Plant Lore, Legends, and Lyrics: Embracing the Myths, Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore of the Plant KingdomFolkard, Richard
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Plant Lore, Legends, and Lyrics: Embracing the Myths, Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore of the Plant Kingdom
Folkard, Richard
Plants -- Folklore
So, in the German, in the ‘Man of Iron,’ a princess throws a golden
Apple as a prize, which the hero catches three times, and carries off,
and wins. In ‘Snow White,’ where the poisoned comb occurs, there is
a poisoned magic Apple also. In the ‘Old Griffin,’ the rich princess
is cured by rosy-cheeked Apples. In the ‘White Snake,’ a servant who
understands the voice of birds, helps creatures in distress, gets them
aid, and procures golden Apples from three ravens which fly over the
sea to the end of the world, where stands the tree of life. When he
had got the Apple, he and the princess eat it and marry. Again, in the
‘Wonderful Hares,’ a golden Apple is the gift for which the finder is
to gain a princess; and that Apple grew on a tree, the sole one of its
kind.
In Norse it is the same: the princess on the glass mountain held three
golden Apples in her lap, and he who could ride up the hill and carry
off the Apples was to win the prize; and the princess rolled them down
to the hero, and they rolled into his shoe. The good girl plucked the
Apples from the tree which spoke to her when she went down the well to
the underground world; but the ill-tempered step-sister thrashed down
the fruit; and when the time of trial came, the Apple-tree played its
part and protected the poor girl.
In a French tale, a singing Apple is one of the marvels which Princess
Belle Etoile and her brothers and her cousin bring from the end of the
world. In an Italian story, a lady when she has lost her husband goes
off to the Atlantic Ocean with three golden Apples; and the mermaid
who has swallowed the husband shows first his head, then his body to
the waist, and then to the knees, each time for a golden Apple. Then,
finally, in the ‘Arabian Nights,’ there is a long story, called the
Three Apples, which turns upon the theft of one, which was considered
to have been of priceless value. The Apple-blossom is considered to be
an emblem of preference. To dream of Apples betokens long life, success
in trade, and a lover’s faithfulness.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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