The Fair Fiorita is an Italian fairy tale collected by Thomas Frederick Crane in Italian Popular Tales. Italo Calvino included a variant of it, The Princesses Wed to the First Passer-By, in his Italian Folktales .
A king with three daughters and a son married his daughters to the first men to pass before the castle at noon: a swineherd, a huntsman, and a grave-digger. His son did not go to the wedding, but walked in the garden, where he heard a voice saying that the man was happy who was kissed by the fair Fiorita. He set out in search of her.
Three years later, he saw a palace with a fountain in front of it, and a child playing in the fountain. He approached, and the child cried for his mother, who proved to be his oldest sister. He was glad at her good fortune, stemming from the enchantments of a magician on her husband, as on his other brothers-in-law. They told him to go toward the sunrise, which was the way both to his other two sisters and to Fiorita, and gave him hogs' bristles to throw to the ground if he were in great need.
He went toward the sunrise, and found his other two sisters. The middle one gave him feathers, and the youngest a human bone and told him that an old woman could give him more directions about Fiorita. The old woman lived across from the castle where Fiorita lived, and she came by the window. He fell in love at once, but the old woman warned him that the king would marry her only to a man who found her in a hidden place, and many princes had already died, trying.
He commissioned a cymbal that he could hide in, and had the maker sell it to the king on the condition that he take it every three days to repair it. The king bought it and gave it to Fiorita, who took it to her room. At night, the prince called to her, until she and her maids of honor had searched, and she had concluded that she had imagined the repeated calls, and told them not to come again. He emerged and begged a kiss from her. She allowed it, and a rose formed. She told him that the rose would let him find her first in her hiding place, then among a hundred maidens, but that her father would set other tasks afterwards, more terrible.
After he had found Fiorita, twice, the king put him in a room, filled with fruit, and commanded that he eat it all. He threw down the hogs' bristles, and a great herd of swine appeared and ate it all. The king then demanded birds that sang so sweetly that they would put the princess to sleep. The prince threw down the feathers, and birds appeared that put not only the princess but the king to sleep. The third time, the king demanded that they produce, on the next morning, a two-year-old child who could speak, or he would execute them both. The prince threw down the bone, and the child sprung up.
The king gave his son-in-law his crown and held a great feast for their wedding, to which his sisters and their husbands, and the prince's father came. So the prince and Fiorita reigned over two kingdoms.
The Princesses Wed to the First Passer-By does not include his sneaking into the princess's presence, or the need to discover her in a hiding place, as indeed many similar fairy tales, where the hero is helped by his brothers-in-law, as in The Death of Koschei the Deathless and The Three Enchanted Princes and What came of picking Flowers .
The finding in a hiding place is a motif that can also occur on its own, as in The Princess Who Was Hidden Underground and The Golden Lion .
Farmer Weathersky is a Norwegian fairy tale collected by Peter Chr. Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe in Norske Folkeeventyr.
"Katie Woodencloak" or "Kari Woodengown" is a Norwegian fairy tale collected by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe in Norske Folkeeventyr. Andrew Lang included it in The Red Fairy Book.
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.
Vesle Åse Gåsepike is a Norwegian fairy tale collected by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe in Norske Folkeeventyr. It has also been translated as Little Lucy Goosey Girl, and classified as Aarne-Thompson tale type 870A, "The Goose-Girl as Suitor".
Fair, Brown and Trembling is an Irish fairy tale collected by Jeremiah Curtin in Myths and Folk-lore of Ireland and Joseph Jacobs in his Celtic Fairy Tales.
The Golden Branch is a French literary fairy tale written by Madame d'Aulnoy. Andrew Lang included it in The Red Fairy Book.
"The Pig King" or "King Pig" is an Italian literary fairy tale written by Giovanni Francesco Straparola in his The Facetious Nights of Straparola. Madame d'Aulnoy wrote a French, also literary, variant, titled Prince Marcassin.
The Golden Lion is an Italian fairy tale collected by Laura Gonzenbach in Sicilianische Märchen. Andrew Lang included it in The Pink Fairy Book.
The Bird 'Grip' is a Swedish fairy tale. Andrew Lang included it in The Pink Fairy Book. It is Aarne-Thompson type 550, the quest for the golden bird/firebird; other tales of this type include The Golden Bird, The Greek Princess and the Young Gardener, How Ian Direach got the Blue Falcon, The Nunda, Eater of People, and Tsarevitch Ivan, the Fire Bird and the Gray Wolf.
The Child who came from an Egg or The Egg-Born Princess is an Estonian fairy tale, collected by Dr. Friedrich Reinhold Kreutzwald in Eestirahwa Ennemuistesed jutud.
The Little Good Mouse is a French literary fairy tale written by Madame d'Aulnoy. Andrew Lang included it in The Red Fairy Book.
Babiole is a French literary fairy tale, written by Madame d'Aulnoy. In English publications, the name is sometimes translated as Babiola.
What came of picking Flowers is a Portuguese fairy tale first collected by Teophilo Braga with the name Cravo, Rosa e Jasmin. Andrew Lang included it in The Grey Fairy Book.
The Greek Princess and the Young Gardener is an Irish fairy tale collected by Patrick Kennedy in Fireside Stories of Ireland. Joseph Jacobs included it in More Celtic Fairy Tales.
(Le Pigeon et la Colombe)"The Pigeon and the Dove" is a French literary fairy tale written by Marie Catherine d'Aulnoy and published in her book New Tales, or Fairies in Fashion written in 1698.
The Enchanted Snake or The Snake is an Italian fairy tale. Giambattista Basile wrote a variant in the Pentamerone. Andrew Lang drew upon this variant, for inclusion in The Green Fairy Book.
"The Griffin" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm in Grimm's Fairy Tales.
The Man of Stone is a Romanian fairy tale collected by Petre Ispirescu in Legende sau basmele românilor.
The Princess Who Was Hidden Underground is a German fairy tale. Andrew Lang included it in The Violet Fairy Book.
Fairer-than-a-Fairy is a literary fairy tale published anonymously in the 1718 fairy tale collection Nouveaux contes de fées. It is attributed to the Chevalier de Mailly. Andrew Lang included it in The Yellow Fairy Book.
