A princess was so beautiful and had such golden hair that she was known as Pretty Goldilocks. A neighboring king fell in love with her from her description, but much to the king's disappointment, she rejected his ambassador, saying she had no wish to be married. A young courtier and royal favorite, called Charming, told his friends that if he had gone, she would have accepted, and the king threw him in prison. He lamented his fate, and the king, hearing, told him what he had said was the cause of it. Charming said that he would have drawn such a picture of the king as to make him irresistible to her, and the king decided to send him. On the way, he helped a carp that was out of water, a raven being chased by an eagle, and an owl caught in a net; each one promised to help him. When he attempted to bring his master's suit before the princess, she told him that she had lost a ring in the river and was so vexed that she would not listen to any suit unless the ambassador brought back her ring. His dog, Frisk, advised him to try, and the carp brought him the ring. When he brought it to Goldilocks, she told him that a giant who was a prince had tried to marry her and was troubling her subjects. She could not listen unless he killed the giant. He went to fight it, and with the raven's aid in pecking the giant's eyes during the fight, he succeeded. Goldilocks refused unless he brought her some water from the Fountain of Health and Beauty, and the owl fetched the water for him. The princess agreed then and made preparations to go and marry the king, although she at times wished they could stay, and she would marry Charming. Charming refused to be disloyal to his king. Goldilocks married the king but remained fond of Charming, and Charming's enemies told the king that she praised him so highly, he should be jealous. The king had Charming thrown in a tower. When Goldilocks begged for his freedom, the king refused, but decided to rub his face with the water from the Fountain of Health and Beauty to please her. A maid had broken that bottle, though, and replaced it with another, not knowing the other bottle was actually a potent poison used for executing nobles by rubbing their faces with it. Frisk came to the queen and asked her not to forget Charming, and the queen immediately released him and married him.
Analysis
The heroine's lack of agency has been noticed and called into question: despite being part of Madame d'Aulnoy's cast of heroines and princesses with agency in her literary fairy tales, Princess Goldilocks still needs the intervention of a third party in order to ensure her happy ending at the end of the tale. An alternate translation to the name of the tale is The Fair with Golden Hair or The Fair Maid with Golden Locks. Fair is an English word associated with beauty, and it keeps the connection between light-colored hair and good qualities, like kindness and beauty.
Variants
Despite its origins as a literary tale penned by Madame d'Aulnoy, the story shares many recognizable themes and motifs with many tales collected from oral tradition and folklore, such as those by the Brothers Grimm. For example, Ferdinand the Faithful and Ferdinand the Unfaithful. The tale type has many variants across Europe and Asia. In French sources, d'Aulnoy's tale has been reported to have influenced at least 5 of the 51 versions collected. The episode where the king tries to get rid of his rival by bathing in a vat of a special mixture or using the ointment/holy water the hero collected also happens in Romanian fairy tale The Girl Who Pretended to be a Boy, published in 1901 in Andrew Lang’sThe Violet Fairy Book. A similar event happens in Russian fairy taleThe Firebird and Princess Vasilisa and in French/Breton fairy tale King Fortunatus's Golden Wig. When the emperor or king uses the ointment or magical water, a mix-up happens: the maid or a lady-in-waiting accidentally breaks the flask and, in a hurry, unknowingly substitutes the broken vial for poison. This theme is also widespread in French literary and oral tradition, under the theme of La Jeune Fille aux cheveux d'or et l'Eau de la mort et de la vie: a king, emperor or sultan becomes enamored with a princess or lady of royal birth, famed for her golden hair, and sends an emissary to win her over in his stead. When the dame is brought before her would-be suitor, she seizes the opportunity to dispose of him, by performing an elaborate ritual involving the holy water, or bath. After the deed is done, her kingly suitor is killed, and she is free to marry the emissary. A predecessor to the tale, as written by Madame d'Aulnoy, is Livoretto, an Italian literary fairy tale by Giovanni Straparola, in his The Facetious Nights. The character of the lovely maiden with golden hair also appears in Slavic fairy tales, with the name Dieva Zlato Vláska or simply Zlatovláska, meaning Goldenhair. As such, the fairy tale was adapted into the Czech film Zlatovláska. A variant in Spanish has been collected by writer Fernán Caballero, titled Bella-Flor. The tale has been translated into English and published in Andrew Lang's The Orange Fairy Book, with the name The Princess Bella-Flor. A Filipino variant, titled Benito, the faithful servant, has been collected and published in The Journal of American Folklore.
Legacy
The tale was one of many from d'Aulnoy's pen to be adapted to the stage by James Planché, as part of his Fairy Extravaganza. He translated the tale as The Fair One with Golden Locks for the stage.
