One day, he steals the boy’s clothes while he’s bathing in the river and tells the approaching king the boy is the Marquis. Chu Renhuo’s version of Mulan has the warrior come home from war to find her father dead, her mother remarried, and the khan calling her to be his concubine. Illustrated by Robin Eisenberg. While the mermaid’s sisters provide her with a dagger to kill the prince and save her own skin, the mermaid can’t bring herself to do it. [via Flavorwire; Huffington Post; List25; Wikimedia Commons; Wikimedia Commons; Wikimedia Commons; Wikimedia Commons; Wikimedia Commons; Wikimedia Commons; Ancient Origins; Wikimedia Commons], Featured photo: Chris Heller / Getty Images. He agrees to relent if she can guess his real name. The rest of Talia’s story is too gruesome to be a children’s tale. Another Charles Perrault piece, Bluebeard tells the story of a wealthy, ugly, blue-bearded man who has been married many times; trouble is, no one knows what happens to his wives. While there’s not enough historical data to truly understand what happened in Hamelin, texts and artwork from the time hint that, around 700 years ago, the town’s children either died or disappeared. ... Fairy tales are for kids right? From the Little Mermaid to Little Red Riding Hood, the sugarcoated renditions we know and love come from much darker places. What is shocking is that “Hansel and Gretel” doesn’t stray too far from the reality of the Great Famine of 1315-1317, which serves as a backdrop for the dark cannibal tale. A king then follows his hunting falcon into the lord’s home, where he discovers the sleeping beauty. Folklore & Superstition 10 Fairy Tales That Were Way Darker Than You Realized as a Kid The evil queen is on the loose -- and armed with a knife -- in the Hans Christian Anderson story 'The Snow Queen.' This too is enough to transform him into a doting prince. When the child is born, she can’t give it up. } Copyright © 2011 - 2019 List25 LLC. Peter brings Wendy to Neverland to act as a mother to the Lost Boys. Be it the initiative of Disney or the people in general, the dark origins of Disney fairy-tales have been disguised and toned down for children over the years, to make them appropriate for everyone. Well, not to … ( Public Domain ) The Ancient Origins of Fairy Tales . Forget a magic smooch. The dark and creepy origins of classic fairy tales Some stories are so classic, they were told at least once in everyone's childhood. After convincing one of his neighbour’s reluctant daughters to marry him and her moving in, he leaves for a while. She submits, throwing her clothing in the fire and joining the wolf in bed. } catch(e) {}, by Adding insult to injury, a flock of birds then pecks out the eyes of the sisters for their wickedness. Seguir. The Beast allows him to take it if he returns, but Belle forces the story out of her father and goes to the castle. Although Catherine and Petrus appear to have had a happy marriage, they and their children were never treated as fully human. We dug deep with this list to find where our common stories come from and what the original dark (very dark) stories really were. _g1.classList.remove('lazyload'); The evil queen shows up, unknowing it was her stepdaughter’s wedding. Stories like ' The dog is close to death too, but its master nurses it back to health before later taking the dog out back and shooting it because he can’t have a dog in the nursing home. Most fairy tales have a certain message or takeaway for the reader, but it’s not always as … A bishop, trying to keep his abbey, tried bribing the king with 12 estates in return for not taking it, hiding the deeds in a pie crust to keep them safe from thieves. But still, I think it's worth mentioning. The prince returns that night and crawls up the hair only to find the evil witch. What’s worse, each step the mermaid takes is excruciating, as if sharpened knives are cutting into her newly developed stems. List25® is a registered trademark. One infant sucks the flax from her finger, thus rousing Talia from her magic slumber. He describes himself as her faithful son – now that’s the strangest friend zoning we’ve ever heard! Although the real-life couple’s relationship was sadly lacking in singing cutlery or wisecracking candlesticks, Petrus did have one thing in common with the fairy tale’s titular Beast. Some people believe the children may have been led away to participate in a children’s crusade. What many don’t know is that the roots of these stories are nowhere near the romanticized idea of whimsical magic. When the townspeople attempt to stiff their medieval exterminator, he responds by using his magic tune to lure the town’s children to their doom. The Disney movie 'Frozen' is based very very loosely on this fairy tale. List25 designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com. Many Disney movies are based off of fairy tales written by Hans Christian Anderson, The Brothers Grimm, and others. By Lizzie Carr. The Disturbing Origins of 10 Famous Fairy Tales. Related: 7 Creepy Folklore Creatures From Around the World. The siblings learn of the plot and escape into the woods. In some versions, it’s not a kiss from the princess’s goodness that transforms the frog into a prince but chopping off his head. She pushes him off the tower into thornbushes which break his fall but stab his eyes out. In both cases, two doves sent by Cinderella’s dead mother alert the prince of the sisters’ blood in the slippers. Yes, off to grandmother’s house she went, but in some original versions, the wolf arrived to the house early and chopped up the grandmother, putting her flesh in the pantry and blood in a wine bottle. Aladdin uses the ring genie to transport there, kills the sorcerer, and brings his palace back to where it was. The original versions of some of our best-loved fairy tales are a far cry from their Disney-fied incarnations - with violence, gore, sexual threat, abuse and poverty all part of the plot. A cruel stepmother convinces her husband that the only way to avoid starvation is to abandon their children. In this one, a maid tricks her princess into changing identities with her so she can marry a prince. This video is outdated, click here to watch the updated version.\r \r \r or check out my new channel at\r. The nightmare of Hansel and Gretel is largely intact compared to other watered-down fairy tales. Yes! Some academics say the American version of Brer Rabbit is an allusion to the African slaves who used their cunning against their slave masters. In the 16th century, when a new gate was built at the town’s entrance, it was inscribed with the following message: “In the year 1556, 272 years after the magician led 130 children out of the town, this portal was erected.”. Her heartbroken father, who can’t bear the thought of burying his daughter, instead lays her on one of the many beds in his large estate. (A Russian folk version has a prince come upon a female frog/princess.). Today, Disney-fied fairy tales are most familiar to the masses in their animated forms; the originals, when revisited, can seem comparatively brutal and dark. In another disturbing rendition, the wolf demands that Little Red strip naked. He receives a promotion. London: Harrap (1922). When she arrives, she’s forced to step into burning-hot iron shoes brought from the fireplace and dance until she dies. In the original version of this tale, written by Giambattista Basile in 1634, the princess (named Talia) isn’t awoken by the kiss of true love. Soon thereafter, a not-so-kind old witch kidnaps the pair with plans to fatten them up to eat. Enter your account data and we will send you a link to reset your password. Take a look at the Top 10 Most Dark Original Versions of Fairy Tales you grew up with! Lozew. In Carlo Collodi’s original version, once Gepetto carves Pinocchio, the marionette runs away. Olivia Martinez, Senior Staff Writer. When the king learns of his wife’s scheme, he burns her alive in order to be with Talia. The Pied Piper of Hamelin is a story which tries to account for the strange disappearance or death of most of the town’s children. American writer Daniel P. Mannix’s The Fox and the Hound isn’t originally so much about friendship. Her father tells the king she can weave straw into gold (she can’t) so he puts her to it, saying he’ll kill her if she doesn’t do it by morning. At some point or another, you want to be in the Disney movie or just want a particular character with you in real life. And it is this aggressive act that turns the frog into a prince—not the pitying kiss we know from the cartoon. A Hamelin town ledger entry from 1384 alludes to the tragedy: “It is 100 years since our children left.” Reports of a stained glass window in the now-destroyed Hamelin church (see reproduction above) speak of a colorfully dressed piper leading children away from the village and into the hills. In the Brothers Grimm version of “The Frog Prince”, the ending is far more violent. After much abuse and spending winter alone, he joins the swans who return in spring. The fairy tale itself is full of dark details that were later scrubbed clean. The sorceress cuts off Rapunzel's hair and throws her out into the wilderness. One may recall when Anastasia and Drizella struggle to get their grubby, pudgy feet into Cinderella’s slipper. The second detailed the acts of a nobleman, named Gilles de Rais, who tortured, mutilated, … As for the cook who saved the children? Illustration in The fairy tales of Charles Perrault 1628-1703; Clarke, Harry, 1889-1931, illustrator. The Dark Origins of Classic Fairy Tales. Aladdin is a Middle Eastern fairy tale in which Aladdin, then trapped in the magic cave, rubs a ring he wears and a lesser genie takes him back to his mother. She stays there and the Beast continuously asks her to marry him. In the end, her suffering is all for naught; the prince chooses another woman. From gruesome mutilation to mass murder of children, get enlightened by the disturbing truth about these original versions of children’s fairy tales. Peter and Wendy by J.M. The story goes that King Henry VIII was confiscating Catholic lands in England after breaking away from Rome. Going under the original name Henny Penny, the original story of Chicken Little features the paranoid chick gathering up other animals on its way to tell the king the sky is falling (after an acorn fell on its head). In it, the fox purposefully leads one of a man’s dogs onto railroad tracks where it’s hit by a train and dies. Even though we all know there are many things seriously wrong with Disney fairy tales, lets admit it, we all enjoy watching good triumphi The young Margarete fell in love with a prince who later became Philip II of Spain. Ultimately, the horror of their story doesn’t come from Petrus’ appearance, but from the degradation he and his loved ones faced. Considered to be a ‘wildman’ — a savage, half-human creature found in European mythology— he was taken from his home and given as a present to King Henry II of France. At this point the disgusted princess throws the amphibian against the wall. 7 Creepy Folklore Creatures From Around the World, Frozen in Fear: 30 Creepy Facts About Sleep Paralysis, The Loveland Frog: Ohio’s Creepy Amphibian Cryptid, may have served as inspiration for Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont’s. The true story goes that the piper agreed with the mayor to get rid of the rat infestation. I was horrified to find that the origins of many of my favorite Disney movies had much more gruesome details that Disney completely left … Using techniques commonly applied by biologists, academics studied the links between stories from around the world and found that some of them had prehistoric roots. The Beast emerges, angry that after the food and drink he consumed he also takes the rose. These stories aren’t your happy endings but rather sometimes gruesome and shocking tales. _g1.setAttribute('srcset', _g1.getAttribute('data-srcset')); As for the lovable dwarves, the von Waldeck family reportedly ran a copper mine where they employed young children, many of whom suffered from severe deformities because of the poor working conditions. Some also include the girl stripping naked, burning her clothes, getting into bed, and being eaten by the wolf. Want more terrifying bedtime stories? Perrault based his fairy tale on two accounts of dark depravity in Brittany, France. In earlier versions as well as the 1697 edition by Charles Perrault, Little Red Riding Hood unwittingly cannibalizes her own grandmother after the wolf tears apart the old woman and serves her guts to the girl. Get the best viral stories straight into your inbox! Pinocchio goes back to Gepetto’s house that night and accidentally kills the wise talking cricket. But the prince sees through their ruse—literally. With a gruesome ending, the Brothers Grimm’s Rumpelstiltskin tells the story of an imp who makes a deal with a miller’s daughter. As it’s all too much for her, Mulan kills herself. He escapes and lives with wild geese and ducks who are soon slaughtered by hunters. The king later kills his wife (who tried to get him to unknowingly eat the children) to be with Sleeping Beauty. 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