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THE CUCKOO, THE HERON, THE HEATHCOCK, THE PARTRIDGE, THE NIGHTINGALE, THE SWALLOW, THE SPARROW, AND

Date of account
English edition published 1872
Source
Zoological Mythology; or, The Legends of Animals, Volume 2 (of 2)
Reference
Zoological Mythology; or, The Legends of Animals, Volume 2 (of 2) · selected passage 11
Rights
public_domain
Language
English
Record updated
2026-08-25

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Record summary

In a Servian story,[58] the father of the maiden whose hands had been cut off by the witch, her mother-in-law, causes, by means of the ashes of three burned hairs from the tail of the black stallion and that of the white mare, golden hands to grow on the maiden's arms

Published source text

Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.

Source passage

Source text · mention only

In a Servian story,[58] the father of the maiden whose hands had been cut off by the witch, her mother-in-law, causes, by means of the ashes of three burned hairs from the tail of the black stallion and that of the white mare, golden hands to grow on the maiden's arms. The apple-tree, with golden branches, which we have already mentioned, is the same as this girl who comes out of the forest (or wooden chest) with golden hands. From the branches it is easy to pass to the hands of gold, to the fair-haired son who comes out of the trunk.[59] The idea of a youth as the branch of a tree has been rendered poetical by Shakspeare, who makes the Duchess of Gloster say of the seven sons of Edward--

Historical context

Contextual commentary · mention only

This material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.

Modern context

Contextual commentary · mention only

Lattice compares motifs and reported features without assuming that a traditional being is a biological species or that similar stories document one external cause.

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