Top 10 Gruesome Fairy Tale Origins

[Dante]

10

Pied Piper

In the tale of the Pied Piper, we have a village overrun with rats. A man arrives dressed in clothes of pied (a patchwork of colors) and offers to rid the town of the vermin. The villagers agree to pay a vast sum of money if the piper can do it – and he does. He plays music on his pipe which draws all the rats out of the town. When he returns for payment – the villagers won’t cough up so the Pied Piper decides to rid the town of children too! In most modern variants, the piper draws the children to a cave out of the town and when the townsfolk finally agree to pay up, he sends them back. In the darker original, the piper leads the children to a river where they all drown (except a lame boy who couldn’t keep up). Some modern scholars say that there are connotations of pedophilia in this fairy tale.

 

 

9

Little Red Riding Hood

 

The version of this tale that most of us are familiar with ends with Riding Hood being saved by the woodsman who kills the wicked wolf. But in fact, the original French version (by Charles Perrault) of the tale was not quite so nice. In this version, the little girl is a well bred young lady who is given false instructions by the wolf when she asks the way to her grandmothers. Foolishly riding hood takes the advice of the wolf and ends up being eaten. And here the story ends. There is no woodsman – no grandmother – just a fat wolf and a dead Red Riding Hood. The moral to this story is to not take advice from strangers.

 

8

The Little Mermaid

 

The 1989 version of the Little Mermaid might be better known as “The big whopper!” In the Disney version, the film ends with Ariel the mermaid being changed into a human so she can marry Eric. They marry in a wonderful wedding attended by humans and merpeople. But, in the very first version by Hans Christian Andersen, the mermaid sees the Prince marry a princess and she despairs. She is offered a knife with which to stab the prince to death, but rather than do that she jumps into the sea and dies by turning to froth. Hans Christian Andersen modified the ending slightly to make it more pleasant. In his new ending, instead of dying when turned to froth, she becomes a “daughter of the air” waiting to go to heaven – so, frankly, she is still dead for all intents and purposes.

 

7

Snow White

 

In the tale of snow white that we are all familiar with, the Queen asks a huntsman to kill her and bring her heart back as proof. Instead, the huntsman can’t bring himself to do it and returns with the heart of a boar. Now, fortunately disney hasn’t done too much damage to this tale, but they did leave out one important original element: in the original tale, the Queen actually asks for Snow White’s liver and lungs – which are to be served for dinner that night! Also in the original, Snow White wakes up when she is jostled by the prince’s horse as he carries her back to his castle – not from a magical kiss. What the prince wanted to do with a dead girl’s body I will leave to your imagination. Oh – in the Grimm version, the tale ends with the Queen being forced to dance to death in red hot iron shoes!

 

6

Sleeping Beauty

 

In the original sleeping beauty, the lovely princess is put to sleep when she pricks her finger on a spindle. She sleeps for one hundred years when a prince finally arrives, kisses her, and awakens her. They fall in love, marry, and (surprise surprise) live happily ever after. But alas, the original tale is not so sweet (in fact, you have to read this to believe it.) In the original, the young woman is put to sleep because of a prophesy, rather than a curse. And it isn’t the kiss of a prince which wakes her up: the king seeing her asleep, and rather fancying having a bit, rapes her. After nine months she gives birth to two children (while she is still asleep). One of the children sucks her finger which removes the piece of flax which was keeping her asleep. She wakes up to find herself raped and the mother of two kids.

 

5

Rumpelstiltskin

 

This fair tale is a little different from the others because rather than sanitizing the original, it was modified by the original author to make it more gruesome. In the original tale, Rumpelstiltskin spins straw into gold for a young girl who faces death unless she is able to perform the feat. In return, he asks for her first born child. She agrees – but when the day comes to hand over the kid, she can’t do it. Rumpelstiltskin tells her that he will let her off the bargain if she can guess his name. She overhears him singing his name by a fire and so she guesses it correctly. Rumpelstiltskin, furious, runs away, never to be seen again. But in the updated version, things are a little messier. Rumpelstiltskin is so angry that he drives his right foot deep into the ground. He then grabs his left leg and rips himself in half. Needless to say this kills him.

 

4

Goldilocks and the Three Bears

 

In this heart warming tale, we hear of pretty little goldilocks who finds the house of the three bears. She sneaks inside and eats their food, sits in their chairs, and finally falls asleep on the bed of the littlest bear. When the bears return home they find her asleep – she awakens and escapes out the window in terror. The original tale (which actually only dates to 1837) has two possible variations. In the first, the bears find Goldilocks and rip her apart and eat her. In the second, Goldilocks is actually an old hag who (like the sanitized version) jumps out of a window when the bears wake her up. The story ends by telling us that she either broke her neck in the fall, or was arrested for vagrancy and sent to the “House of Correction”.

 

3

Hansel and Gretel

 

In the widely known version of Hansel and Gretel, we hear of two little children who become lost in the forest, eventually finding their way to a gingerbread house which belongs to a wicked witch. The children end up enslaved for a time as the witch prepares them for eating. They figure their way out and throw the witch in a fire and escape. In an earlier French version of this tale (called The Lost Children), instead of a witch we have a devil. Now the wicked old devil is tricked by the children (in much the same way as Hansel and Gretel) but he works it out and puts together a sawhorse to put one of the children on to bleed (that isn’t an error – he really does). The children pretend not to know how to get on the sawhorse so the devil’s wife demonstrates. While she is lying down the kids slash her throat and escape.

 

2

The Girl Without Hands

 

Frankly, the revised version of this fairy tale is not a great deal better than the original, but there are sufficient differences to include it here. In the new version, a poor man is offered wealth by the devil if he gives him whatever is standing behind his mill. The poor man thinks it is an apple tree and agrees – but it is actually his daughter. The devil tries to take the daughter but can’t – because she is pure, so he threatens to take the father unless the daughter allows her father to chop off her hands. She agrees and the father does the deed. Now – that is not particularly nice, but it is slightly worse in some of the earlier variants in which the young girl chops off her own arms in order to make herself ugly to her brother who is trying to rape her. In another variant, the father chops off the daughter’s hands because she refuses to let him have sex with her.

 

1

Cinderella

 

In the modern Cinderella fairy tale we have the beautiful Cinderella swept off her feet by the prince and her wicked step sisters marrying two lords – with everyone living happily ever after. The fairy tale has its origins way back in the 1st century BC where Strabo’s heroine was actually called Rhodopis, not Cinderella. The story was very similar to the modern one with the exception of the glass slippers and pumpkin coach. But, lurking behind the pretty tale is a more sinister variation by the Grimm brothers: in this version, the nasty step-sisters cut off parts of their own feet in order to fit them into the glass slipper – hoping to fool the prince. The prince is alerted to the trickery by two pigeons who peck out the step sister’s eyes. They end up spending the rest of their lives as blind beggars while Cinderella gets to lounge about in luxury at the prince’s castle.

 

I love how fairy tails stories changes through the years.

[Beast]

Wow, I actually enjoyed reading the old version, lmao

[Cube]

Interesting read.

 

Although the "updated" Rumplestilskin must be either very new, or extremely uncommon.

[martinist]

Interesting stuff, now i want to read the origonal versions. To google I go!

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

Interesting read, though for some peculiar reason the only one to make me feel a little queasy was The Girl Without Hands. Even the updated version.

[Rummy]

I already knew some of these cos my mate did some Grimm related stuff for her final piece of her degree, and I also have a book of all the Grimm's tales. Apparently in Snow White when it says her step mother(dont recall any queen versions as it is) it's actually her natural mother she's just massively vain and callous, but they changed it to make it a bit nicer for the masses.

Also, Grimm's version of Cinderella doesn't have any sort of fairy godmother and all that crap(there's some sort of magic tree, though), and Cinderella is much more of an able young lady(I prefer the Grimm's version cos of it) though her sisters do still chop off their toes and get their eyes pecked out.

[Goafer]

I had heard some of those vairations before. I definitely remember someone (possibly on TV) telling me about the sisters mutilating their own feet. The Pied Piper one rings a bell too, especially the bit about the lame boy.

[Paj!]

Fairy Tales are well known for being warning tales/moral fables, as much as whimsical stories.

 

They left out the part in Sleeping Beauty about ogres and cannibalism. (IIRC)

 

Also, in The Little Mermaid, before she stabs herself, to win the Prince's affection on land, she doesn't just give up her voice. In human form, every step she took caused excruciating pain (like standing on a thousand daggers or something IIRC), and then at one point the court force her to dance at a ball. And she does. And in the end, the Prince doesn't even choose her.

[Ashley]

Not read it as after doing a module about folklore I've come across most of it and yeah it is interesting. While I love Disney it is important to explore the original stories, they're far more fun in different ways.

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

Not read it as after doing a module about folklore I've come across most of it and yeah it is interesting. While I love Disney it is important to explore the original stories, they're far more fun in different ways.

Not to mention scary and repulsive. *shudders*

[Dante]

The Origin of Sleeping Beauty was called "Sun, Moon, and Talia".

 

After the birth of a great king's daughter, Talia, wise men and astrologers cast the child's horoscope and tell the king that Talia would be later endangered by a splinter of flax. To protect his daughter, the father commands that no flax would ever be brought into his house.

 

Years later, Talia sees an old woman spinning flax on a spindle. She asks the woman if she can stretch the flax herself, but as soon as she begins to spin, a splinter of flax goes under her fingernail, and she drops to the ground, apparently dead. Unable to stand the thought of burying his child, the king puts Talia in one of his country estates.

 

Some time later, a different king, hunting in nearby woods, follows his falcon into the house. He finds Talia, tries unsuccessfully to wake her up, and rapes her. Afterwards, he leaves the girl on the bed and returns to his own city.

 

Still deep in sleep, she gives birth to twins (a boy and a girl). One day, the boy cannot find his mother's breast; and instead he begins to suck on Talia's finger and draws the flax splinter out. Talia awakens immediately. She names them "Sun" and "Moon" and lives with them in the house.

 

The king returns and finds Talia is awake - and a mother of twins. However, he is already married. He calls out the names of Talia, Sun and Moon in his sleep, and the queen hears him. She forces the king's secretary to tell all and, with a forged message, brings the children to court. She orders the cook to kill the children and serve them to the king. The cook hides them and cooks two lambs. The queen taunts the king while he eats.

 

Then the queen has Talia brought to court. She commands that a huge fire be lit in the courtyard, and that Talia be thrown into the flames.

 

Talia asks to take off her fine garments first. The queen agrees. Talia undresses and utters screams of grief with each piece of clothing. The king hears Talia's screams. His wife tells him that Talia would be burned and that he had unknowingly eaten his own children.

 

The king commands that his wife, his secretary, and the cook be thrown into the fire instead. The cook explains how he had saved Sun and Moon. The king and Talia marry; and the cook is rewarded with the title of royal chamberlain.

 

The last line of the fairy tale--its moral--is as follows: "Lucky people, so 'tis said, He who has luck may go to bed, And bliss will rain upon his head ."

[Emasher]

I think my parents told me a few of the original versions when I was a kid. Although, the least gruesome ones. I had an english teacher once who talked about some of the others in class. I don't think I've ever heard of "The Girl Without Hands" though, is that more common in Europe?

[Ashley]

Not to mention scary and repulsive. *shudders*

 

You find those scary? Pff. Should read some vagina dentata stories.

 

"There was a Rakshasa's daughter who had teeth in her vagina. She used to live mostly as a tigress and kept ten or twelve tigers with her. When she saw a man, she would turn into a pretty girl, seduce him, cut off his penis, eat it herself and give the rest of his body to her tigers.

 

"One day she met seven brothers in the jungle and married the eldest so that she could sleep with them all. After some time she took the eldest boy to where her tigers lived, made him lie with her, cut off his penis, ate it and gave his body to the tigers.

 

"In the same way, she killed six of the brothers till only the youngest was left. When his turn came, the god who helped him sent him a dream. 'If you go with the girl,' said the god, 'make an iron tube, put it into her vagina and break her teeth.'

 

"The boy did this, and when the tigers came for his body he climbed into a mango tree and made himself very small. The tigers chased him and the girl became very angry. He cursed her, 'let nothing but your face remain!' And so it was: she became a Chamgedri, which eats, excretes, urinates and copulates through one and the same aperture.

 

"One of the mangoes opened and the boy crept inside. A parrot carried off the mango to a Raja's palace. It dropped it, the fruit broke open, the boy emerged, and after various adventures, he married the Raja's daughter."

[Dante]

I think my parents told me a few of the original versions when I was a kid. Although, the least gruesome ones. I had an english teacher once who talked about some of the others in class. I don't think I've ever heard of "The Girl Without Hands" though, is that more common in Europe?

 

I think it wasn't well known because it mention the devil in the story.

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

I did NOT need to see that, Ashley! Curse youuu! X-P

 

Also, is it just me that isn't getting how the "moral" of that Sleeping Beauty story is even a moral?

[Ashley]

I did NOT need to see that, Ashley! Curse youuu! X-P

 

Also, is it just me that isn't getting how the "moral" of that Sleeping Beauty story is even a moral?

 

That was a fairly easy going one :p

 

Don't try and alter yourself for the sake of attracting someone else?

[Dante]

I did NOT need to see that, Ashley! Curse youuu! X-P

 

Also, is it just me that isn't getting how the "moral" of that Sleeping Beauty story is even a moral?

 

You maybe think you're in luck by sleeping with another woman but trouble will fall on your head?

[EEVILMURRAY]

Some more real life amazingly true facts here:

http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=fairytales

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

Some more real life amazingly true facts here:

http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=fairytales

Are you sure those are real?

[EEVILMURRAY]

Oh definitely, they found hieroglyphics and everything proving it.

[Coolness Bears]

Awesome! I prefer the original versions of the tales much darker and grim none of this happily ever after rubbish!

[Konfucius]

I think my mum used to tell me the Cinderella Version by the Grimm Brothers and I also seem to recall the more gruesome ending to Rumpelstiltskin and the Pied Piper.

[Jonnas]

I had heard of some of these endings. Some of those sound disturbing for the sake of being disturbing, though.

And that tale with the flute-player of Hamelin... I never knew there were versions where the kids returned, actually. The version I heard always had the kids disappearing with the guy to God knows where.

[Ashley]

(FYI, its pretty much impossible to track down the 'original' version these are just ones that happened to have survived. I just needed to get that point out there )

[Tellyn]

I remember the Cinderella one from primary school, which is slightly worrying.