dell'Uccello d'Oro''. Author
Wentworth Webster published two Basque tales: he summarized one wherein the youngest of three princes obtains the water of life to heal his father, a magic horse and a bird. In another, titled
The White Blackbird, the third prince quests for a white blackbird to cure his blind father, the king, as well as a young lady from the king's house and a very beautiful horse.
Germany Folklorist
Jeremiah Curtin noted that the Russian, Slavic and German variants are many, such as
Die drei Gärtnerssöhne ("The gardener's three sons"); or
Der Goldvogel, das Goldpferd und die Prinzeßin, by German theologue Johann Andreas Christian Löhr. In the Plattdeutsche (
Low German) variant collected by
Wilhelm Wisser,
Vagel Fenus, the protagonist searches for the bird Fenus because his father dreamt that it could restore his health, while in the tale
De gollen Vagel, the tale begins with the usual vigil at the garden to protect the tree of golden apples. In a variant from
Flensburg,
Guldfuglen ("Goldbird"), the gardener's youngest son, with the help of a fox, searches for the White
Hart and the "White Maiden" ("hivde Jomfru"). In a dialectal German tale from
Grabatz,
Banat, collected from informant Margarete Birkenheuer with the title
Die Goldent ("The Golden Duck"), a king becomes ill and has a dream about the feather from the golden bird (a duck) that can cure his eyes. The king's youngest son begins his quest for the golden duck and finds its nest with silver eggs. He goes to steal the bird when the animal honks to alert its master, a giant, who comes to stop the theft. The giant sends the prince for a stallion in a stable, but the animal neighs and alerts its master, twelve giants, who send the prince to capture a maiden from her father's garden.
Hungary In a Hungarian tale titled
A csodás szőlőtő ("The Wonderful Grapevine"), three princes ask his father, the king, why one of his eyes laughs while the other cries. This prompts a quest for the king's lost grapevine and, later, for the savage
paripa (horse) from another king and a beautiful princess. In another Hungarian variant translated by Michel Klimo as an alternative version of ''L'Oiseau de Feu'', the hero is a king's son who is helped by a wolf. In his quest, the prince gets the golden-feathered bird, a golden-maned horse from the seven-headed dragon, and the golden-haired princess from the twelve-headed dragon.
Poland In a Polish variant,
About Jan the Prince, the fabled bird is named "The Flamebird". The tale was originally collected by Antoni Josef Glinski, with the title
O Janie królewiczu, żar-ptaku i o wilku wiatrolocie ("About Jan the Prince, the Flamebird and the Wind-like Wolf"). With the help of the wind-wolf, Prince Jan takes part in a quest for the Flamebird, a golden-maned steed and Princess Wonderface.
South Slavic In a
Yugoslavian variant,
The Little Lame Fox, Janko, the naive but good-hearted youngest son of a farmer, is helped by a fox in his quest for the Golden Apple-Tree, the Golden Horse, the Golden Cradle and the Golden Maiden. The Golden Maiden, a princess herself, insists that she will marry Janko, for his good and brave heart.
Slovakia In a
Slovak tale
Popelvár, the foolish hero gets the bird for his father, the king, but he is killed by his brothers, who also take his wife, princess Sipsindilona. In this tale, the princess shows more agency than other heroines and tries to find a way back to her beloved on her own terms.
Czech Republic In a
Czech tale collected by
Karel Jaromír Erben,
Ptak Ohnivák a Liška Ryška ("The Firebird and the Red Fox"), the youngest prince is helped by a red fox in his quest for the Ohnivák, the horse Zlatohřivák and the maiden Zlatovláska ("Golden-Hair"). He also published the tale in the Czech almanac
Máj, and even compared it to the German tale by the Grimms.
Bulgaria In a
Bulgarian variant, "Златното птиче" ("The Golden Bird"), the king orders his sons to guard his prized golden apple-tree from the nocturnal thief. The youngest prince discovers it is a bird with "fiery-like, luminous feathers". The kings sends his sons to look for the bird: the two elders give up on the quest as soon as they begin, while the youngest meets an old man who helps him. The prince gets the bird and a flying horse as part of the quest, and marries the daughter of the king who owns the golden bird.
Udmurt people In a tale from the
Udmurt people published by folklorist
Nadezhda Kralina with the title "Дочь хозяина мира" ("The Daughter of the Lord of the World"), a poor man has three sons and tasks them with watching the crops against a nocturnal thief. The elder two fail, but the youngest, Petir, discovers a bird of dazzling beauty and golden plumage. They go on a journey and meet a man on the road; the elder two are rude to him and the old man sends them to their deaths at the hands of a bear and a wolf. The youngest is kind and the old man gives him a flying carpet. Petir, then, takes part in a chain of quests for the golden bird from the lord of the air, the golden-maned horse from the lord of the earth, the golden-scaled perch from the lord of the water, and the daughter of the lord of the world. The tale was also translated into
Hungarian with the title
A világgazda lánya ("The Daughter of the Lord of the World"), and sourced from the Votjak (another designation for the Udmurt people).
Slovenia In a
Slovenian variant published by author and linguist with the title
Zlata tica ("Golden Bird"), the hero is the youngest of three princes. He is helped by a bear (
Slovenian:
medved) and quests for the titular golden bird, a horse "unlike any other in nine realms" and a mermaid (Slovenian:
morsko deklico; 'maiden from the sea'). The tale is considered to be the earliest appearance in print of the tale type in Slovenia.
Scandinavian Variants from Scandinavia countries have been attested in the works of
Svend Grundtvig (Danish variant "The Golden Bird" or
Guldfuglen) and
Peter Asbjornsen (Norwegian variant "The Golden Bird" or
Gullfuglen). According to scholar 's
The Types of the Norwegian Folktale, tale type 550, known in Norway as
Gullfuglen, registers 25 variants across Norwegian sources.
Baltic Countries Lithuania August Leskien collected variants from
Lithuania, where the wolf is the helper, akin to Slavic variants:
Vom Dummbart und dem Wolf, der sein Freund war. In this tale, a blind king has an orchard with a golden-apple tree. A luminous bird steals the apples and the youngest son, a fool, goes after it and takes part in a quest for a white horse and a princess who has never set eyes on any man. In another Lithuanian tale by Leskian and Brugmann, also titled
Von dem Dummbart und dem Wolf, der sein Freund war, the apples are made of diamond and the thieving bird is a falcon. The foolish youngest son gets the bird, a fine horse and a princess of great beauty.
Latvia In a
Latvian variant collected in 1877 by , "одарѣ раскрасавицѣ царевић и братѣдуракѣ съ его помощниками" ("The talented princes, the foolish brother and his helpers"), the king sets a deadline for his three sons: one year from now, they must capture and bring him the golden bird that ate his golden apples. The youngest son is the only one that soldiers on, and eventually captures the bird, two dogs, a steed and a princess. Fricis Brīvzemnieks, in the same book, gave an abridged summary of two other variants: in one, the prince abducts a princess with golden hair, eyes like dew and fingernails like diamonds, and in the other, when the prince captures the golden bird, it uses its power to revive the older brothers who were petrified.
Armenia Armenian scholarship reports at least 60 variants of tale type ATU 550 in Armenian publications.
Azerbaijan In an Azeri tale titled "Соловей Хазарандастана" (Azeri: "һазарандастан бұлбүлү", "Hazarandastan bülbülü"; English: "The Nightingale of Khazarandastan"), a padishah has a beautiful garden. One day, however, some visitors compliment the garden, but say it lacks Bili-Bilgeis Khanum, a rose of Khazarandastan and the nightingale of Khazarandastan, and the horse Suleimani-ereb. Hearing their conversation, the padishah decides to send his three sons to quest for the objects. The elder princes fail and end up in heavy debts in two cities, while the youngest prince finds the rose and the nightingale, tames the horse by uttering the name of prophet Solomon, and defeats Bili-Bilgeis Khanum in battle to win her over. The young prince takes the four objects with him and pays his brothers' debts. In gratitude, the elder brothers do not want to deal with their father, since they failed the quest, and decide to steal the credit: they tie his brother's feet and arms and throw him in a well, then take the rose, the nightingale and the Khanum with them, and leave the horse behind, since it recognizes the younger brother as its master.
Caucasus Region In a variant from the
Karachay-Balkars with the title "Золотая птица" ("Golden Bird"), the titular golden bird steals magic apples from the king's garden that grant youth and restore vitality. For three years, the king orders his three sons to guard the tree. On the third year, the youngest prince discovers the bird. With the help of a wolf, he then takes part in a quest for the golden-maned horse of the Earth Khan and a goldfish from the lake of Khan Dadiyana. In a tale from the
Nogais titled "Золотая птица" ("Golden Bird"), an old man has three sons and an apple tree in his garden. Someone creeps into his garden and steals the golden apples from the tree, so he orders his sons to stand guard on the garden. The elder two fail, but the youngest, taken to be a fool by his elders, discovers the golden bird. With the help of a wolf, he also acquires a gray horse with golden mane and liberates a golden-haired maiden from the many-headed azdahas.
Asia Syria In a
Syrian tale collected by Uwe Kuhr with the title
Der Falke ("The Falcon"), a king has two sons named Saif ad-Din and Baha ad-Din by his first wife, and a son named Aladdin by his Black concubine. He also has a beautiful tree in his garden, with leaves of gold, silver and diamonds that are stolen by a giant falcon. The three sons stand guard on the tree, but only Aladdin discovers the falcon. The king then sends them after the bird. Aladdin rescues a snake that becomes a girl and offers him guidance in his quest: for the bird from the Hall of Birds of Prey, for the flying horse of the giant demons, for the all-crushing sword that vanquishes enemies, and for princess Fatima, taken by the ghouls. In an Arab tale collected by
Enno Littmann from a Syrian source and translated to German language with the title
Die Geschichte von dem Vogel mit der Feder ("The Story of the Bird with the Feather"), a king has three sons, ‘Adschîb, Gharîb and Kasîm. One day, the king is sitting on his throne room when a bird flies in, picks up a hair of his beard and flies away. The bird returns twice again, but on the third time, the king manages to catch a gold feather from the bird's tail. He then announces he wishes to have the bird and sends his sons after it. The elder two princes stop by a crossroads and leave their quest, while Kasîm journeys on. With the help of a demon, prince Kasîm reaches the garden where the gold bird is, inside a cage. He tries to capture the bird, but its owner, a king, is alerted of the attempted theft and sends Kasîm for the Rennpferd (a racehorse). To get the Racehorse, which belongs to another king, Kasîm has to obtain a pomegranate in such-and-such a garden from another monarch. The king who owns the garden promises to give Kasîm two pomegranates in exchange for the daughter of the Jewish king, princess Badî‘at el-Husn wal-Dschamâl. After stealing the princess and obtaining the objects, with the demon taking their forms to trick the monarchs, Kasîm also rescues two captive princesses from their demonic captors in an underground lair, then returns to free his brothers from servitude and is betrayed by them. Due to this, the Jewish princess transforms into a Black slave, the bird's feathers lose their luster and turn white, the pomegranates turn black, and the race horse becomes a lame horse ("Klepper", in Littmann's translation).
South Asia In an Indian variant,
In Search of a Dream, the youngest prince quests for an emerald bird, because his father, the king, had a dream about a beautiful garden, with a tree in it where the bird was perched. Apart from this tale, Indian scholar
A. K. Ramanujan pointed the existence of twenty-seven variants collected from all over India.
North Asia In a
Tatar tale collected in
Tobolsk,
Der den Vogel suchende Fürstensohn ("The Prince's Son that seeks the bird") and published in
Vasily Radlov's collection, the prince's youngest son watches his father's house at night and finds a bird. Soon, he travels to capture the bird and bring it home. With the help of a wolf, he later steals seven wonderful horses and a golden
cithara from two different foreign princes and finally abducts a princess from a fourth realm. In a tale from a
Shor teller, titled "ПТИЦА СЧАСТЬЯ" ("The Bird of Good Fortune"), a rich man has three sons, the youngest named Alyg Ool. Alyg Ool is considered a fool and has slept by the fireplace so many years his skin is full of soot. One day, the father orders his sons to stand guard at their crops and shoo away the birds. Near the crops stands a beautiful
birch tree. They notice that the birch leaves are being eaten by something, so they spend the next three nights on a vigil. The elder two fail, but Alyg Ool, the youngest, discovers a golden bird. He decides to pluck a feather from its body, instead of shooting it, and chases after it. To help him, he buys a horse. He follows the bird to the kingdom of a kaan. Alyg Ool tries to take the bird, but he accidentally sounds the bells and alerts the kaan. The kaan wakes up and asks Alyg Ool to bring him a maiden named Altyn Tarak.
Central Asia Tajik folklorist published a
Tajik tale titled "ХАСАН И ВОЛК" ("Hasan and the Wolf"). In this tale, the king is quite sad, until he is convinced to visit other cities and their gardens. He learns that on the fortieth garden, a wondrous tree produces a flower and a fruit, but they are stolen by a bird. He asks his son Hasan to stand guard on the tree and bring him the flower, the fruit and the bird. Hasan stands guard on three nights, and on the third discovers the bird. He shoots at it and it drops a feather with something writing on it. He is approached by a wolf, who helps him obtain the beautiful daughter of another padishah, and the yellow horse that belongs to a
div. In an
Uzbek variant, "Сладкоголосый соловей" ("The Nightingale with the Sweet Voice"), a cruel sheik or shah orders the construction of a splendid tree made of gold and jewels he collected all his life. After it is made, some nocturnal thief begins to steal pieces of the tree. The shah's three sons decide to hold a night watch. Only the youngest discovers the culprit: a bird of immense beauty - its beak of ruby, the feathers of pearls and coral, and with a sweet-sounding voice. The shah decides that whoever brings the bird shall inherit the throne. A monkey is the helper in this variant, and the prince also quests for a beautiful princess that sleeps in a golden ark, and a horse named Kara Kaldyrgotsch from magician Orsaky, who lives in the Isle of Diamonds.
East Asia In a
Mongolian tale translated as
Die goldenen Äpfel ("The Golden Apples"), a prince plants apple trees in his garden, and they wield beautiful apples. One year, however, the apples begin to disappear, and the prince asks his three sons to investigate into the matter. The youngest brother discovers that, at night, a rainbow appears and some birds fly about to eat the apples. The third son snatches a feather and shows it to his father, who proclaims that whoever brings him the bird shall inherit his throne. The third son begins the quest: he sacrifices his horse to feed a wolf who becomes his mount and guide, and eventually steals a horse from the chaan and rescues one of the Prince Olgör's daughters from an unwanted marriage. At the end of the tale, the wolf asks for a heavy golden axe to be made and to be used on him. The prince's third son, reluctantly, kills the wolf, but the animal changes back into his original human form.
Africa May Augusta Klipple's 1938 study locates variants of type 550 in Africa among the Swahili and in Kordofan.
North Africa In a North African tale translated from Arabic to Russian with the title "Молодой принц" ("Young Prince"), a king owns a garden with a magic tree that yields golden apples, but which are stolen every night. Thus, the king stands guard all night and discovers the culprit: a bird with golden plumage. The following morning, the king orders his sons to capture the bird: the princes lie in wait on different nights, but the elder two fail due to falling asleep, and the youngest manages to steal a single feather. The king guards the feather in a chest, forgetting about it for months, until he opens the chest again. He then orders his sons to fetch him the bird. The three princes go on a quest and part ways at a crossroads. The youngest prince walks into a road and suddenly his horse falls ill and dies, and a wolf appears to offer its help, explaining that the crossroads had an inscription: on one way, the rider would die, on the other, their mount. The prince agrees with the wolf's help and takes part in a chain of quests: for the fiery-golden bird, locked in a golden cage in a tree of gems, for a horse with golden teeth as quick as lightning, and for a princess more beautiful than the Moon who is located beyond seven seas, seven mountains and seven deserts.
Northeast Africa German ethnologue
Leo Frobenius collected a tale from
Kordofan with the title
Vogel, Pferd, Büchse ("The Bird, The Horse, The Box"): a Melik has a beautiful tree in the garden that yields seven
apricot-like fruits. However, one night, a bird comes and takes one of the seven fruits, until there it none. The youngest son offers to stand guard on the tree the next night and shoot at the bird, which leaves a feather. The youth takes the feather and shows his father, who wants the bird for himself. The three sons go on a quest for the bird; the two elders brothers stop at a crossroads, read the signposts and cease their questing. The youngest son continues on his quest, with the help of an Aldjann: he obtains a bird, a horse that can be summoned everywhere by simpling rubbing some hairs from his mane, and a box that holds another king's servants, drummers and trumpeters. When he gets the box, the prince opens it and a large retinue comes out. The Aldjann helps the prince put everyone inside again and close the box. The tale was translated to Russian as "Птица, конь и ларец" ("Bird, Horse and Stall"), sourced from the
Nubian people.
Central Africa In a variant from
Congo,
The Tale of the Golden Birds, a flock of golden-coloured Golden Birds fly over the kraal, and the local king sends his 11 sons after them. During their long journey, every one of the brothers decide to settle in a local village, until there is only one brother left to continue their quest. He arrives at the city of the Golden Birds, whose people demand the Magic Drum. In turn, the people who have the drum ask for the Golden Queen from the city that rules over all the land and who shines like the sun. The youngest gets the prizes and visits his brothers before returning to their father. His brothers, however, kill him and take the birds, the drum and the woman to their father. A little dog, which the Golden Queen took with her, resurrects the slain brother, who goes to his home city and reveals his brothers' treachery.
Eastern Africa German linguist published a
Swahili tale titled
Kisa cha binti Matlai Shems (
German: "Die Geschichte von Fräulein Matlai Shems"): a king with six sons by his official wife and a seventh by a concubine sees a bird with golden wings and legs of mother-of-pearl. The king wants the bird for himself and sends his seven sons after him. The six elders begin their quest, but cease midway, for they believe their father lost his mind. Only the youngest soldiers on, and obtains the bird, a Sword of Thunder and princess Matlai Shems ('East, the place where the Sun rises'). Büttner, on a footnote, supposed that the tale was a fragment of a larger story. In an Eastern African variant, "История Маталаи Шамси, принцессы Заря" ("The Story of Matalai Shamsi, Princess of the Dawn"), a king and his seven sons are sitting in the garden, when a beautiful luminous bird passes by them. The king wants his sons to get the bird for him and sends them. Six of them decide to give up the quest partway through, while their youngest half-brother, Shamsudini, vows to fulfil their father's request. He meets a
djinn on his way who becomes his helper after getting him food. Shamsudini embarks on a quest for the Thunder-Sword and Matalai Shamsi, the "Princess Sunrise". The story was first published by Dutch linguist
Jan Knappert with the title ''The Story of Bibi Matalai Shamsi, 'Princess Sunrise''', and sourced as from the
Swahili. German linguist published another Swahili tale titled
Msiwanda ('The lastborn son'). In this tale, a king has seven sons: Salem, Sleman, Nasur, Said, Hemedi, Abdallah and Msiwanda ('The last born son'). One day, a beautiful bird perches on a tree in their garden and the king marvels at the bird, wanting to have it for himself. He sends his seven sons after the bird. On the journey, each of them eventually gives up and stops by every city on the way. Only Msiwanda continues the journey, and obtains the bird, the Thunder Sword, the Drum that sounds seven times louder and a woman named Binti Sanabu.
Western Africa In a tale from the Ndowe people of
Equatorial Guinea,
Los tres reyes ("The Three Kings"), there are three kings, one that owns an orchard, the second a golden bird and the third a golden horse. The golden bird flies over to the first king's orchard to eat fruits, which greatly inconveniences the first king. So he announces that whoever brings him the bird, shall marry his daughter. A youth leaves his village and walks to the second king to get the bird, which he brings to the first king, and later to the third king to get golden horse. However, the youth has a last task from the first king: raze a mountain to the ground. With the help of an old woman, the youth fulfills the task and marries the princess. He then prepares to go back to his village with the bird, the horse, and his wife, but the old woman appears again to warn him that his brothers will trick him and steal his possessions and his wife. In another tale from the Ndowe people with the title
Los cuatro reyes ("The Four Kings"), there live four kings, one with a golden apple tree, another that owns a golden bird, a third a golden horse, and the fourth has a golden daughter. The son of the first king watches over the golden apple tree for the thieving golden bird, and later goes on a quest for the golden horse and the fourth king's golden daughter, with the help of a leopard.
Americas Canada A similar variant fairy tale of French-Canadian origin is
The Golden Phoenix collected by
Marius Barbeau, and retold by
Michael Hornyansky. It follows the hero Petit Jean, the youngest son of the King, who discovers the thief of his father's golden apple to be a golden Phoenix, a legendary bird. Other differences include a battle with 3 mythical beasts, a Sultan's game of hide-and-seek and his marriage with the Sultan's beautiful daughter.
United States Variants have been recorded from American regions and states: a version named
The Golden Duck from
West Virginia; a tale ''The King's Golden Apple Tree'', from
Kentucky; a version from the American Southwest. In a French-Missourian variant, ''L'Zouéseau d'Or'' ("The Golden Bird"), the youngest prince, P'tit Jean (Little John) finds out that the golden bird is the thief from his father's garden. He then goes on a quest for a golden-maned horse and the Prettiest Princess in the World, with the help of a fox. At the end of the tale, the fox is revealed to be the princess's brother.
Mexico J. Alden Mason collected a variant from Mexico, titled
Cuento del Pájaro del Dulce Canto (English: "The Bird of the Sweet Song").
Brazil In a
Brazilian variant collected by
Sílvio Romero in Sergipe,
A Raposinha (English: "The little fox"), a prince stops three men from beating a dead person, and in gratitude is helped by a fox in his search for a parrot from the Kingdom of Parrots as a cure for the king's blindness. Author published a
Portuguese Brazilian tale titled
O Besouro de Ouro ("The Golden Beetle"): king Hostiaf VI loses his sight after he walks among some thorns, and his youngest son, Julião, goes on a quest for a remedy to cure him. With the help of the titular Golden Beetle (which is the soul of a dead man), he takes part on a chain of quests: the cure for his father is the blood of a feeble-looking parrot in the kingdom of Parrots; to get the parrot, he is tasked with getting a sword from the Kingdom of the Swords; to get the sword, he has to steal the lamest looking horse from the Kingdom of Horses; lastly, to get the horse, he is orders to capture the princess from a neighbouring kingdom. With the Golden Beetle's advice, he brings them all with him, and meets his elder brothers en route to their kingdom. The elder princes, jealous of their cadet's success, throw him in a well and take the parrot, the sword, the horse and the princess with them.
Literary versions French author
Edouard Laboulaye included a literary version named
The Three Wonders of the World in his book
Last Fairy Tales: the queen wishes for a magical bird that can rejuvenate people with its song. The youngest prince also acquires the winged horse Griffon and a wife for himself, the princess Fairest of the Fair. Italian author
Luigi Capuana used the motif of the golden-coloured bird stealing the apples in his literary
fiaba ''Le arance d'oro'' ("The Golden Apples"), where a
goldfinch is sent to steal the oranges in the King's orchard. Professor
Jack Zipes states that the tale type inspired Russian poet
Pyotr Pavlovich Yershov to write his fairy tale poem
The Little Humpbacked Horse. The tale begins akin to ATU 530, "The Princess on the Glass Mountain", (hero finds or captures wild horse(s) with magical powers) and continues as ATU 550: the envious Tsar asks the peasant Ivan to bring him the firebird and the beautiful
Tsar-Maid. A literary treatment of the tale exists in
The True Annals of Fairy-Land: The Reign of King Herla, titled
The Golden Bird: with the help of friendly fox, the king's youngest son ventures to seek the Golden Bird, the Golden Horse and a princess, the Beautiful Daughter of the King of the Golden Castle. At the conclusion of the tale, the fox is revealed to be the Princess's brother,
transformed into a
vulpine shape. Czech school teacher Ludmila Tesařová (
cs) published a literary version of the tale, named
Pták Zlatohlav, wherein the knight quests for the golden-headed bird whose marvellous singing can cure an ailing princess. == Adaptations ==