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Grimms' Fairy Tales
Rapunzel
There were once a man and a woman who had
long in vain wished for a child. At length the woman hoped
that God was about to grant her desire. These people had
a little window at the back of their house from which a
splendid garden could be seen, which was full of the most
beautiful flowers and herbs. It was, however, surrounded
by a high wall, and no one dared to go into it because it
belonged to an enchantress, who had great power and was
dreaded by all the world. One day the woman was standing
by this window and looking down into the garden, when she
saw a bed which was planted with the most beautiful rampion
(rapunzel), and it looked so fresh and green that she longed
for it, and had the greatest desire to eat some. This desire
increased every day, and as she knew that she could not
get any of it, she quite pined away, and looked pale and
miserable. Then her husband was alarmed, and asked, "What
aileth thee, dear wife?" "Ah," she replied,
"if I can't get some of the rampion, which is in the
garden behind our house, to eat, I shall die." The
man, who loved her, thought, "Sooner than let thy wife
die, bring her some of the rampion thyself, let it cost
thee what it will." In the twilight of the evening,
he clambered down over the wall into the garden of the enchantress,
hastily clutched a handful of rampion, and took it to his
wife. She at once made herself a salad of it, and ate it
with much relish. She, however, liked it so much -- so very
much, that the next day she longed for it three times as
much as before. If he was to have any rest, her husband
must once more descend into the garden. In the gloom of
evening, therefore, he let himself down again; but when
he had clambered down the wall he was terribly afraid, for
he saw the enchantress standing before him. "How canst
thou dare," said she with angry look, "to descend
into my garden and steal my rampion like a thief? Thou shalt
suffer for it!" "Ah," answered he, "let
mercy take the place of justice, I only made up my mind
to do it out of necessity. My wife saw your rampion from
the window, and felt such a longing for it that she would
have died if she had not got some to eat." Then the
enchantress allowed her anger to be softened, and said to
him, "If the case be as thou sayest, I will allow thee
to take away with thee as much rampion as thou wilt, only
I make one condition, thou must give me the child which
thy wife will bring into the world; it shall be well treated,
and I will care for it like a mother." The man in his
terror consented to everything, and when the woman was brought
to bed, the enchantress appeared at once, gave the child
the name of Rapunzel, and took it away with her.
Rapunzel grew into the most beautiful child beneath the
sun. When she was twelve years old, the enchantress shut
her into a tower, which lay in a forest, and had neither
stairs nor door, but quite at the top was a little window.
When the enchantress wanted to go in, she placed herself
beneath it and cried,
"Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down thy hair to me."
Rapunzel had magnificent long hair, fine as spun gold,
and when she heard the voice of the enchantress she unfastened
her braided tresses, wound them round one of the hooks of
the window above, and then the hair fell twenty ells down,
and the enchantress climbed up by it.
After a year or two, it came to pass that the King's son
rode through the forest and went by the tower. Then he heard
a song, which was so charming that he stood still and listened.
This was Rapunzel, who in her solitude passed her time in
letting her sweet voice resound. The King's son wanted to
climb up to her, and looked for the door of the tower, but
none was to be found. He rode home, but the singing had
so deeply touched his heart, that every day he went out
into the forest and listened to it. Once when he was thus
standing behind a tree, he saw that an enchantress came
there, and he heard how she cried,
"Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down thy hair."
Then Rapunzel let down the braids of her hair, and the
enchantress climbed up to her. "If that is the ladder
by which one mounts, I will for once try my fortune,"
said he, and the next day when it began to grow dark, he
went to the tower and cried,
"Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down thy hair."
Immediately the hair fell down and the King's son climbed
up.
At first Rapunzel was terribly frightened when a man such
as her eyes had never yet beheld, came to her; but the King's
son began to talk to her quite like a friend, and told her
that his heart had been so stirred that it had let him have
no rest, and he had been forced to see her. Then Rapunzel
lost her fear, and when he asked her if she would take him
for her husband, and she saw that he was young and handsome,
she thought, "He will love me more than old Dame Gothel
does;" and she said yes, and laid her hand in his.
She said, "I will willingly go away with thee, but
I do not know how to get down. Bring with thee a skein of
silk every time that thou comest, and I will weave a ladder
with it, and when that is ready I will descend, and thou
wilt take me on thy horse." They agreed that until
that time he should come to her every evening, for the old
woman came by day. The enchantress remarked nothing of this,
until once Rapunzel said to her, "Tell me, Dame Gothel,
how it happens that you are so much heavier for me to draw
up than the young King's son -- he is with me in a moment."
"Ah! thou wicked child," cried the enchantress
"What do I hear thee say! I thought I had separated
thee from all the world, and yet thou hast deceived me.
In her anger she clutched Rapunzel's beautiful tresses,
wrapped them twice round her left hand, seized a pair of
scissors with the right, and snip, snap, they were cut off,
and the lovely braids lay on the ground. And she was so
pitiless that she took poor Rapunzel into a desert where
she had to live in great grief and misery.
On the same day, however, that she cast out Rapunzel, the
enchantress in the evening fastened the braids of hair which
she had cut off, to the hook of the window, and when the
King's son came and cried,
"Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down thy hair,"
she let the hair down. The King's son ascended, but he
did not find his dearest Rapunzel above, but the enchantress,
who gazed at him with wicked and venomous looks. "Aha!"
she cried mockingly, "Thou wouldst fetch thy dearest,
but the beautiful bird sits no longer singing in the nest;
the cat has got it, and will scratch out thy eyes as well.
Rapunzel is lost to thee; thou wilt never see her more."
The King's son was beside himself with pain, and in his
despair he leapt down from the tower. He escaped with his
life, but the thorns into which he fell, pierced his eyes.
Then he wandered quite blind about the forest, ate nothing
but roots and berries, and did nothing but lament and weep
over the loss of his dearest wife. Thus he roamed about
in misery for some years, and at length came to the desert
where Rapunzel, with the twins to which she had given birth,
a boy and a girl, lived in wretchedness. He heard a voice,
and it seemed so familiar to him that he went towards it,
and when he approached, Rapunzel knew him and fell on his
neck and wept. Two of her tears wetted his eyes and they
grew clear again, and he could see with them as before.
He led her to his kingdom where he was joyfully received,
and they lived for a long time afterwards, happy and contented.
From Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, Household Tales, trans. Margaret
Hunt (London: George Bell, 1884), 1:50-4. |
