Boots and His Brothers ( Norwegian: ''Per, Pål og Espen Askeladd'') is a Norwegian

fairy tale A fairy tale (alternative names include fairytale, fairy story, household tale, magic tale, or wonder tale) is a short story that belongs to the folklore genre. Such stories typically feature magic, enchantments, and mythical or fanciful bei ...

collected by

Peter Christen Asbjørnsen Peter Christen Asbjørnsen (15 January 18125 January 1885) was a Norwegian writer and scholar. He and Jørgen Engebretsen Moe were collectors of Norwegian folklore. They were so closely united in their lives' work that their folk tale collection ...

and

Jørgen Moe Jørgen Engebretsen Moe (22 April 1813–27 March 1882) was a Norwegian folklorist, bishop, poet, and author. He is best known for the '' Norske Folkeeventyr'', a collection of Norwegian folk tales which he edited in collaboration with Pe ...

in their ''

Norske Folkeeventyr Norwegian, Norwayan, or Norsk may refer to: *Something of, from, or related to Norway, a country in northwestern Europe *Norwegians, both a nation and an ethnic group native to Norway * Demographics of Norway *Norwegian language, including the two ...

''.

Synopsis

A king had his castle shadowed by a great

oak tree An oak is a hardwood tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' of the Fagaceae, beech family. They have spirally arranged leaves, often with lobed edges, and a nut called an acorn, borne within a cup. The genus is widely distributed in the Northe ...

, and had no well that held water year round. He declared that whoever cut down the oak and dug the well would have the princess and half the kingdom. Three brothers, who had set out because their father was too poor to give them anything, were going to his palace. The

youngest son The youngest son is a stock character in fairy tales, where he features as the hero. He is usually the third son, but sometimes there are more brothers, and sometimes he has only one; usually, they have no sisters. In a family of many daughters, ...

heard something hewing, and went off. He found an

axe An axe (; sometimes spelled ax in American English; American and British English spelling differences#Miscellaneous spelling differences, see spelling differences) is an implement that has been used for thousands of years to shape, split, a ...

that was

hewing In woodworking, hewing is the process of converting a log from its rounded natural form into lumber (timber) with more or less flat surfaces using primarily an axe. It is an ancient method, and before the advent the sawmills, it was a standa ...

by itself, and it said that it had been waiting for him. He took it and went back, telling his brother that it had been an axe, and endured their ridicule. Again, he heard something digging, found a shovel digging by itself, and took it as well; then he wondered where a brook came from, and found not a spring but a

walnut A walnut is the edible seed of any tree of the genus '' Juglans'' (family Juglandaceae), particularly the Persian or English walnut, '' Juglans regia''. They are accessory fruit because the outer covering of the fruit is technically an i ...

, which he stopped up with moss. When they reached the king, he had decreed that whoever tried and failed to cut down the oak and dig the well would have his ears clipped off and be put on a deserted island. The two older tried, failed, and suffered the punishment. The youngest set the axe to cut down the tree, the spade to dig the well, and the nut to fill it. The story says that it was just as well that the brothers lost their ears, because it spared them hearing people's comments that their youngest brother had not been a fool to wonder.

Translations

German language German (, ) is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family, mainly spoken in Western Europe, Western and Central Europe. It is the majority and Official language, official (or co-official) language in Germany, Austria, Switze ...

translation of the tale was ''Peter und Paul und Esben Aschenbrödel'' - ''Aschenbrödel'' usually referring to a male

Cinderella "Cinderella", or "The Little Glass Slipper", is a Folklore, folk tale with thousands of variants that are told throughout the world.Dundes, Alan. Cinderella, a Casebook. Madison, Wis: University of Wisconsin Press, 1988. The protagonist is a you ...

Analysis

Tale type

The tale is classified in the international Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index as type ATU 577, "The King's Tasks". Its original name is also the title of the tale type in Norway, according to scholar 's ''The Types of the Norwegian Folktale''.

Variants

Folklorist

Stith Thompson Stith Thompson (March 7, 1885 – January 10, 1976) was an American folklore studies, folklorist: he has been described as "America's most important folklorist". He is the "Thompson" of the Aarne–Thompson–Uther Index, which indexes Folklore, ...

stated that the tale type was "popular" in Norway, but also "confined to that country". Hodne's catalogue listed 22 variants of the tale type in Norway.Hodne, Ørnulf. ''The Types of the Norwegian Folktale''. Universitetsforlaget, 1984. pp. 139-140.

References

External links

{{Portal, Norway
''Boots and His Brothers''
Scandinavian folklore Norwegian fairy tales ATU 560-649 Asbjørnsen and Moe Askeladden (ash-lad or boots) in folklore Fairy tales about brothers Fiction about sentient objects Fairy tales about talking objects Folklore featuring impossible tasks