The Black Bull of Norroway

 So despite having "Norway" in the title, this is a Scottish fairy tale. It does, however, have a lot in common with one of the best known Norwegian fairy tales around. Which is why I decided to talk about it today.

Our heroine is the youngest of three sisters, as our heroines often are. They all go to a washerwoman for a sort of mystical matchmaking session, and the oldest two go off with some men in nice carriages who come by her door, while our girl sees a black bull riding past, and because this is a weird sort of matchmaking gig, she gets dropped on the bull's back, and off they go.

They have a long journey, during which she eats out of his right ear and drinks out of his left, until they arrive at a castle, where apparently the bull's older brother lives. She's given a magic apple, and then they move onto another castle, where another brother lives, and give her a pear. In a third brother's castle she gets a magic plum. Then they ride on to a glen, and the bull leaves her there, with instructions not to move at all, while he goes to fight the Old One.

The bull tells her that if everything turns blue he's won, and if everything turns red, the Old One has. So she sits by herself in the glen, waiting, which isn't my idea of a good honeymoon, until everything turns blue. She's really excited, though I'm not sure why - it hasn't exactly been a fantastic marriage so far. Anyway, she's excited, so she moves around a little (just, like, uncrossing her legs), against the bull's express orders, and consequently, he's unable to find her again.

Our girl wanders long and far in search of him - again, not clear on the why. She doesn't owe him anything and we haven't seen them bonding in any way. Why not just go home?

But she wanders. She comes eventually to a glass hill, too slippery to climb, and meets a smith who promises to make her special glass-climbing cleats if she works for him for seven years. And she agrees, which, again, no clue why - she hasn't been given any indication that her missing bull is up the hill. And she walked around the entire base searching for a way up, so she could have just kept going.

After seven years she climbs the hill in her special shoes, and meets another washerwoman. This one is apparently a little less magical, and not a fantastic person.

She tells our girl about a knight who will marry whoever washes his dirty clothes. Which is where we really start getting "East of the Sun, West of the Moon" vibes - it's the return of the magic laundry. The washerwoman can't wash the clothes. Her daughter can't wash the clothes. But our girl falls madly in love with this knight - um, honey, what about the bull you've been doing all this work to find? - and she's able to wash his clothes, through the purity of her love or something, idk.

The washerwoman lies to the knight and tells him that her daughter washed the clothes, a wedding date is set, and our girl is devastated. She gets out her magic apple, finds a bunch of jewels inside, and gives them all to the washerwoman's daughter in exchange for a night with the knight before their wedding. The washerwoman drugs him, so he sleeps straight through her speech about the seven years of hard work she's put into bringing about their reunion, and, okay, when and how, exactly, did she figure out that her bull and the knight were the same person? Because this is literally the first time it's come up in the text. I mean, it was obvious to us, but it shouldn't have been obvious to her, right?

I'm so confused.

Things move forward predictably from here - she makes the same deal with the pear and the plum, eventually someone tells the knight about all the noise someone's making in his bedroom at night, and he doesn't take the drugged drink on the final night. He's reunited with our girl, and they burn the washerwoman and her daughter (details on this move not provided) and live happily ever after.

This story...this story is just...wow.

I have so many unanswered questions. There are so many plotholes. This is such a mess.

Why are we choosing husbands based on who (or what) walks past a washerwoman's door first? Why does the bull have to fight an Old One? What does that even mean? Why can't he find her again if she moves at all, and for how many hours or days was she expected to hold completely still? Why did he have to leave her in the middle of nowhere, instead of one of the THREE castles we just visited?

Why did she feel the need to go after him instead of just going home? Why was she so determined to climb the glass hill, when she's fully capable of walking around it, and we have no evidence that the bull is even up there? If shoes that can climb that hill are worth seven years of labor, why are the washerwoman and her daughter just chilling up there? They can't possibly be getting a lot of business.

How did the knight get up there? Why is his clothing magically dirty? Is it from his fight with the Old One? Has our girl actually met him as the knight, or just heard about him? How does she know who he is? When does she figure out who he is? Why are we, the audience, not kept up to date about this discovery?

I just - it's a mess. I give up.

The Second Half: Related Stories

So I’ve been thinking more about the second half of King Lindorm, though I still haven’t put together a more thorough translation. But that’s just a good reason to take a more thorough look at other, similar stories.

The second half deviates significantly from the first; it’s categorized by Aarne-Thompson as a completely different tale type—707.

Some other notable stories that fit into this type are The Girl Without Hands, Mary’s Child, Bearskin, and the entire Bird Brothers category (This includes The Six Swans, The Twelve Brothers, The Twelve Wild Ducks, etc.). You can read more about Mary’s Child here, and you can read a post I wrote about Bird Brothers for Blooming Twig in 2015 here.

Now, most of these stories are, like King Lindorm, two part stories, where the first part ends with a girl marrying a king, and in the second part we have type 707. And a lot of these stories have pretty different first parts, though obviously the entire Bird Brothers category is very similar in both parts. And for the second half we split into two variants. In the Bird Brother types and Mary’s Child, the king’s wife is accused eating her own children and can’t defend herself because something in the first half of the story has made her unable or unwilling to speak. In Bearskin, The Girl Without Hands, and King Lindorm, the king’s wife is accused of giving birth to animals, and is unable to defend herself because she has no idea what’s going on—the king is away, and they’re sending letters to each other which are being switched out by someone with a grudge.

The one thing that I find really important about all of these stories is that the king is totally on his wife’s side. Their baby is dead and in pieces, and her mouth is smeared with blood? Clearly she’s being framed, or there’s been some kind of misunderstanding. His wife gave birth to puppies? Okay, that’s a little weird, a little concerning, but we’ll sort it all out when I get home.

These are men who love, trust, and defend their wives. Which is kind of rare in folklore.

And a lot of these guys are just straight up being good husbands, but the lindworm, specifically? He had better be a good husband. He was literally a dragon and she fixed him. Dude owes her. He had better be sticking up for his wife, and he has exactly zero room to judge when it comes to giving birth to non-humans.

(I think it’s worth noting that of all the stories in this category I’ve ever read, King Lindorm is the only one that features the king’s wife, um…feeding her breast milk to two other enchanted princes to break their spells? Don’t quote me on that, because I still don’t have a totally solid translation.)

!!!

I always love when Kristin from Tales of Faerie mentions me!

https://talesoffaerie.blogspot.com/2016/09/around-web.html?showComment=1475811200152#c1998881645995428249

*#@% You, Mary

This story is actually called “Mary’s Child,” or “Our Lady’s Child,” usually, and it shows up in the Brothers Grimm. And it will be a miracle if I can get through this essay without using some seriously bad language (but I’ll try, because my grandparents read this blog), because I am bursting with anger today, and the Virgin Mary deserves all I have and more.

Not the real Mary. Just to clarify. Fairy tale Mary. Fairy tale Mary deserves more anger than I have to give. I'm cool with the real life mother of God. No issues there.

Okay. So first of all, you got this baby. This baby’s dad is all broke, like everyone in fairy tales,  so one day when he’s out chopping wood, the Virgin Mary just appears all out of nowhere, like, hey man, you can’t afford to raise a kid. I’ll take her.

And this broke wood chopper dude, he’s like, yeah, okay. So the baby goes off with Mary to grow up in Heaven.

All good, yeah? Sounds fun.

Well, the crap is coming.

So the girl is like fourteen now, right? And Mary’s  gotta go on a trip. She decides—hello, Bluebeard—to leave all the keys to Heaven with this kid. Except of course one of the keys opens a door the kid’s not allowed to open.

Now this raises a lot of questions. Like, why would you leave these incredibly important keys in the charge of not only a child, but a living, human child—i.e. the only person in Heaven likely to make big with the sin and all? Or, like, where on earth does Mary have to be? Dude, you’re dead. Take a load off. Jesus came, Jesus went, your work is done. Naptime. Or, like, where exactly is God in all this? Or why are there locked doors in Heaven? Why are actual physical locks even a thing? Like, can’t the power of the Lord keep the special doors closed? And, most importantly, why is God putting up with all the crap that Mary is about to pull over the next several years of this child’s life?

So. Kid has the keys. Kid is hanging out with her little angel pals, and they’re all curious. There some arguing about how that would be wrong, we shouldn’t do that, it’s a sin, but you’re dealing with a high school freshman who grew up surrounded by the Sinless, and she is way past due for some rebellion.

Newsflash, Mary: Kids mess up. They can’t all be like your first one. Jesus was a special case, Mary. This kid is normal, Mary. She may be fully human, Mary, but she sure ain’t fully God.

Door opens. Mary returns, and it becomes obvious that the door opened—kid’s finger turns gold or something. Kid tries to lie about it, so that doesn’t help. Golden fingers don’t lie, kid.

So Mary dumps this child back down on earth, and she takes her voice while she’s at it. Recap: Girl, fourteen years old. Experience with other flawed human beings, zero. Experience with the trials of real life, particularly the wilderness, zero. Voice, none.

And here she is, smack dab in the middle of a forest, a child, and her clothes are all ripped and she’s tired and she’s hungry and she’s scared. And suddenly, a king.

I mean, you know where it’s going from here, right?  It’s not the first time. Big grown up king man marries the little girl with literally nothing, not even a voice to say no. And before you know it, she’s all knocked up.

And along comes Mary, in the middle of the night right after the baby is born, and she’s all like, hey, kid. You got a confession to make? Maybe one concerning a door you totally didn’t open?

And the kid says, “Nope.” (Her voice magically comes back so she can answer Mary's question.)

Okay. So, not the brightest. Not the most honest. She’s a stubborn girl. But, okay. She’s what, fifteen, now? And she can’t talk, and aside from the whole statutory rape thing, you really can’t say no to a king, especially when you have no voice. So I don’t think it’s all that much of a leap to assume this relationship was less than entirely consensual. And she’s a little girl, and she’s all alone in the world, and now she’s a mother. And she got kicked out of freaking Heaven. She has literally nothing left, and it’s all Mary’s fault.

And just thinking about it, I’m already all like screw you, Mary. So imagine how she’s feeling. I wouldn’t be about to admit defeat in the face of this crap either.

So Mary gets all pissed and takes away the newborn baby, and the next morning everyone’s saying that our girl ate her offspring.

But the king, he’s really into this whole child bride situation, so he decides to let the cannibalism slide just this once.

A year later, along comes baby number two. Mary shows up in the middle of the night, and she asks if the kid opened the door. And the kid is down a baby and the respect and trust of her people, on top of everything else. So she’s just like, “Screw you, Mary, I didn’t open your stupid door.”

Bye bye baby number two, hello continued rumors of cannibalistic infanticide.

Fortunately, the novelty of doing it with a little girl who can’t talk back has yet to wear off, so the king lets it go. Who needs babies for kids when you already got one for a wife?

Another year passes. Deceit and childbirth, take three. Mary asks, girl lies, baby goes away to Heaven to live with Grandma. And maybe a mute seventeen year old wife isn’t quite as fun as a sixteen year old, or fifteen, or fourteen, because finally, the king is like, “Okay, enough with the baby-eating. We gotta burn this chick at the stake.”

So apparently, the fire from the stake-burning melts the “hard ice of pride” around our girl, and she’s just thinking, like “Crap, I really wish I’d told Mary the truth.”

And BAM! The voice comes back, and she admits to God and everyone that she opened that stupid door when she was fourteen stupid years old.

The fire goes out, Mary descends from the heavens, returns the babies, and FORGIVES her. Girl makes one mistake when she’s young and stupid, and Mary torments her in every way imaginable for the next three years, and then MARY forgives HER.

It’s a problem.

So, in conclusion $#%@ you, Mary.