Fairytale Origins: Snow White

Discover the enchanting origins of Snow White like never before with Fairytale Origins: Snow White. Immerse yourself in a captivating journey through the magical world of fairytales as you uncover the untold story of this beloved character. Delve into a richly illustrated narrative that brings to life the charm and wonder of classic folklore. Get ready to be transported to a realm where imagination knows no bounds.

Transcript

Snow White is one of the youngest European fairy tales.

In 1630s Naples Italian author Gian Battista Basile wrote a story about a girl who slept in a glass coffin.

She was killed by her mother who had hit her head too hard with a comb.

Basile's fairy tale collection,

Il pentamerone,

Stories for the little ones,

Was filled with grotesque tales which often made fun of Italian court of the time.

In 1782 popular German fairy tale writer Johann Karl August Musaus published a book called Volkmärchen der Deutschen,

German Folk Tales.

Book included the story called Richilde and it is believed that this story was the inspiration for brother Screamin' story.

Richilde was a proud and a beautiful woman who owned a magical mirror which she had received as a baptizing gift.

She had a step daughter called Blanca,

Referring to the color white.

Each day Richilde would go to her magic mirror asking who is the fairest of them all and each time the mirror would answer you my queen.

On Blanca's 15th birthday the mirror answers to the queen that Blanca is the fairest of them all.

Richilde became outraged.

She ordered poison from her doctor and prepared a gift basket and sent it to Blanca.

Blanca lived in a castle of her own,

Where she had dwarves as her servants.

Dwarves recognized the poison and saved Blanca's life.

Richilde attempted again and again until one day Blanca opened a letter which was filled with poison and she fell into a coma.

Dwarves built a glass coffin and Blanca's body was taken to the castle's crypt.

Handsome prince was on a pilgrimage at the same time.

Prince wakes Blanca with a relic which he brought with him from the holy land.

Prince and Blanca fell in love and together with the dwarves help they started to plan revenge for the queen.

Prince visited the queen's castle and started to flatter her.

Vain queen wanted to marry the young prince.

The queen soon finds out that the prince is not there for her,

But for Blanca.

But together with the help of the dwarves they manage to beat the queen.

The queen thinks that she is going to marry the prince,

But the dwarves have prepared special slippers for her,

Which burn her feet like iron.

Then she has to dance with the prince wearing these slippers and being humiliated.

She was locked into the highest tower to think her evil deeds,

While Blanca and prince lived happily ever after.

Dwarves were most likely inspired by gruesome custom of the 18th century European aristocrat families to collect divergent people.

Tsarist of Russia was even known from organizing a wedding ceremony to one of her little chamber maidens.

Another popular character to appear in fairy tales is the evil stepmother.

We can find her from fairy tales such as Cinderella,

Snow White and Hansel and Gretel.

Stepmothers in the fairy tales are known from trying to turn the life of their stepchildren to living hell.

Here are some methods from the stories of Brothers Grimm how stepmothers have tortured their stepchildren.

Turning into an animal Marrying to a beast Poisoning with an apple Poisoning with a comb Poisoning with a shirt Drowning Burning Abandoning Tempted the forest One of the most famous versions of Snow White is told by Brothers Grimm.

During one beautiful midwinter day when snowflakes were falling from the skies like feathers,

There was a queen sewing by the window.

She hurt her finger to the needle and three drops of blood dropped into the snow.

Queen watched the snow,

Thinking,

I wish I had a child.

Red as blood,

White as snow and black as the wooden frames of my window.

Soon after that she had a baby girl,

Who had lips red as blood,

Skin white as snow and hair black as even wood.

Queen died and the king married again.

New queen was a beautiful and a proud woman and she owned a magical mirror.

Each day she asked,

Mirror,

Mirror on the wall,

Who is the fairest of them all?

And each time the mirror answered,

You,

My queen.

King died and the evil queen treated Snow White as her servant.

One day mirror said that Snow White was the fairest of them all.

Queen got outraged and ordered one of the hunters to bring liver and lungs of Snow White.

Hunter felt sorry for the young princess and helped her to escape.

Snow White hid into the cabin of the seventh horse,

Where she became their servant.

Queen found out she was alive and disguised as a witch.

She gave her a poison apple.

Snow White fell into a coma,

But everyone thought she was dead.

Dwarves built her a glass coffin,

Which they took into the top of a mountain.

The moment handsome prince lifted the coffin to carry it away,

The piece of poisoned apple fell between her lips and princess Snow White was awakened.

Many of the Brothers Grimm fairytales were not orally collected folktales,

Like Brothers wanted people to believe.

Most of them were collected from the books from the library of castle.

And majority of the Grimm fairytales were not even German,

But of Italian or French origin.

When it came to Snow White,

Brothers were honest for once and they admitted that the inspiration for the story came from Musaus Arityute.

The story that inspired Brothers Grimm version came from a fellow German writer,

Albert Ludwig Grimm published his book called Kindermärchen,

Stories for children.

There was a play in the book,

Very similar to Snow White.

In the play,

A stepmother orders two hunters to take Snow White into the woods and kill her.

For the dwarves most likely came from old Germanic myths,

Such as the story of Nibelung and Nordic Edda poems.

In the fairytale,

Dwarves are introduced with repetition.

Who has been sitting in my chair?

One of the dwarves asked.

Who has eaten from my plate?

Second dwarf asked.

Who has eaten my vegetables?

Who has used my fork?

Who has cut with my knife?

Who has drank from my glass?

Snow White as a character in the Brothers Grimm fairytale is kind and obedient.

In the 19th century fairytales,

Noble lady was always good-tempered and good-hearted.

She takes care of the dwarves and becomes their servant.

She cleans,

She cooks for them.

Nature always plays big part in Brothers Grimm fairytales.

Dwarves don't take the glass coffin into a castle or crypt.

Instead they take it into the top of a mountain.

Each night and day one of the dwarves looks after the coffin.

Snow White loves birds,

So there are always birds flying around her as well.

Usually crows,

Downs or owls.

There is an interesting folktale version of Snow White found from Eastern Russia.

In this version of the fairytale,

Evil queen uses group of beggars as her mirror,

Asking them,

Have you ever seen anyone as beautiful as me?

Answer of the beggars does not please the queen.

The baby in that cradle is the most beautiful thing we have ever seen.

Outraged queen orders beggars to leave empty handed.

She takes the baby to the edge of the forest and leaves her there.

One of the beggars,

An older lady,

Finds the baby and adopts her.

Snow White grows to be a beautiful young maiden.

When the old woman dies,

Girl is forced to find a new home for herself.

She finds a beautiful small cabin,

Hidden in the woods.

There she meets eight brothers,

Who promise to treat her as their sister.

Brothers are not dwarves in this version of the story.

They are dragon killers,

And each day they go fight against dragons.

One evening dragon attacks the cabin.

Clever Snow White pours water in the cauldron and drops some heavy stones there.

She invites the dragon to eat with her,

But when the dragon enters inside,

Snow White throws the burning stones to the dragon's mouth and kills it.

Brothers find the dead dragon and they become even more attached to Snow White and the following nights they kill more dragons together.

Stepmother finds out that Snow White is still alive and she sends a poisoned shirt for her.

Snow White puts the shirt on and falls down to the floor.

Brothers believe that she is dead and take her into the forest in a coffin made of gold and glass.

Son of a priest is riding by and sees the beautiful girl.

He steals the coffin and takes it to his bedchamber,

Where he sleeps next to the dead girl.

Son of a priest gets thinner and soon he himself starts to look like a corpse.

He goes to see the local witch,

Who promises to help.

She turns man's home into a banyan,

Which is a Russian sauna.

Room is heated and the poison in the shirt starts to disappear.

Snow White wakes up very dizzy after being asleep for a week.

Son of a priest wants to marry Snow White,

But she cannot agree without talking to her brothers first,

For they are now her guardians.

Brothers are tripped when they find out that Snow White is alive.

Evil queen is on her way,

But the brothers manage to kill her.

Russian Snow White has lots of elements from traditional Slavic folklore tradition.

Unlike her western counterpart,

She is a very active character who does not wait around for her prince to come.

The elements of necrophilia,

Which makes this version very dark.

Brothers who are dragon killers can be seen as an allegory of Russian's ancient past,

Where warriors of distant tribes were sometimes referred as dragons.

This fairy tale was written by a Russian fairy tale author Alexander Pushkin in 1830.

It is believed that he had based his story to the French translation of Brothers Grimm Snow White.

At that time,

Pushkin was a father of small children and was very fond of creating fairy tales for Russian children.

Most famous film adaptation of Snow White was made by Walt Disney in 1937.

Young Walt Disney had ambitious dream to create a full-length animation film.

Hollywood movie industry referred the film as Disney's Folly,

While it was on production.

To get a loan for the film,

Disney had to pledge his own house,

Among other things.

But it was all worth it because Snow White became a huge financial success with 1.

38 million budget,

Bringing 480 million in the box offices worldwide.

Walt Disney's animation was based on Brothers Grimm version of Snow White,

But the biggest difference was that Walt Disney gave individual personality to each of the dwarfs.

They became dark,

Grumpy,

Happy,

Sleepy,

Bashful,

Sneezy and dopey.

There was over 700 animators working on Snow White and over 20 million drawings were made.

Film was a critical success and recommended for both children and adults.

Disney's Snow White is sweet and kind-hearted in her nature,

But she has also a sassy side of her that people often tend to neglect.

This comes out especially in scenes that she shares with Grumpy.

Snow White is also the first official Disney princess in the Disney princess merchandise.

One of the most interesting symbols in Snow White is the apple.

Apple is known as the fruit of wisdom,

And the stories about the poisonous apples have been told as early as in the Bible.

In the Old Testament,

Apples are related to knowledge,

Albeit of different kinds.

In the Song of Solomon,

The apple is linked to ideas of beauty.

In Greek mythology,

Apple was one of the symbols of Aphrodite,

The goddess of love and sensuality.

Apple has also symbolized positivity and optimism and feminine beauty.

And we can connect all these traits to Snow White herself.