Fairy Tale Friday--Bella Venezia (Italy)

Hello and welcome to Fairy Tale Friday. Are you sitting comfortably? Good. Then I’ll begin.

This week we look at an Italian tale entitled Bella Venezia which was collected by  Italian journalist and author Italo Calvino in his 1956 book  Italian Folktales.  According to Wikipedia he was the most translated contemporary Italian writer at the time of his death. Wiki goes on to say:

 He did not compile tales from listeners but made extensive use of the existing work of folklorists; he noted the source of each individual tale but warned that was merely the version he used. He selected Bella Venezia as the Italian variant of Snow White because it featured robbers, rather than the variants containing dwarfs, which he suspected were imported from Germany.

This is an interesting tale, but not the best written. I suspect it is the translation which is rather stilted and with inconsistent punctuation which I have tried to remedy.  We begin with the innkeeper Bella Venezia who knocks the price down if you tell her she is more beautiful that anyone in your country. This work to feed her vanity until one day a traveller tells her that her daughter is better looking. She makes him pay double.

Like Rapunzel, she locks up her daughter (not stepdaughter) in a hut by the sea with only a tiny window and feeds her on bread and water. Her mistake was giving the poor girl a window because other travellers claim that the most beautiful girl is locked up in a hut by the sea.

Our antagonist now tries to seduce the poor kitchen boy with a promise of marriage (and sex) if he will kill her daughter and bring back her eyes and a bottle of blood. Now, I have read that in some old Italian folktales that the bottle of blood should be stoppered with the girl’s toe. Not in this one, but it would have made a nice touch.

The kitchen boy lets her go and slaughters a lamb instead so he can marry the Innkeeper.  Our protagonist--who is never named, though her mother is-- turns up crying in the woods. She happens upon a band of thieves who use a similar phrase to the one used in Aladdin (Open, Desert as opposed to Open, Sesame) and moves in with them after a bit of hiding under the bed and doing the cooking and cleaning like a magic elf when they are out.

The youngest who likes to dress rather flamboyantly and stay at expensive inns shoots his mouth off and alerts the girl’s mother to the fact that she is still living so she bribes an old witch to kill her daughter.

The thieves are broken hearted and bury her in a tree which the King’s son and his hunting dogs dig up. As in other tales, the Prince takes the dead girl back to the palace and wants to marry her dead or alive. She wakes up and they marry. Hoorah and  all that happy ending cliché rot.

Does it bother anyone else that she doesn’t have a name and the only word she ever utters in this tale is “Oh”?

source

Bella Venezia source

There was a mother and a daughter, who kept a noble inn, where the passing King and Princes stopped. The innkeeper was called Bella Venezia, and while the travellers sat at the table she was talking:

 “What country are you from”

“From Milan.”

“And have you seen one more beautiful than me, in Milan?”

“No, beautiful more than you I have not seen any.”

Then they came to terms: "It would be ten scudi, but you give me five," said Bella Venezia, because everyone who told her that he had never seen a prettier than her, made them pay half.

“Where do you come from?”

“From Turin.”

“And is there any one more beautiful than me in Turin?”

“No, I have never seen more beautiful than you.”

 One day, the innkeeper was asking a traveller as usual:  “And have you ever seen her, a more beautiful than me?” - When her daughter passed through the hall. And the traveller replied: "Yes, I have seen it."

Then, when it comes to reckoning:  “it would be six shields, but you give me three.”

“And who is it ?”

“Your daughter, it is.”

 In the evening the mistress called the kitchen boy:  “Go to the seaside, build a hut with only a small, small window, and lock up inside my daughter.”  He did so then looked at the window and saw in the dark that girl's face, the most beautiful he had ever seen. A little afraid, he spurred his horse on and ran away.

So the daughter of Bella Venezia was locked up night and day in that hut by the sea, she heard the sound of the waves but could not see anyone, except the kitchen boy who came every day to bring her bread and water. But while locked up in there, the girl became more beautiful every day.

“Which country are you from?” Asked the innkeeper

“From Rome.”

“Have you ever seen a prettier than me?”

“Yes, I do,” 'said the stranger.

“And where?”

“Closed in a hut by the sea.”

“Here is the bill: it costs ten scudi, but I want thirty from you.”

In the evening, Bella Venezia asked the kitchen boy:  “Listen, will you marry me?

If you want to marry me, you have to take my daughter, take her to the woods and kill her. If you bring back her eyes and a bottle full of her blood, I will marry you.”

The kitchen boy wanted to marry his mistress, but he didn't feel like killing that beautiful and good girl. Then he took the girl into the woods and left her, and to bring her eyes and blood to Bella Venezia, he killed a lamb that is innocent blood. And the master married him.

The girl, alone in the woods, cried, cried, but nobody heard her. Towards evening she saw a small light down there: she approached, heard many people speak, and full of fear she hid behind a tree. It was a rocky and deserted place, and twelve thieves had stopped in front of a white stone. When the thieves had gone away, the girl went to the white stone and said:  “Open, desert!” and the illuminated door opened. Inside there was a table set for twelve, with twelve plates, twelve loaves and twelve bottles of wine. And in the kitchen there was a skewer with twelve chickens to be roasted. The girl cleaned up everywhere, made twelve beds, roasted twelve chickens. And as she was hungry, she ate a wing for each chicken, gnawed a corner of each bread, and drank a finger of wine from each bottle. When she heard the thieves returning, she hid under a bed. The twelve bandits, to find everything clean, the beds made, the roasted chickens, did not know what to think. Then they saw that each chicken lacked a wing, each bread a corner, each bottle a finger of wine, and said:  “Someone must have entered here.” And they decided that one of them would remain on guard the next day.

 “You are good for nothing!” Said the chief, when returning he saw that the house had been visited again and put another on guard. But even this remained outside the door, while the girl was inside, and so, taking the fool every time, all the thieves tried to keep watch for eleven days in a row, and did not discover the girl.

On the twelfth day, the youngest thief wanted to keep the chief on guard; and instead of staying outside, he stayed inside, and saw the girl come out from under the bed. He grabbed her by the arm: "Don't be afraid," he said, "since you are there, detach yourself. We will treat you like a little sister.”

So the girl stayed with the thieves and did all the services, and they brought her jewellery, gold coins, rings and earrings every evening.

The youngest of thieves loved to dress like a great lord to do his robberies and stop at the best inns. So one evening he went to eat at Bella Venezia.

“Where do you come from?” Asked the innkeeper.

“From the bottom of the woods,”  said the thief.

“And have you ever seen a prettier than me?”

“I've seen it,” said the thief.

“And who is it?”

“She is a girl we have with us.”

So Bella Venezia understood that her daughter was still alive.

An old woman came to the inn every day to beg, and this old woman was a witch. Bella Venezia promised her half of her wealth if she could find and kill her daughter. One day the girl, while the robbers were gone, was singing at the window, when an old woman passed by and said: - “I am selling pins! For sale brooches! Beautiful girl, will you let me up? I'll show you a pin for the head which is a marvel.” The old woman, with the air of showing her how a pin was fine in her hair, stuck it in her skull. When the thieves returned and found her dead, they all burst into tears, albeit with the hairy heart they had. They chose a large tree with a hollow trunk and buried it in the trunk.

The King’s son went hunting. He heard the dogs barking, joined them; they were all scratching with their paws on the trunk of a tree. The King's son looked into it and found a beautiful dead girl.

If you were alive, I would marry you, "said the King's son," but even when I'm dead, I can't get away from you. " He blew the horn, gathered his hunters, and had it brought to the royal palace. He made her shut up in a room, without the Queen her mother knowing anything about it, and she spent the day in that room, contemplating the beautiful dead woman. “Dead or undead, I can't live far from her!”

The mother, suspicious, entered the room suddenly.  “Ah! That's why you didn't want to go out! But she is dead! What are you doing with it?”

“At least have her comb it!” Said the Queen, and had the Royal Hairdresser called. The Real Hairdresser began to comb it, and his comb broke. He took another comb and broke that too. So, one after another, he broke seven combs. – “What's wrong with this girl?” Asked the Real Hairdresser. And he touched a pinhead. He pulled slowly, and as he pulled the pin, the young girl took up the colours, and opened her eyes, sighed, breathed, said:  “Oh!” and stood up. The wedding took place. Also tables on the streets. Those who wanted to eat ate and those who did not want did not eat.

Ah Lord!

A hen to every sinner!

To me who am a sinner,

A hen and a chanterelle!

That’s all for this week. Stay tuned next week for a tale from Greece.