The presence of the supernatural wife in folktales —whether she be a transformed animal, an inhabitant of another world, or some kind of fairy or elf—has long interested those who like to speculate about the ultimate origins of folktales and other human institutions. Each generation of scholars has had its favorite theory. A century ago these scholars were talking with the utmost certainty and dogmatism of these supernatural spouses, telling us that they represented now this, now that phenomenon of sky or cloud or seasonal change. A generation later these creatures were dogmatically described as always essentially animals and as related to primitive totemistic ideas. Still later the ritualistic school had its inning and all these stories became embodiments of ancient rites. And even today there remain some scholars who assert that they have the key that unlocks this mystery. This key they find in the interpretation of dreams. [105]

No matter whether one is convinced by such general theories of origin or, like the present writer, is skeptical of them all, it is clear enough that to the teller of tales the supernatural wife is no more important than her male counterpart. Fairy lovers, animals who are really transformed men, and even demigods marry human maidens and eventually take on human form themselves so as to live happily with their faithful wives.

Most of the problems connected with this group of tales come to light when we examine the story of Cupid and Psyche. This tale receives its name from the treatment given it by Apuleius in the second century after Christ. [106] This classical form of the tale certainly does not represent the original from which the modern European versions are derived. It belongs to a widely-diffused tradition which has a considerable variation from place to place. [p. 98] These variations can best be clarified by means of a generalized summary of the story (Type 425). In one way or another a girl is married to a monster husband. This introductory part of the story has many variations. Sometimes the monster is born as a result of a hasty wish of the parents. Usually he is a man at night and a monster or animal by day. Frequently the father of the girl promises his daughter in marriage to the monster, either because he has fallen into the power of the evil creature and thus buys his freedom or else in order to secure an unusual present which his youngest daughter has asked him to bring back from his journey. In some cases the father and daughter make unsuccessful attempts to evade their bargain. Usually, however, the girl goes willingly and joins the supernatural husband.

At this point, no matter what the introduction to the story may have been, the manifold versions of the tale begin to converge. In spite of the fact that the girl has been really forced into this marriage and that the husband is thought of in the earlier part of the story as a monster or a disagreeable animal, the heroine is not only complacent about the marriage but almost immediately comes to love her unusual mate. Frequently the life of the pair together is described as taking place in the midst of the greatest luxury. The chief desire of the girl is now to disenchant her husband, so that they can continue their joyful existence as normal human beings. In some of the related tales the girl succeeds in disenchanting the monster from his animal or supernatural form by means of a kiss or tears, or by burning the animal skin, or sometimes by cutting off his head. But in Cupid and Psyche she always loses her supernatural husband because she fails in some way to obey instructions. It may be that she burns his animal skin too soon, but more frequently she learns and reveals the secret of his unusual form.

As soon as she disobeys, the husband leaves her, sometimes giving her vague instructions as to where she may find him. She sets out immediately on a long and sorrowful wandering. Sometimes she wears iron shoes which must be worn out before she reaches the end of her journey. She gets magic objects from an old woman (or frequently from three in succession); she asks her direction from the wind and stars; she climbs a steep glass mountain at the top of which she finds her husband. Before being reunited she still has to win him from the wife that he is about to marry and especially to cause him to recognize her, since he has forgotten all about her. To do this she sometimes takes service as a maid and buys with three jewels the privilege of sleeping with her husband three nights. The story always ends with the reunion of the couple and a happy marriage.

In both the introductory part and in the last section which describes the search for the husband, this tale has much in common with a great many related stories. We have seen daughters promised to animals by bankrupt fathers in the tale of the Animal Brothers-in-law (Type 552), and we shall shortly mention a number of other stories of marriages to animal husbands [p. 99] The quest for the lost husband corresponds in a great number of details with the similar quest for the lost supernatural wife (Type 400). The adventures at the very end of the story are frequently the same as those in the tale of the Forgotten Fiancée (Type 313C).

The most complete study of this story is that of Ernst Tegethoff. [107] He considers the kernel of the tale to be the interruption of the happy life of the heroine and her supernatural husband because of the disobedience of the wife. In his consideration of the distribution of the versions of the tale he finds that the nature of the prohibition which the wife violates is an important indication of the direction in which dissemination has taken place. In spite of the great detail with which the material for Tegethoff's study has been assembled, he has not made adequate analysis so as to show clearly the probable relationships of the widely scattered versions. The tale has been known in literary circles for nearly two thousand years and has been frequently the subject of artistic treatment since. But Tegethoff is inclined to think that, except for Italy, the literary treatments have had little influence on the oral.

Where and when the first Cupid and Psyche tale was told is certainly not known, but it would be possible by close analysis to find much more than we now know about that probable time and place and something of the form of the story which has given rise to such a long and vigorous folk tradition. It is told in every part of Europe, but it is especially popular in the western half, where several countries have already reported more than fifty versions. The sixty-one Italian oral variants are of especial interest in connection with the appearance of the tale in Apuleius and Basile. There are a few examples of the story in the Near East and in India. Among primitive peoples it does not seem to be told except by the Zuñi of New Mexico. It has been recorded from the French in Missouri, and the Negroes of Jamaica. In all, several hundred oral variants are available to the student of this tale.

Instead of making such an investigation, Tegethoff chooses to speculate as to the psychological condition which might conceivably produce this story. It would seem to the reader that he decided upon his theory first and interpreted all of his facts in the light of that theory. Since he wishes to show that the story is the result of a dream experience, he first sloughs off all motifs that appear in other tales. There is left, then, only the bare fact of a girl who is married to a monster husband and whose happiness is interrupted by some transgression of hers. Though the story never appears in this particular form, the author presumably imagines that it was first told in this elemental fashion as a result of somebody's dream. Whose? Presumably of a girl who dreams of a lover and is rudely awakened by someone entering the room with a [p. 100] light. This may be the explanation for this story, and I should not wish to deprive anyone of the privilege of believing so. But even in the search for the ultimate origins of a folktale, there is no reason to be absurd. It would be much fairer and honester to say that we have no idea, and probably never will have, as to the original form of this tale and as to who made it up. And we certainly have no way of finding out what was the particular psychological state of the unknown and unknowable person who invented this story. [108]

Tegethoff is convinced that the story of the animal husband who is disenchanted has a different origin from that which we have just mentioned, but if so it has become so thoroughly amalgamated with the other Cupid and Psyche stories that it is impossible now to separate them. [109]

It is true that the motif of the disenchanted animal husband appears frequently in other tales than Cupid and Psyche. These stories are all rather simple in structure leading to the disenchantment as the climax of the action. In one of these, The Two Girls, the Bear, and the Dwarf (Type 426), the girls let a bear into their hut in the woods. They also rescue an ungrateful dwarf from death. It turns out that the bear has been enchanted by the dwarf. When the bear kills the dwarf, he changes into a prince. This story is a literary concoction which appeared in a German folktale collection in 1818 and was retold by Grimm. It has not been reported outside of a very small area in central Europe.

In an Italian tale known as The Wolf (Type 428), which is probably a mere variation of Cupid and Psyche, a girl is assigned seemingly impossible tasks by a witch. Eventually she is sent to another witch with a letter giving instructions that the girl is to be killed. The wolf who helps the girl escape is thereby disenchanted and becomes a prince who marries her. This story is well known through its appearance in Gonzenbach's Sicilian collection. It has been recorded orally in Italy, Spain, Portugal, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Russia.

Even less a part of the oral tradition of Europe is the story of The Ass (Type 430). It is really a retelling by the brothers Grimm of a fourteenth century Latin poem, Asinarius. The prince who has been transformed to an ass plays a lyre and is entertained at the king's court. A princess disenchants him and becomes his wife.

Somewhat more of the folk flavor is found in Grimm's tale of The House in the Wood (Type 431). It has at least a large number of motifs found in well-recognized folktales. Three sisters, one after the other, are sent out into the woods. Like Hansel and Gretel, they leave a clue of grain, but this is eaten by birds. Each in turn comes to a house where they find an old man, [p. 101] a cock, a hen, and a cow. The elder sisters are discourteous to these animals and are thrown into the cellar. The youngest feeds them and in this way disenchants them all. The old man turns out to be a prince and the animals his servants. He marries his rescuer. Only nine versions of this tale have been noted, and all of them seem likely to be mere retellings of the Grimm story.

Belonging to this same group of tales are two about serpents. In one of them (Type 433A), a huge serpent carries a princess into its castle. She kisses it and disenchants it. In the other (Type 433B), a childless queen bears a son who has the form of a serpent and who stays far away from home. He is disenchanted by a maiden, usually by bathing him. Both of these serpent stories are most popular in Scandinavia, though the first has also been reported in the Baltic countries and in Hungary. The second tale, known in Danish as Kung Lindorm, was given a thorough study a generation ago by Axel Olrik. This has been recently elaborated in the light of newly available material by Anna Birgitta Waldemarson. [110] The peculiar distribution of the versions—some simple legends in India and complicated tales of exactly the same pattern in the Near East and in Denmark and southern Sweden—shows upon analysis that there can be little doubt of the origin of the tale in the East, of its development into a story of the disenchanted serpent husband, followed by the adventures of the cast-off wife (either Type 451 or 707). This secondary development was accomplished in the Near East, and the tale, with both parts, seems to have been carried to Scandinavia without having left any important traces on the way.

Another tale which may be nothing more than a truncated Cupid and Psyche story is Hans My Hedgehog (Type 441) which has been given some popularity through its appearance in Grimm. It does not seem to be known outside of Germany and the countries to its immediate east. A childless woman gives birth to a hedgehog. Years later the king unwittingly promises his daughter to the hedgehog in return for showing him the way out of the forest. The hedgehog is eventually disenchanted by the girl and changes into a handsome youth.

Finally, in this group of supernatural husbands should be mentioned The Frog King (Type 440), sometimes also known as Iron Henry. This tale goes back to a Latin story written in Germany in the thirteenth century. It also received literary treatment in Scotland in the sixteenth century. But in spite of this literary background, it seems to be fairly well known to story-tellers in Germany and eastward well into Russia, and it has been reported sporadically from nearly all countries in Europe, though not from any other continent. It has achieved a certain fortuitous fame because it appears as number one of the celebrated Grimm collection. The youngest of three sisters throws a [p. 102] ball into a spring. A frog promises to give her back the ball (in some versions, to make the spring run clear) if she will promise to marry him. The girl proceeds to forget her promise. But the frog duly appears at her door and requests entrance. He sleeps at the door, later on the table, and finally in her bed. He is disenchanted and becomes a prince. This may happen in any number of ways: by being allowed to sleep in the girl's bed, by a kiss, by having his head cut off or his frog skin burned, or by being thrown against the wall. A picturesque trait is added to this story by the experiences of the frog king's servant, Iron Henry. He has grieved so at his master's misfortune that he has three iron bands around his heart to keep it from breaking. As his master is disenchanted the bands snap one by one.