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Mother Hulda is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm and first published in 1812 as part of Children's and Household Tales. It was originally known as Frau Holle and is tale number 24.
Plot synopsis
Mother Hulda tells the tale of a rich widow and her two daughters: the elder was spoilt and idle, because while she was bad, she was her own daughter; the younger one unloved and overworked, because while she was good, she was the stepdaughter. Every day she would sit outside the cottage and spin beside the well. One day she pricked her finger on the point of the spindle. When she washed the blood away, the spindle fell from her hand and sank out of sight. When she leapt into the well after it, she found herself in the otherworld of Holda, who kept her as maidservant for several weeks. Then Holda was so impressed by the girl's meekness and industry she sent her back to her family, with an apronful of gold.
The mother sent the lazy daughter down the well to get more gold. Copying her sister, the lazy daughter bloodied her finger and leapt into the well. But Holda reproved her idle nature by sending her home covered with pitch.
Origins
The exact origin of Mother Hulda is difficult to trace but it is certain that the character originated in Norse mythology, where she is associated with a number of different deities including Frigg and Hel (Hölle in German).
Hel is the queen of Hel, the Norse underworld, and described in Norse mythology as a half-dead, half alive monster, but in German mythology she was viewed with some beneficence, as a more gentle form of death and transformation. In this context, Mother Hulda is connected with Hertha, the goddess of peace and fertility, otherwise known as Hlodyn in the Edda. Hlodyn herself was more commonly referred to as Jord, the personification of the primitive, unpopulated, and uncultivated Earth. She is one of the wives of the chief god Odin and the mother of the god Thor. Since the term mother goddess is used interchangeably in various texts across Europe it is possible that some confusion exists over the exact status of Jord and Frigg in this context.
In early Germanic mythology however, Hulda was known as the goddess of marriage. She was a beneficent deity, the patroness and guardian of all maidens. When Christianity slowly replaced Scandinavian paganism during the early Middle Ages, much of the old customs were gradually lost or assimilated into Catholic tradition. By the end of the High Middle Ages, Scandinavian paganism was almost completely marginalized and blended into rural folklore, in which the character of Mother Hulda eventually survived. In Germanic Pre-Christian folklore, Hulda, Holda, Holle and Holla were all names to denote a single Goddess. One who rules the weather; sunshine, snow and rain. She dwells at the bottom of a well, rides a wagon, and first taught the craft of making linen from flax. She is the goddess to whom children who died as infants go, and alternatively known as both the Dark Grandmother and the White Lady, elements which are more typically associated with the Grimm's fairy tale as well. Her connection to the spirit world through the magic of spinning and weaving has associated her with witchcraft in Catholic German folklore.
The legend itself, as it was eventually passed to the Grimm Brothers, originates from oral traditions in Central Germany in what is now known as Hessen. It was told to them by Henriette Dorothea Wild (whom Wilhelm Grimm married in 1825.) with more details added in the second edition (1819). It is still common expression in Hessen to say "Hulda is making her bed" when it is snowing.
A steep rock near the city of Hilgerhausen even bears the name "Hollestein", meaning "Stone of Hulda".
Analysis
According to the Aarne and Thompson classification system of fairy tales, Mother Hulda is a story of type 480, The Kind and the Unkind Girls.
Mother Hulda is one of Germany's most durable female legendary figures and one who without doubt represents a pre-Christian heathen deity who survived in popular belief and in the memory of common people well into the nineteenth century.
See also
- Diamonds and Toads
- The Three Heads in the Well
- Father Frost
- The Three Little Men in the Wood
- The Two Caskets
- True and Untrue
- Hulda
- Holda
External Links
Frau Holle | La Maljunulino Holle | Dame Holle | ホレのおばさん | Vrouw Holle
"Mother Hulda"