We begin, as is so often the case, with a foolish father.
Guys. Only make deals with clearly defined terms. Endless wealth in exchange for “the first thing that greets you” or “what your wife carries” is not a god bargain. “Oh,” you say, “I’m sure she’s just carrying her purse.”
No. You idiot. Why would a creature able to provide endless wealth want a random woman’s purse? Your wife is pregnant.
This particular father receives wealth in exchange for what stands behind his mill, reasoning that the only thing back there is the apple tree.
Think, man, think! Why does the strange old man want your apple tree?
The strange old man promised to come back in three years for what he’s owed, which, to the surprise of no one but the miller, is the miller’s daughter.
Three years pass. The miller’s daughter, who is beautiful and pious and clean, washes herself and then draws a circle around herself with chalk. Because of this, the strange old man—who, by the way, is the devil—is unable to approach her.
He demands that the miller keep water away, so that she cannot clean herself, and the miller, being a coward as well as an idiot, complies.
The girl weeps on her hands, making them so clean that the devil still cannot claim her. He demands that the miller chop off her hands, which he does. She then weeps on the stumps, cleaning them as well, and the devil gives up on the whole thing—this girl is just too clean for him.
The miller at least feels bad about maiming his daughter, and promises to take good care of her from now on, but understandably, she just wants to get away from him.
She wanders until she reaches the royal orchard, which is surrounded by a moat. She prays, and an angel dries the moat so that she can reach the orchard, where she eats several pears.
The gardener witnesses this and reports it to the king. The king comes along the next night, meets the girl, and falls in love. He marries her, and has new, silver hands made for her.
It’s all going well until the king has to go to war, leaving his pregnant wife behind in the care of his mother.
Now, this seems like an ideal set-up for an evil mother-in-law, but she’s actually cool. The problem here is the devil, who’s still mad he didn’t get the miller’s daughter.
She has a son. Mother-in-law writes a letter to the king, letting him know. The devil replaces the letter with one claiming she’s given birth to a changeling. The king is a little freaked out by this news, but writes back that they should continue taking good care of his wife, and he’ll be home as soon as he can. The devil replaces the letter again, with one that says the king’s wife and child should be put to death.
The mother-in-law is not cool with this. She attempts to talk her son out of this plan with several letters, all of which are intercepted by the devil. In the last, he demands that after they kill the girl, they should cut out her tongue and eyes to keep as proof that it’s been done.
Mom-in-law has eyes and a tongue taken from a doe to show her son when he comes home, and sends her daughter-in-law and grandson into hiding.
They leave the palace. The queen prays, and an angel comes to care for her and the baby. Her hands grow back. They just—they just grow back. Like, that’s a thing that happens. Because of “the grace of God and her own piety.”
Seven years pass.
Meanwhile, the king has come home, and he and his mom have talked, and while they’re not quite sure who switched out all their messages, clearly they’ve been sabotaged. The king goes off in search of his wife and son, vowing to neither eat nor drink until he finds them.
God keeps him alive through the nearly seven years of dehydration and starvation. Eventually, he reunites with his wife and son, all the misunderstanding are cleared up, and they live happily ever after.
I hate that her hands grow back. That wasn’t a detail I remembered going in, and I am not a fan. There’s no good reason for it. It contributes nothing to the plot; it’s just something that happens in the background.
Disability is never a part of living happily ever after. It’s always cured in the end, unless you’re evil, in which case you probably deserve it. The girl’s hands grow back. Rapunzel’s prince goes blind, but only until she weeps on him, and her tears restore his sight. (Whether that prince is good or evil is a whole different conversation, but that’s not relevant here.)
It feels…icky. A similar kind of icky as the fact that nearly all of the antagonists, and zero of the protagonists, in Basile’s fairy tales are black. It says certain kinds of people don’t get happy endings. And it’s a problem.
So that kind of sucks. But on the bright side. The mother-in-law. I love the mother-in-law. So, so often, this character is evil. There are several similar stories where, instead of the letter being switched out, the mother-in-law writes a letter lying about the birth in the first place. And so, so often, even when the mother-in-law is right about something (like it being creepy to keep a corpse in your bedroom and call it your wife), the narrative still acts like she’s evil.
This is a good mother-in-law! She argues with her son and is applauded for it! She protects her daughter-in-law and grandson! She rocks! I love her! We need more good mothers-in-law!
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