The Rose-Tree is an English

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

Joseph Jacobs Joseph Jacobs (29 August 1854 – 30 January 1916) was an Australian-born folklorist, literary critic and historian who became a notable collector and publisher of English folklore. Born in Sydney to a Jewish family, his work went on to popula ...

in ''English Fairy Tales''. It is also included within '' A Book Of British Fairytales'' by

Alan Garner Alan Garner (born 17 October 1934) is an English novelist best known for his children's fantasy novels and his retellings of traditional British folk tales. Much of his work is rooted in the landscape, history and folklore of his native count ...

. It is Aarne–Thompson type 720, my mother slew me; my father ate me. Another of this type is " The Juniper Tree", where the dead child is a boy; ''The Rose Tree'' is an unusual variant of this tale in that the main character is a girl.Maria Tatar, ''The Annotated Brothers Grimm'', p 209 W. W. Norton & company, London, New York, 2004

Synopsis

A long time ago there was a man who had two children; a daughter by his first wife and a son by his second. His daughter was very beautiful, and although her brother loved her, his mother hated her. The

stepmother A stepmother, stepmum or stepmom is a female non-biological parent married to one's preexisting parent. Children from her spouse's previous unions are known as her stepchildren. A stepmother-in-law is a stepmother of one's spouse. Culture Ste ...

sent the daughter to the store to buy candles. But

three 3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious and cultural significance in many societies ...

times, the girl put down the candles to climb a stile, and a dog stole them. When the daughter returned, her stepmother told her to come and let her comb her hair. The stepmother claimed that she could not comb it on her knee, or with the comb, and sent the girl for a piece of wood and an axe. When she returned, the stepmother cut off her head. She stewed her heart and liver, and her husband tasted them and said they tasted strangely. The brother did not eat but buried his sister under a rose-tree. Every day he wept under it. One day, the rose-tree flowered, and a white bird appeared. It sang to a cobbler and received a pair of red shoes; it sang to a watchmaker and received a gold watch and chain; it sang to three millers and received a millstone. Then it flew home and rattled the millstone against the eaves. The stepmother said that it thundered, and the boy ran out, and the bird dropped the shoes at his feet. It rattled the millstone again, the stepmother said that it thundered, the father went out, and the bird dropped the watch and chain at his feet. It rattled the millstone a third time, and the stepmother went out, and the bird dropped the millstone on her head.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rose-Tree Rose-Tree Fiction about cannibalism Fairy tales about talking animals Fairy tales about magic ATU 700-749 Joseph Jacobs Fairy tales about stepmothers Fiction about reincarnation Fairy tales about resurrection

Synopsis

See also

References