# The Padisah's Youngest Daughter and Her Donkey-Skull Husband

The Padishah's Youngest Daughter and Her Donkey-Skull Husband is a Turkish fairy tale collected and published by folklorist Barbara K. Walker. The story follows a princess who marries a youth magically concealed within a donkey skull. After breaking his trust, she loses him and embarks on a perilous journey to his mother’s home, where she is subjected to a series of arduous tasks to reclaim him.
The tale belongs to the international folklore cycle classified as Animal as Bridegroom or The Search for the Lost Husband (ATU 425). This narrative type typically involves a human protagonist marrying a supernatural spouse, losing them through a broken prohibition, and undertaking a quest to restore the relationship. The story shares thematic parallels with the Graeco-Roman myth of Cupid and Psyche, as recorded in Apuleius' Metamorphoses. Both narratives feature a heroine who must endure trials imposed by a supernatural maternal figure (often interpreted as a witch or mother-in-law) to reunite with her estranged husband. Such tales emphasize motifs of forbidden curiosity, marital separation, and redemptive perseverance.
Barbara K. Walker included the tale in her compilation Turkish Folktales (1990), contributing to the study of Anatolian oral traditions. The story underscores cultural variations of the ATU 425 cycle, highlighting motifs unique to Turkish storytelling, such as the donkey-skull disguise and the symbolic trials reflecting societal expectations of loyalty and resilience.

## Sources

The Padishah's Youngest Daughter and Her Donkey-Skull Husband is a Turkish fairy tale published in 1993 by folklorist Barbara K. Walker. The story, archived in the Uysal–Walker Archive of Turkish Oral Narrative, was first recorded in 1970 from the oral tradition of storyteller Niyâzi Çam in Bursa Province.

## Summary

The padishah gathers everyone in the palace courtyard so that his three daughters may toss their apples to choose their husbands. When the third daughter throws hers, it lands near a donkey skull. As per tradition, she marries the donkey skull. However, inside the nuptial chamber, her husband reveals himself to be a handsome youth. He warns her never to reveal his true form, as doing so will cause him to disappear, forcing her to embark on a quest to find him.
Life goes on, and one day, the princess visits the women's public bath. There, she is mocked for having married a donkey skull. Frustrated by the ridicule, she impulsively reveals her husband's secret. Shortly after, he arrives at the bathhouse to reprimand her, telling her that she may never find him again, even if she walks with an iron cane and wears a pair of iron shoes. With that, he vanishes. Determined to find him, the princess sets off on her journey, wearing a pair of iron shoes.
Her search takes her to Pearl Mountain, the Gold Fountain, and the Diamond Fountain, where her husband resides in a mansion. They reunite, but he warns her that his mother is a giantess who may devour her. To protect his wife, he transforms her into a broom to hide her from his mother. The next day, he persuades the giantess not to harm a padishah's daughter if she arrives. With her reluctant agreement, he restores the princess to her human form.
The giantess then sets the princess a series of impossible tasks: to sweep and not sweep her house, to fill forty cauldrons with her tears, to climb a mountain, enter another mansion, and retrieve a closed box. The husband secretly advises her on how to succeed—she must drink from a bitter fountain and praise its taste, eat a sour pear and compliment it, close an open door and open a closed one, and swap the food of two animals (giving meat to a lion and grass to a horse). Following his instructions, she retrieves the box and escapes. However, overcome by curiosity, she opens it, unleashing "wild music." Her husband arrives just in time to close the box again. She then delivers it to the giantess.
That night, the couple decide to flee the mansion, with his family in pursuit. To evade them, they transform first into a minaret and a mosque, then into a sheep and a flock of sheep, and finally into a poplar tree (the princess) and a snake coiled atop it (the prince). When the giantess reaches the tree, the snake asks her for a kiss, then spits venom into her mouth, killing her. With the danger gone, the princess and her husband return to her kingdom.

## Analysis
### Tale type

In the Typen türkischer Volksmärchen ("Turkish Folktale Catalogue") compiled by Wolfram Eberhard and Pertev Naili Boratav, the variants featuring a horse husband are grouped under a single type: TTV 98, Der Pferdemann ("The Horse Man"), which corresponds to tale type AaTh 425 in the international classification. In a later publication, Boratav noted that although the Catalogue registered 25 variants, an additional six had been collected since its original release.
In his monograph on Cupid and Psyche, Jan-Öjvind Swahn [sv] acknowledged that Turkish type 98 represents subtype 425A in his analysis—that is, the "Cupid and Psyche" variant, considered the oldest and containing the episode of the witch's tasks. However, in the international index, Swahn’s classification is listed as type ATU 425B, "The Son of the Witch."

### Motifs
#### The supernatural husband

In most of the collected variants, the supernatural husband is depicted as a horse, followed by a man with a donkey's head and a camel. In other tales, he may appear as a snake, a frog, or even as the Turkish hero Kaloghlan.

#### The heroine's tasks

Another recurring motif in this tale type involves the heroine traveling to another witch's house to retrieve a box or casket that she is forbidden to open. German folklorist Hans-Jörg Uther noted that these motifs—specifically "the quest for the casket" and the visit to the second witch—constitute "the essential feature" of this subtype.

#### The heroes' Magic Flight

According to Christine Goldberg, some variants of this tale type conclude with a "Magic Flight" sequence—a combination that appears sporadically in Europe but traditionally in Turkey. In these versions, as a final transformation to deceive the ogress mother, the princess becomes a tree while her supernatural husband transforms into a snake coiled around it. Although this episode is more characteristic of tale type ATU 313, "The Magic Flight," some variants of ATU 425B also include it as a closing episode. German literary critic Walter Puchner argues that the motif became attached to type 425B as a Wandermotiv ("Wandering motif").

## Variants
### Turkey
#### Shah Bender

Turkologist Ignác Kúnos published a tale titled Шаһ Бäндäр (Turkish: Şah Bender; English: "Shah Bender") in the 8th volume of Vasily Radlov's Proben der volkslitteratur der türkischen stämme. In this tale, translated by Johannes Østrup as Shah Bender, three princesses cast their lot with apples in a contest to choose their husbands. The youngest princess throws her apple, and it lands near a donkey. She marries the donkey, who subsequently reveals that he is a prince named Shah Bender and warns her not to reveal their secret. The following day, he participates in his father-in-law's tournament as a mysterious knight and defeats his opponents. Out of pride, the princess informs her family that the mysterious knight is her husband, and he vanishes.
Determined to find him, the princess embarks on a quest during which she encounters an ogress who gives her a walnut and sends her on her way. This event recurs twice more, with the princess acquiring a lemon and a pomegranate. Eventually, she reaches a kingdom with three castles; a servant emerges from each castle, and she bribes them with the fruits to secure a night’s stay. She also cleans a bloodied shirt during her journey.
Her mother-in-law then begins to mistreat her, forcing her to sweep the floor under penalty of death and to fill a kettle with her tears. Ultimately, Shah Bender's mother arranges his betrothal to another girl and compels the princess to bear ten candles tied to her fingers. When Shah Bender notices that her fingers are burning, she explains that it is her heart that burns. In response, Shah Bender tosses the candles onto the false bride, rescues his princess, and both escape in a transformation sequence. In their final forms, the princess transforms into a cypress and Shah Bender becomes a seven-headed monster.

#### Donkey Prince

In a Turkish Anatolian tale collected by Necati Demir titled Eşek Prens ("Donkey Prince"), a man finds a donkey in a field that implores him to take it home. When the man does so, the donkey transforms into a youth who requests that the man court the padishah's daughter on his behalf. Overcome with fear, the man returns home at night and informs the donkey youth that he cannot comply. In response, the donkey orders him to go the next day under threat of death. Consequently, the man proceeds to the padishah's palace to court the princess. However, the padishah sets a condition: any suitor must first complete the task of building a palace more beautiful than his own. The man relays the challenge to the donkey youth, who produces two hairs that he rubs together to summon a djinn, commanding it to construct the palace. The following day, upon seeing the magnificent palace, the padishah marries his daughter to the donkey in a ceremony lasting 40 days and 40 nights.
The princess meets the youth beneath the donkey skin and falls in love with him. Later, as the padishah extends the festivities by arranging riding competitions, the donkey youth informs the princess that he will compete in disguise. He cautions her not to reveal his identity, warning that if she does, he will vanish and she will only be able to find him by wearing down a pair of iron sandals and bending an iron cane. During the tournament, he appears on the first day in black garments on a black horse, on the second day in red vestments on a red horse, and on the third day in white clothes on a white horse. When the princess declares that the mysterious contestant is her husband, the audience celebrates his prowess—only for him to vanish immediately thereafter.
Distraught, the princess recalls his advice and sets out in search of him, donning the iron sandals and carrying the iron cane. Her quest leads her first to a copper house, where a maidservant reveals that she has not seen the princess's husband and directs her to the next location. The princess then visits a silver house, again finding no sign of him, until finally she reaches a golden house. There, a maidservant drawing water points to a nearby tree under which a youth rests. At this moment, the princess realizes that her iron sandals are worn out and her iron cane is bent. The donkey youth reunites with his wife but warns her that his elder sister, who lives nearby, might devour her. To protect her, he transforms her into an apple and pockets it. Upon entering the house, his elder sister detects a human scent on him. The donkey youth shows her the apple, claiming it to be his wife, and extracts a promise from her not to devour it. The princess then regains her human form.
Despite her promise, the donkey youth's elder sister contrives to have the princess sent to his younger sister to be devoured and orders her to fetch a ladle. As the princess begins the arduous journey, her husband intercepts her, warning that the task is a trap. He advises her to close an open door and open a closed one, to exchange the fodder between two animals (substituting meat for a dog and grass for a horse), and to reach his sister's house, where, while she is occupied in another room, she must steal the ladle and return quickly. The princess follows his instructions precisely, retrieves the ladle, and runs back. Although the younger sister commands the animals and the door to hinder her progress, they fail to do so.
Undeterred, the donkey youth's sisters conspire next to send the princess to their middle sister so that she, too, may be devoured, ordering her to fetch a sieve. Recognizing their scheme, her husband advises that they escape. Transforming into a large bird, he carries his princess away and flies into the sky. Realizing the couple has fled, his sisters pursue them in a cloud of smoke. On the road, as they become aware of their pursuers, the prince—still in bird form—lands and transforms himself into a pool while the princess becomes water, thereby deceiving his younger sister. Later, when his elder sister again gives chase, the donkey prince transforms the princess into a rose and himself into a snake coiled around it. His elder sister, recognizing them, threatens to kill the pair, but the prince devises a plan: remaining in snake form, he asks his sister for a goodbye kiss. When she leans in to kiss the snake, he bites her to death. He then carries the princess back to her kingdom, and they live happily together.

### Turkish Cyprus
#### The Padishah and his Daughters

In a Turkish Cypriot tale titled Padişah ve Kızları ("The Padishah and His Daughters"), a padishah convenes with his daughters and instructs them to shoot arrows at random among a crowd of people to choose their husbands. The eldest daughter's arrow strikes the son of the vizier's eldest son, the middle daughter's arrow strikes the head of the vizier's middle son, and the youngest daughter's arrow strikes the head of a donkey. Despite repeated attempts—three more times the youngest daughter's arrow hits the donkey—the padishah insists she try again. Resigned to her fate, the princess marries the donkey.
Soon after, the animal begins to speak and reveals that he is a "Green Angel" (yeşil melek in the original), warning her not to disclose his secret; if she does, she will be forced to wander in gold shoes and search for him on the Golden Mountain, the Silver Mountain, and the Cevahir Mountain until she finds him again.
Time passes, and the donkey sheds his disguise, transforming into a human youth who brings flowers to the princess. At the wedding of the eldest princess, the donkey husband—in his human form—appears as a mysterious guest and again presents flowers to the princess before departing. The same event occurs at the middle princess's wedding. Mocked by her sisters, the princess eventually reveals that her husband is the Green Angel, causing him to vanish. Recalling his earlier warning, the princess asks her father for a pair of gold shoes and embarks on a journey to find him.
Her quest leads her first to a stream near the Golden Mountain, where a maidservant fetching water with a golden jug informs her that the Green Angel is not there. She then proceeds to the Silver Mountain, where another maidservant drawing water with a silver jug also fails to see him. Finally, the princess reaches the Cevahir Mountain and notices that the soles of her shoes are worn out—a sign that the Green Angel is near.
The tale further explains that the Green Angel is the son of a dev (giantess) woman who lives on the Cevahir Mountain. The princess is eventually reunited with the Green Angel. Some days later, his dev mother orders the princess to sweep half of the house while leaving the other half unswept. After the princess departs, the Green Angel uses a broom to sweep one part of the house while deliberately neglecting the other, arousing the dev mother's suspicion that the princess had help. Next, the dev woman orders the princess to fill jars with her tears; although the princess cries, she can fill less than half a jar. In response, the Green Angel fills the jar with water and sprinkles in some salt.
Subsequently, the dev woman commands the princess to visit her sister and retrieve a box. Anticipating a trap, the Green Angel intercepts her and advises that she first pass through an open door, then exchange the fodder between two animals (substituting bones for a dog and straw for a donkey), drink three handfuls of water from a stream, eat an apple from a tree, and give a scarf to a woman who is cleaning an oven with her breasts. Finally, she must enter his aunt's house and steal the box from the table while the creature is distracted sharpening her teeth, then take the box and return without opening it.
The princess follows these instructions precisely, retrieves the box, and makes her way back, despite the dev aunt commanding the animals and landmarks to impede her progress. Meanwhile, the dev mother receives the box and prepares for her son’s wedding by placing candles on the princess’s hands and lighting them, intending that, once the candles melt, she and her sisters will devour the princess. In a desperate attempt to save her, the Green Angel twice asks the princess for a kiss; when she refuses, preferring death at the hands of his female relatives, he then instructs her to hold the candles in her place. This enables both to escape, while the false bride suffers the consequences of the melting candles and is devoured by the dev sisters.
Realizing they have consumed the wrong person, the dev family chases after the couple. To evade his mother, the Green Angel transforms the princess into an orchard and himself into a gardener. The dev mother encounters only the gardener and utters a curse that the princess will never bear children. Later, when the dev aunt pursues them, the Green Angel transforms the princess into a tree and himself into a seven-headed dragon (ejderha in the original). His dev aunt threatens the transformed pair, but the dragon attacks her, forcing her to flee. Ultimately, the princess and the Green Angel return to her kingdom and marry. In time, when the princess proves unable to bear children, the Green Angel summons his dev mother to help with the delivery, thereby breaking the curse imposed on his daughter-in-law.

#### Green Angel (Lefkosa)

In a Turkish Cypriot tale titled Yeşil Melek ("Green Angel"), set in a certain village, a king declares that it is time for his three daughters to marry. He takes them up a hill and has them throw balls onto the rooftops; whichever ball lands on a house determines the husband—the son who lives in that house. The eldest princess’s ball lands on the rooftop of a king’s house, and she marries his son. A wedding is celebrated for forty days and forty nights. Next, the middle princess casts her ball onto the vizier’s house and marries the vizier’s son. Finally, when the youngest princess throws her ball, it lands near a donkey’s head. After a second attempt yielding the same result, she resigns herself to fate and marries the donkey.
That night, the donkey transforms into a youth as handsome as the fourteenth moon and implores her to keep his secret, warning that if she reveals it, she will lose him. Some time later, a tournament is announced in the village in which every knight will compete. The transformed youth informs the princess that he will take part in the competition. During the tournament, a handsome and mysterious knight is admired for his prowess, while the youngest princess is mocked for her choice of husband. After enduring the ridicule, she declares that her husband is the mysterious knight. In response, he vanishes.
Determined to find him, the princess asks her father to prepare provisions for her journey and sets off in search of her husband. She passes by the White Mountain and the Blue Mountain until she reaches the Green Mountain, where a maidservant announces that she is fetching water for the Green Angel. The princess requests to be taken to him, but the maidservant warns that his mother is a man-eating creature. Undeterred, the princess reunites with her husband, who introduces her to his mother as his wife.
His mother then orders the princess to complete a series of tasks. First, she commands her to fill a vase with her tears; however, the Green Angel fills the vase with water and sprinkles salt, arousing his mother’s suspicion. Next, the creature orders her to both sweep and not sweep the house; the Green Angel takes a broom and instructs her on how to perform the task. For the third task, the princess is forced to eat bread meant for a dog and a cat, yet it does not diminish. Concluding that the task is impossible, the Green Angel tells his wife, and together they escape from his mother’s house.
On the road, the couple meets an old man and asks him to help them hide, but he insists that they plant some vegetables first. As the dev mother approaches, the Green Angel instructs the princess to slap him; upon doing so, he transforms into a serpent while the princess becomes a red “gabag.” The dev mother nears and declares that she wishes to eat the princess first. In response, the Green Angel asks his mother to allow himself to be eaten instead; when she opens her mouth, he, still in serpent form, bites her tongue. Released from his curse, the Green Angel returns with the princess to her kingdom, where they celebrate their marriage anew.

### Caucasus Region
#### Rutul people

In a variant collected from the Rutul people, in Dagestan, titled Как ослик Ризван превратился в юношу ("How Donkey Rizvan Becomes a Youth"), a childless couple prays to God for a son, and the wife gives birth to a donkey. One day, the donkey son expresses his desire to marry the princess, and his human mother convinces the king to accept the proposal. However, the padishah orders the prospective son-in-law to complete a series of tasks. The donkey son fulfills these tasks and subsequently marries the princess.
On the wedding night, the donkey son reveals his true form to his human wife: he is a man named Rizvan beneath the animal skin. The widow then persuades the princess to hide her husband's donkey skin, keeping it out of his reach so that she can burn it. The princess complies, and as a result, her husband loses his donkey skin. He transforms into a bird and tells his wife that if she ever wishes to see him again, she must search for him in a distant kingdom.
The princess spends years searching for him until she reaches a fountain, where a slave woman is carrying water to Rizvan. The princess begs for a drink and accidentally drops her wedding ring into the jug. When the slave woman delivers the jug to Rizvan, he recognizes his wife’s ring and summons her. Reunited at last, they decide to escape from the castle in a Magic Flight sequence, pursued by a creature named Azhdaha.
While on the road, Rizvan and his wife ride on horses. Noticing their pursuers, they throw objects behind them to deter the chase: first, Rizvan throws a saddle-bag full of water that creates a sea between them, causing the Azhdaha to drown; next, he throws some salt behind them to form a mountain that deters his younger sister.

#### Armenia

In a 1979 article, researcher Suzanna A. Gullakian [hy] noted that the supernatural husband appears as a donkey in at least two Armenian tales related to tale type AT 425.
Scholars Isidor Levin and Uku Masing published an Armenian tale titled Herr Amir (Turkish: Bay Amir). In this tale, a lonely old couple complains that they have no one to care for them in their old age. One day, the old man opens the door and finds a young donkey ("Eselsjunges") in front of their balcony. The little donkey invites himself in and explains to the couple that he is actually a youth beneath the donkey skin. He proves his story by removing the skin to reveal his human form and then reverting to a donkey. Later, he asks his adoptive mother to request the hand of the king's daughter in marriage.
The king consents to the marriage but orders the suitor to complete several tasks. He must build a house that overshadows the king's palace, extend a carpet between the palace and the house lined with blooming trees to provide shade for the princess, and finally appear with an army of one hundred knights on one hundred white horses. The donkey-child advises his human mother to go to the garden and, under the name Herr Amir, request that each task be accomplished. Eventually, the king's daughter marries the little donkey. One day, she asks him what can be done about the skin; Herr Amir tells her that she may burn the donkey skin to transform him into a human, but warns that he will vanish and she will not see him again unless she walks with steel shoes and carries a steel cane. When the king's other daughters visit and comment that their husbands are better than hers, the princess, angered by their mockery, takes the donkey skin and burns it. Immediately, her husband appears to her sisters in human form, and at midnight, Herr Amir gives her one last kiss before vanishing.
The princess then asks her father for steel shoes and a steel cane and embarks on a quest to find him. Meanwhile, Herr Amir returns to his true parents and yearns for his human wife so intensely that he is consumed by fever. His sisters go to a nearby spring to fetch water to cool him down. After a long journey, the princess notices that her steel shoes are worn out and hopes that her husband is nearby. She sees two women drawing water in jars and inquires about the reason. The women explain that the water is for Herr Amir, who is burning with fever. The princess asks for a drink and accidentally drops her ring into one of the jars. When the women deliver the jugs to their brother, Herr Amir recognizes his wife's ring and instructs his sisters to bring the girl to the fountain.
Herr Amir finds his wife, and she lives with him under his parents' roof until one day his mother inquires about the woman he brought home. Dismissing her concerns, Herr Amir and his wife plan their escape. While on the road, as the couple is pursued by his family, they transform several times to deceive them: first into a mill (the princess) and a miller (Herr Amir), then into a garden (the princess) and a gardener (Herr Amir), and finally into a rose tree (the princess) and a snake coiled around its trunk (Herr Amir). Ultimately, Herr Amir's father ceases his pursuit and allows the couple to go, returning home. Herr Amir and the princess then return to her kingdom, celebrate a new wedding, and become king and queen.

### Central Asia

Gabriele Keller argues that the tale type TTV 98, "Pferdemann" (see above), is also widespread in Central Asia.

#### Uzbekistan

Author Gabriele Keller collected an Uzbek variant titled Chötiktscha or Xo’tikcha (German: Eselkind; English: "Donkey-Child"). In this tale, the titular Chötiktscha is no ordinary animal; he falls in love with the padishah's daughter and asks his elderly owner to act as his Sovtschi and request her hand in marriage. Despite her reservations, the old lady goes to the padishah's palace doors and, after a few days, is invited in to explain the reason for her visit. After divulging her motives, the padishah rejects the woman's proposal. Nevertheless, the old woman insists, and the padishah agrees—provided that her donkey first performs a series of tasks: he must bring a herd of lambs, oxen, camels, and a horse, and cause cooking oil to flow between their doors as if along a path. He completes these tasks and marries the princess in a grand ceremony, after which the princess goes to live with the donkey.
One day, the princess's mother visits her daughter and reveals that her husband is not an ordinary donkey; he removes the donkey skin at night to become a handsome youth—a Peri—and dons the donkey skin again in the morning. The princess's mother tells her that her father lives in shame because of her choice of husband and urges her to burn the donkey skin. Her husband learns of this and forbids her from doing so, warning that she will never see him again unless she wears out a cane until it is as small as a needle and shoes until they resemble a sieve. Despite his protests, the princess takes the donkey skin and burns it. The man laments this loss, transforms into a pair of doves, and flies away. Though her mother tries to comfort her by suggesting she can have any other man, the princess proclaims that she needs no one else and embarks on a quest, dressed as a dervish, to find him.
She journeys far and wide until she reaches an oasis where she rests in the shade of a tree, noticing that both the cane and the shoes are worn out. There, she sees a child (a girl) carrying an Oftoba (a water jug) to fetch water. When the princess asks whom the water is for, the girl replies that it is for her brother. The princess places her ring in the water jug, and the girl delivers it to her brother. Her husband, recognizing the ring, instructs his sisters to bring the dervish to him, and he recognizes the dervish as his wife. The story further explains that the princess's mother-in-law is a Dev.
The princess's husband hides her from his mother by transforming her into a broom but later introduces her as his wife and makes his mother promise not to devour her. Some time later, the Dev-mother orders the princess to visit her Dev sister and bring back a pair of scissors. The princess's husband advises her that she must pass by several landmarks: she is to compliment a broken bridge; a stream of blood named "Qonjiring" ("blood-stream"); a squeaking mosque called Ridscha; and a fallen door. She must also trade the animals' fodder (a plate for the dog, a jug for the stork), meet his cousin "Olti-Emtschak" ("The Six-Breasted One") and give her tools (an armguard and a handguard) to help clean the tandir oven; then, she must delouse his aunt on the clay terrace ("Supa"), tie her hair around the terrace, retrieve the scissors, and flee.
The princess follows these instructions, takes the scissors, and runs back to her mother-in-law's house. The Dev-aunt commands her daughter, the animals, the door, the mosque, the stream, and the bridge to stop her, but the princess escapes. The Dev-aunt then visits her sister, and together they plan to eat the princess that very night. At last, Chötiktscha takes his wife along with several objects (a comb, a mirror, and grains of salt) and both escape, with the Dev-family in pursuit. Chötiktscha throws the salt behind him to create a mountain, the comb to form a thornbush, and the mirror to create a river between them. When the Dev-relatives ask how he crossed the river, Chötiktscha suggests that his mother and his aunt put some stones in their pockets and cross it; consequently, the Dev-relatives sink to the bottom of the lake. Chötiktscha and his human wife return home and live happily ever after.
Keller classified the tale as type AaTh 425B, "Die Aufgaben der Hexe (Hexensohn)" ("The Witch's Tasks [Son of the Witch]"), and as Turkish Type TTV (EB) 98, "Pferdemann" ("Horse as Husband"), with elements of type AaTh 480 (helping and complimenting inanimate objects on the way to the second witch) and a conclusion following type AaTh 313, "The Magic Flight".