| The Willful Child | |
|---|---|
| Folk tale | |
| Name | The Willful Child |
| Aarne–Thompson grouping | ATU 779 |
| Country | Germany |
| Published in | Grimms' Fairy Tales |
"The Willful Child" (German : Das eigensinnige Kind) is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm as tale number 117. [1] As a legend, it is widely distributed in Germany. [2]
It is Aarne-Thompson type 779, divine rewards and punishments. [3] Other tales of this type are The Star Money and Frau Trude .
Once upon a time there was a child who was wilful and would not do what her mother wished. For this reason, God had no pleasure in her, and let her become ill. No doctor could do her any good, and in a short time, the child lay on her deathbed. When she had been lowered into her grave, and the earth was spread over her, all at once her little arm came out again and reached upward. And when they had pushed it back in the ground and spread fresh earth over it, it was all to no purpose, for the arm always came out again. Then the mother herself was obliged to go to the grave and strike the arm with a rod. When she had done that, the arm was drawn in, and at last, the child had to rest beneath the ground. And everything went back to normal.
In their first edition, the girl merely became ill; that God made her ill was added in later ones.
The original German text uses a neuter noun, das Kind, for the child; the gender of the child cannot be determined.
Grimms' Fairy Tales, originally known as the Children's and Household Tales, is a German collection of fairy tales by the Grimm brothers or "Brothers Grimm", Jacob and Wilhelm, first published on 20 December 1812. Vol. 1 of the first edition contained 86 stories, which were followed by 70 more tales, numbered consecutively, in the 1st edition, Vol. 2, in 1815. By the seventh edition in 1857, the corpus of tales had expanded to 200 tales and 10 "Children's Legends". It is listed by UNESCO in its Memory of the World Registry.
"The Robber Bridegroom" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, tale number 40. Joseph Jacobs included a variant, Mr Fox, in English Fairy Tales, but the original provenance is much older; Shakespeare alludes to the Mr. Fox variant in Much Ado About Nothing, Act 1, Scene 1:
"Mother Trudy" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, tale number 43. It is Aarne-Thompson type 334, at the witch's house.
"The Hut in the Forest" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm. Andrew Lang included it in The Pink Fairy Book (1897). It is Aarne-Thompson type 431.
"The Tailor in Heaven" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, tale number 35.
"The Griffin" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm in Grimm's Fairy Tales.
"The Star Money" or "The Star Talers" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm in Grimm's Fairy Tales.
A Riddling Tale is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm in Grimm's Fairy Tales.
"Going a Traveling" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm in Grimm's Fairy Tales, tale number 143. It is Aarne-Thompson type 1696, What Should I Have Said?.
"The Ear of Corn" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, number 194. It is Aarne-Thompson type 779, Divine Rewards and Punishments.
"The Sea-Hare'" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, number 191.
"The Crumbs on the Table" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, number 190.
"The Pack of Ragamuffins" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, number 10. The title has been variously translated into English, as in "The Adventures of Chanticleer and Partlet: How They Went to the Mountains to Eat Nuts", "The Pack of Ragamuffins", "The Vulgar Crew", "A Pack of No-goods", "Riffraff", "The Pack of Scoundrels", "The Good-For-Nothings", and possibly others.
"The Louse and the Flea" or "Little Louse and Little Flea" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, number 30.
"The Maid of Brakel" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm in Grimms' Fairy Tales, tale number 115.
"Lazy Henry" or "Lazy Heinz" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm in Grimm's Fairy Tales, number 164. It was first added in the third edition.
"The Peasant in Heaven" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm in Grimm's Fairy Tales, number 167.
"The Duration of Life" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm in Grimm's Fairy Tales, number 176. It was first included in their fourth edition.
"The Grave Mound" is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, KHM 195. It is Aarne-Thompson type 779, Divine Rewards and Punishments.
The Shroud, : KHM 109, also known as The Burial Shirt and The Little Shroud, is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm and published in the first edition of Kinder- und Hausmärchen in 1815. It contains elements of Aarne–Thompson type 769: The Death of a Child.
