Tale of Sleeping Beauty

When this princess was born, all fairies were invited to her christening. Except an old one, who was not seen

for the past 50 years and believed to be dead. She wasn't; and quite angry at the king and queen. So the old fairy predict that the princess, before she's 16, will prick her finger on a distaff and dies. All others fairies already made gifts, except one, not powerful enough to completely undo the malediction. She stated that the princess won't die, but fell into a 100 years slumber.

Her parents were still concerned, and the king and queen order all spinning wheels to be burned. When the princess was 16, she decided to explore her castle, and arrive in a distant tower, where an old lady is busy spinning with a wheel, having never heard of the king 's interdiction to do so.

The princess had never seen a distaff, and asked to took it; she pricked her finger, and fell asleep. Her parents carried her to her bed, and her fairies godmothers put everyone who lived in the castle in a slumber.

100 years later, the general opinion was that the castle was haunted; however, older people remembered a beautiful princess slept there. A prince heard the rumors, and decided to go to the castle despite it was invaded with brambles and vines. But the plants moved aside as soon as the prince arrived. He crossed rooms filled with sleeping people dressed as his grandparents. The prince finally arrived in the princess's bedroom.

As the end of the 100 years had arrived, she opened her eyes, and saw the prince. The castle's inhabitants woke up as well, and the princess and prince were soon married.

## Variants

-The most famous version is the Grimm one, but in the Perrault's one, it's a bit longer. The prince turn out to be the son of an ogre queen. As soon as he go to war, his mother decide to eat her daughter in law, and also their son and daughter, during the prince absence. At first, the cook is ordered to kill the little Aurora, the young princess, but he does not dare to, hide the little girl, and present the queen veal's meat instead. Similarly, he gave her lamb when she wants to eat Jour ("day") , the young prince. And finally, he use a doe when the queen wish to eat the Sleeping Beauty.

She was about to pretend to her son that wolves had eaten his wife and their two children, but once heard their voices inside the cook's house, where they were hidden. Furious, the queen put snakes and toads in a giant vat, and was about to throw in her daughter in law, Aurora, Jour, the cook, his wife, and their servant. However, the prince came back precisely at this moment, and the queen, rather to face him, committed suicide by throwing herself in the vat. This ending is often missing in adaptations as the story look a bit long; the ending seems happy already when the princess wake up.

-There are seven fairies for Perrault and twelve for Grimm.

-Fairies godmothers delivered useful gifts, and Sleeping Beauty is the most often given beauty, talent for dance, singing, grace, and intelligence.

-The theme of the angry fairy godmother is quite old, and also used in the legend of Oberon (Titania's husband) or Beowulf. Also, in the tale of the *Green serpent.* It can be traced back to the Parcae's legend, who spun humans's life thread. Later on in fairy tales, they were reincarnated into three fairies, traditionally invited for christenings, the eldest having the power to predict when the baby would die. To not risking to hear it, parents avoided to invite her, but it always backfired as she still showed up-and avenged herself on the child.

-In the ballet, the old fairy is named Carabosse, and the princess Aurora. She's "Briar Rose" for the Grimm brothers and both names are used in the Disney version.

-In older versions known as *The Sun, the moon, and Thalia*by Basile or *Perceforest,*no angry fairy*:*it's simply predicted by astrologists that Thalia, or Zellandine, are going to be put in a slumber. Also, when a married king (named Troïlus in *Perceforest)*arrive in their bedroom, the heroine is raped, but don't wake up. She don't wake too when she give birth to twins, but one of the babies, wanting to suck his mother's bosom, suck her finger instead, and remove the splinter in the finger; thus the princess wake up. The king have a wife (instead of a mother) who's an ogre, and she act like in the Perrault version. When she dies, the king remarries to the heroine.

Of course, storytellers soon changed details due shocking elements. The princess is the most often kissed to be woken up instead of raped; or she wake up by herself like in the Perrault version. Also, the king's wife became his mother, before being evinced.

-In the Disney version, the brambles do not move aside when the prince (Philip) arrive; he actually have to work in way in with his sword.

-Also, the old fairy is never seen again after she pronounced her malediction. But it's very unlikely that the old woman never heard of the interdiction to spin after 16 years, that she was in the castle do to so, and that the princess had never noticed the room where she was before. That's why in retellings and adaptations, the most often, the old spinner and and the old fairy are the same person, in disguise. In fact, the vilain fairy often stay after to make sure the heroin never wake up like Maleficent in the Disney version, who turn into a dragon and confront prince Philip.

-The manhwa *Once upon a time by* Young A Lee contains an especially tragic variant. It's predicted that the princess will sleep for 100 years, and after a century, a young boy indeed try to get inside the castle and wake her up. But to his horror, he see the princess's ghost, who's already dead, and see the very old, but still alive, king, that he have to confront. Seeing that his daughter had not fallen in a slumber after 16 years, her father, wanting to keep her forever, killed her and coated the corpse with wax. The young man made it alive, but goes back alone, as the princess ascended to afterlife and her father died.