Yu.E. Berezkin, E.N. Duvakin

Thematic classification and distribution of folklore and mythological motifs by area

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L9G. Bluebeard. .16.(.28.).31., (ATU 363)

A man's hair or beard of an unusual color is a sign of his demonic nature.

Portuguese, Spanish, French (Picardy, Vendée, Gascony), (Ukrainians: Poltavskaya), Norwegians, Latvians.

Southern Europe. Portuguese (Coimbra) [a princess rejects suitors, will marry only a man with a golden beard and silver teeth; one day a carriage arrives, footmen in green, in the carriage a gentleman with a golden beard and silver teeth; after the wedding, the husband takes the princess into the forest, a storm begins, the princess calls on Jesus, the storm subsides, and the husband and the carriage disappear; the princess turns to the Virgin Mary and promises that if she is saved, she will not utter a word for a year; a prince appears, believes that the girl is mute, brings her to the palace; a year later he decides to marry another woman; for this occasion he dresses the mute woman in a luxurious dress; the term is over, the princess begins to speak, the prince marries her]: Coelho 1879, no. 48: 112-114; Spaniards (Burgos) [Bluebeard killed his wives and hanged them in one of the rooms; he gave his next wife the key to it, but forbade her to open it; she opened it, was horrified, dropped the key, and the blood could not be washed off; Bluebeard demanded the key, saw the blood, cut off his wife's head, and hung the body with the others]: Marcos et al. 2002, No. 197: 296.

Western Europe. French (Picardy) [a widow has boys Jean, Jeannot, and Jeannois; she went with them to fetch brushwood and lost them; Jean climbed an oak tree and noticed a light in the distance; they came to a castle; young woman: the cannibal Goldenbeard lives here, run; they have nowhere to run; she hid them in the cellar behind a barrel, but when ZB returned, he went in there to drink wine, smelled the children, and when he lifted the barrel, he saw them; the wife hid the knife and ZB went to bed without slaughtering the children; they were left to sleep in the room where ZB's daughters slept; Jeannot noticed that they had golden crowns on their heads, the brothers took the crowns for themselves; at night ZB went out to slaughter the boys, but slaughtered his own daughters; the boys escaped through the window and came to the city; the king took them as pages; ZB spent two or three years exterminating people and destroying everything; The king agrees to give Jean his daughter if he brings him the ogre's golden beard; Jean comes to ZB, who doesn't recognize him; Jean says that he has defeated all the giants before and wants to try to defeat him; slips a sleeping pill into the ogre's drink; cuts off his beard and brings it to the king; Jean marries the princess, but does not receive a noble title; now Jeannot asks for Maria, the younger sister of Jeannot's wife; the king demands that ZB bring him his saber; Jeannot tells ZB that he has come to measure who can drink more wine; ZB started first, fell asleep, Jeannot brought the saber, married M., but did not receive a title either; Jeannois asks for the hand of the youngest princess; the king orders that the ogre himself be delivered in an iron cage; Jeannois arrived in an iron carriage-cage, told the ogre that his offenders were now alone in the palace; he got into the carriage and was brought; burned in the square; Jeannois married the youngest princess, all the brothers received a title; here, too, the mother found her sons]: Carnoy 1883: 241-251; French (Vendee, 1950) [Bluebeard had already killed 6 wives and taken a seventh; when leaving, he left behind the keys; the smallest one to the room that a wife should not enter; she unlocked the door of this room; behind it were the wives hanged in their wedding dresses, their throats cut, and there was blood on the floor; she dropped the key, the blood could not be washed off; in the room at the top of the tower she found an old man imprisoned there - Father Jacques; the other wives did not go up to this tower; J. says that before the murder, SB did it so that the wives laughed; the wife sent a little dog to her brothers, tying a letter to it; SB returned, saw blood on the key and told his wife to put on her wedding dress; the little dog runs like the wind, and the wife keeps answering that she is not dressed yet; SB sharpens the knife; the wife asks J. from time to time what he sees; he sees her brothers who are galloping like the wind; when they come galloping, the wife answers SB that she is ready; the brothers slaughter SB, free J.; they began to live in SB's castle]: Delarue 1957, No. 312A: 186-187; the French(Gascony) [Bluebeard is married seven times, his wives disappear; he kidnaps a girl; the shepherdess says that if necessary, she will send her talking jay to call the brothers of his new wife for help; when leaving, SB gives his wife the keys, tells her not to unlock the closet; she opens it, and there are seven female corpses hanging on seven hooks; the key is covered in blood, it cannot be washed off; the key says that the owner will return in seven days; the shepherdess sends the jay; while SB sharpens his knife, the shepherdess tells from the tower about the approach of the woman's brothers; the brothers kill SB and his three terrible Great Danes; the younger brother marries the shepherdess, receives the castle from SB]: Lopyreva 1959, No. 41: 177-181/

( Cf. Central Europe. Ukrainians (Poltava, Gadyach district, circa 1878) [A lazy son is born to poor people (if they give him food, he eats; if they don’t, he manages, lying on the stove “without pants”). The mother suggests giving him to work so that he can learn something, they give him to a tailor – he returns after 3 days, they give him to a seamstress, a blacksmith – he runs away. The father wants to send him to another kingdom, believing that he will not run away from there. The path lies through the forest, the father sits down on a stump with a sigh to rest – a wrinkled old man with a green beard down to his knees crawls out from there, introduces himself as the forest king Okh, asks why his father called him – he said “Okh” when he sat down. Okh asks to give the boy to him for training for a year on the condition that he will remain to serve for another year if the father cannot recognize him. Okh takes the boy to the other world, to a hut where everyone green, including Oh's wife and children. Oh sends the boy to chop wood, he falls asleep, Oh ties him up and puts him on the wood, sets him on fire, the boy burns. Oh sprinkles living water, the boy comes back to life and becomes a handsome man. A year later, the father comes to Oh for his son, Oh spills a measure of millet, identical roosters come running, the father cannot find his son, he stays for another year. A year later, Oh shows the rams "one and one", the father again does not recognize him. In the third year, on the way, he meets a white old man (white clothes, beard), tells his story, he suggests that the son can be distinguished among the pigeons - everyone will eat millet, and he will be the only one who will sit under a pear tree - with the help of the hint, the father recognizes his son and takes him home. Having turned from a bird into a man, the guy becomes even more beautiful. The father grieves that they are poor, the son turns into a greyhound, catches a fox, predicts that the master will want to buy him for 300 rubles, but forbids his father to sell the chain. The dog is bought for a hundred rubles, it turns into a man and returns to the father. The boy turns into a falcon, the father sells it to the lords without a hat for 300 rubles. At the fair, the boy turns into a horse, the father forgets about the ban and sells it with a halter to Okh, who has turned into a gypsy. He brings the horse to the steppe, leads it to the hut, the horse turns into a perch, swims away, Okh becomes a pike. The perch swims to the shore, turns into a garnet ring, the princess takes it out of the water. Okh turns into a merchant, asks the king to return the lost ring, the girl does not want to give it back, throws it "neither to you nor to me", the ring hits the floor, crumbles into millet, the merchant turns it into a rooster, pecks all the grains except for the one that rolled under the princess's foot. Millet turns into a boy, the princess falls in love with him, persuades her father and marries him]: Rudchenko 1870, No. 29: 107-114).

Baltoscandia. Norwegians [a girl marries a stranger with a green beard; sees her husband eating the corpses of the dead in three churches; in the form of her close relatives he appears to her and asks questions; when he comes in the form of her mother, the girl tells him what she saw and he eats her]: Hodne 1984, no. 363: 88; Latvians [a girl wants to have an unusual husband – with a golden nose, a copper beard; her wish comes true; passing a church (cemetery), she sees her husband eating corpses (the hearts of the buried); the husband appears to her in the form of a brother, father, mother and asks her questions; the girl tells her mother everything she saw; the husband immediately takes on his former appearance and devours her (her heart)]: Arijs, Medne 1977, No. 363: 280.