MARIAN ROALFE COX: fraudulent exchange of letters

In the sequence of events to which the Cinderella tales leads in romantic and legendary literature, many incidents of the folk-tale are reproduced; but these belong more especially to another class of story, of which, therefore, before examining the legends themselves, I may here give a few examples. The episodes most frequently met with in the romances may be thus briefly enumerated:
[···]
3. Persecution [···] and fraudulent exchange of letters.
4. Reunion in distant lands of [···], husband and wife.
In Gonzenbach's twenty-fourth story, "Von der schönen Wirthstochter / Bella Venezia" (Sicilianische Märchen, i, 148), the heroine's mother, who keeps an inn, is jealous of her daughter's beauty, and shuts her up. A king, however, catches sight of her, and marries her. During his absence at the war the heroine bears a child, and her mother in-law writes to tell the king. The messenger stops at Venezia's mother's inn, and the innkeeper/mother takes the opportunity of exchanging the letter for another, announcing that the queen has borne a monster. The king writes word that his wife and their child are to be taken every care of; but again the heroine's mother intercepts the messenger and substitutes a letter containing the order that the queen's hands be cut off, her monster birth bound to her arms, and that she be cast forth into the woods. Through supernatural aid, Venezia acquires a castle and her severed hands are restored. Some time afterwards, the king, losing his way when out hunting, comes to the castle and asks for a night's lodging. In the morning his wife and child are restored to him.
There is a Greek variant, entitled "La Belle sans Mains" (Legrand, Contes pop. Grecs, pp. 241-256), which story, says Legrand, is a feeble echo of the legend entitled "D'une reine du pays francs dont la toute-puissante Notre-Dame guérit les mains coupées". This legend was inserted by the Cretan monk Agapios in his Auaptwnwv Zwtnpia, a curious book, which is still as popular in Greece as it was two centuries ago. Probably Agapios was acquainted with some Italian imitation of the "Roman de la Manekine", of which he made use.
These folk-tale examples will suffice for comparison with such of the legends as have more points of resemblance with stories of this class than with the story of Peau d'Ane.
After collating the several legends which bear upon the adventures of Cinderella in some of the numerous ramifications of the story, I found that M. le Comte de Puymaigre, in his work entitled Folklore (Paris, 1885, pp. 253-277), had made a précis of some of the same material. I am therefore glad to economise further time, having already given much to the subject, by here and there combining his work with my own in the remarks which follow. "La fille aux mains coupées" forms the motif of his study in connection with the legends. M. de Puymaigre met with this in the course of translating Victorial; a book of the fifteenth century, by Gutierre Dias de Games, giving the life of Don Pero Nuño, to whom Games was alférez (ensign). Accompanying Don Pero to France, Games became acquainted with an episode which he considered revealed the cause of the long wars between that country and England (the Hundred Years' War). Gaines relates how a certain French noble maiden has her hands severed, and is marooned on the Channel, for refusing to marry her stepfather. The Virgin Mary appears to her in a dream, and the girl prays her to restore her hands and take her safely to land. The Virgin promises her reward and honour. When the girl wakes, her hands are whole. A soft wind blowing from the French coast drives her boat to the shores of England. The son of the English king, returning with his fleet from Ireland, discovers her, listens to her strange eventful history, and marries her. Finally, when the Duc de Guienne dies, without heir, the English prince goes to Guienne, and claims the duchy for his wife. The French will not give it up, but drive him from the country. The duke had never been reconciled to his stepdaughter, whom he presumed dead, though he had heard of the miracle; and, feeling his end approaching, he had given the duchy to the King of France. This, says Games, was the beginning of the Hundred Years' War.
The above theme, orally transmitted in the folk-tale at the present day, is found in most of the mediaeval literatures of the West, amongst Celts, Anglo-Saxons, and Normans. One of the oldest forms of the saga is that found in the Vitae duorum Offarum, by Matthew Paris.
In the Vita Offae Primi we read of Offa as the king of the West Angles. The king of Northumbria, harassed by the Scots and certain of his own subjects, seeks the aid of Offa, at the same time asking for the hand of his daughter, and promising to acknowledge him his sovereign. These terms are sworn on the Gospels. Offa sets off to the North, defeats the Scots, and sends his people the news of the war. The bearer of the letters is waylaid by Offa's son-in-law, who makes him drunk, and, whilst he sleeps, robs him of his letters, substituting others which announce that Offa has been vanquished, that he considers his misfortune a contrappasso on account of his sin in having married the forest girl, and that she and her twin children are accordingly to be conveyed to some desert place, and left to perish. This letter reaches its destination; the magnates dare not disobey; the queen is cast out; moved by her beauty, the executioners spare the mother, but hack the children in pieces. A hermit finds the queen through hearing the piercing cries which proceed from the corpses; he places the mutilated limbs together, and resuscitates the children through his prayers. When Offa returns he hears with horror of what has been done during his absence. Seeking to solace his grief in hunting, he one day finds in the cave of the hermit the wife and children whom he had believed dead. In his gratitude he vows to found a monastery at the hermit's request. But this promise is only redeemed by Offa II, in the founding of St. Alban's.
The same theme forms the basis of the Roman de la Manekine (MS. de la Bibliothèque Royale, No. 7609), written in verse by Philippe de Reimes, a trouvère of the thirteenth century. l with the incidents in that class of folk-tale of which I have given specimens.) During the absence of her husband, who has gone to take part in a tournament arranged by the King of France, Joie bears a son. The mother-in-law intercepts the letter which should announce the news to the king, and substitutes another, saying that Joie has borne a monster. The king writes that nothing is to be done till his return; his mother exchanges this letter for one ordering the seneschal to burn Joie. Once more she is saved by the substitution of a dummy, and she embarks with her newborn child. The king returns, learns the truth, locks up his mother, and sets out in search of his wife, walking through fire and ice and encountering many a hardship. After seven years he finds he, where she had found shelter. 
Another version of the Manekine legend is related by Nicolas Trivet in his Anglo-Norman Chronicle. The date of this is 1334.
The Tale of Emare, in the Cotton MS. Caligula A. ii, printed by Ritson in his Ancient English Metrical Romances (London, 1802, vol. ii, pp. 204-247), seems, in all but its bad beginning, to be merely an older version of the Constance story.
The outline of Emare is as follows:-- 
[···]
Emare is exposed, clad "in the robe of noble blue", in a boat which drifts to Galys. Here she becomes the wife of the king. Her husband joins the King of France in the war against the Saracens, and during his absence Emare bears a son, Segramour. The letter which should announce the news to the king is exchanged by the king's mother, and the false letter informs him that his wife has borne a monster. The kindly answer which he sends in return is converted by the queen-mother into a cruel sentence. Accordingly, Emare is a second time exposed. [···]The king returns from the wars, and banishes his mother on discovering her treachery. After some years he goes on a pilgrimage to get absolution. He lodges at the house where Emare dwells, and is served by his own son. The
joyful reunion ensues.
The same story has been versified at great length, with certain slight variations, and under different names, by the poet Gower, in the second book of his Confessio Amantis (vol. i, pp. 179-213, of Dr. Pauli's edition), and after him by Chaucer in his Man of Lawes Tale. The former, who makes the lady whom he calls Constance, or Custen, refers to "the cronike" as his authority.
The story likewise occurs, much altered and abridged, in Il Pecorone, by Ser Giovanni Fiorentino (Day I, Nov. 10). The following is an outline:--
The Princess Denise, of France, to avoid a disagreeable marriage with an old German prince, escapes into England, and is there received into a convent. The king, passing that way, falls in love with and espouses her. Afterwards, while he is engaged in a war in Scotland, his wife bears twins. The queen-mother sends to acquaint her son that his spouse has given birth to two monsters. In place of the king's answer ordering them to be nevertheless brought up with the utmost care, she substitutes a mandate for their destruction, and also for that of the queen. The person to whom the execution of this command is entrusted allows the queen to depart with her twin children to Genoa. At the end of some years, she discovers her husband on his way to a crusade; she there presents him with his children, and is brought back with him in triumph to England.
In Ritson's opinion, the author "may seem to have been indebted to a MS. of the National Library, Paris (No. 8701; a paper book written in 1370), entitled Fabula romanensis de rege Francorum, etc.; but there can be little doubt that this novel was adapted from Nicholas Trivet's Life of Constance, whose Chronicles were written at least forty years before Ser Giovanni began to compose his work in 1378 (it was not printed till 1558), while the Canterbury Tales were probably written very soon after, if not some of them before, that date.
We meet with another version of the same theme in a German Volksbuch. Here it is used to point a moral as well as to adorn a tale, with the following title, both critical and exegetical: Eine schöne anmuthige und lesenswürdige Historie von der geduldigen Helena.
abern aber zum Schrocken in Druck gegeben. Köln am Rhein und Nürnberg. This romance, according to Gorres, is based upon an old poem (also 100YW-etiological) under title: "Von eines Kuniges Tochter von Frankreich ein hübsches Lesen, wie der Künig sie selbst zuo der Ee wolt hon, des sie doch got von im behuot, und darumb sie vil trübsal und not erlidt, zuo letst ein Künigin in Engellant ward." But Merzdorf, who has made an elaborate study of this poem, agrees with Graesse in thinking the Volksbuch version an abridged translation of a twelfth century poetic romance by Alexander of Bernai or Paris, de la belle Helayne.
The epic poem by Hans von Bühel is in seventy-two quarto pages, and opens just like El Victorial, with a French damsel fleeing from her unnatural stepfather. She escapes alone in a little ship from Calais, where she has been living incognito for a while, taking with her provisions, and materials for working in silk. She is driven to England, landing near to London. Attracted by he smoke from a little hut, she induces the peasants whom she finds within to engage her to tend their cattle in return for her daily bread. She weaves some beautiful silk, and the peasant woman takes it to London for sale. The wife of the marshal going to mass, buys it of the woman who sits at the cathedral entrance, and also bids her bring all the silk she has to her. The marshal, seeing the work, the like of which could not be produced in all the kingdom, induces the peasant woman to reveal who has made it, and the end of it is that he visits the French princess, and takes her to live in his own house, and treats her as his own daughter. It being the custom of the king (who is also nameless) to visit the marshal's wife after the transaction of affairs with her husband, he chances one day to see the princess, falls in love with her, and shortly marries her with great ceremony and rejoicing. A sudden invasion of the country by the king of Ireland and Scotland necessitates the king's presence at the head of his army. The poem goes on to relate the usual sequence of events, namely, how during the king's absence the queen bore a son, and the marshal to whose care she was confided sent tidings thereof to the king; how the king's mother intercepted the letter, substituting another which stated that the queen had borne a monster--half human, half animal; how she also intercepted the king's reply, and gave orders to the marshal in the king's name to burn both queen and infant prince; how the marshal burnt two baby animals in their stead, and put the queen and her child in the same ship which had brought her thither; how, after many hardships, she at length reached a farmhouse, where she took service, minding the cattle and doing housework; how, after a time, the Pope took her son to live with him, and gave him land and people. And, at last, how the kings of England and France, both on account of their sins--the former having burnt his mother, the latter having desired to wed his stepdaughter--came to the Vatican to seek absolution; how the joyful recognition ensued, and the heroine was taken home, after calling on the way at Paris, where the French king proclaimed his stepdaughter heir to the throne. Having taken part in the rejoicings in England, the French king returns to his capital, falls ill, and dies, before his stepdaughter and son-in-law can reach him; but when they arrive their sovereign right is acknowledged. The King of England and his son are recalled on account of another invasion of the King of Ireland and Scotland, and in the meantime the queen dies, and the throne of France is claimed by another king. Her husband is broken-hearted at her death, and determines to recover the French crown for his son. The poem ends by pointing out this explanation of England's claim to the throne of France, and of the long wars which ensued (It may actually be an explanation of the Anarchy, the dynastic conflict between Queen Matilda and her kinsman the crown pretender Étienne de Blois, who defeated her, and Matilda's son Henry vanquishing, after his mother's death, the usurper, now crowned Stephen I of England).
The poem consists of 15,000 rhymed verses. The Volksbuch has retained much of the naïf simplicity of the poem, though materially altering the plan. The queen bears two sons, twins who are carried off in the wilderness by a lioness and a female wolf, respectively, and "saved" by a hermit (the female beasts had nursed the feral children, as usual). Helene has her hands cut off for having driven the children away, and the niece of the Duke of Gloucester (who herein plays the role of the marshal) willingly gives herself to be burnt at the stake in Helena's stead. After many adventures, the two confederate kings meet with the hapless queen and her two children in Tours.
Still more intricate are the events related in the French version (alluded to above), published in quarto, at Paris, without date, under the title: Histoire de la belle Heleine...
Counselled by a nun, Heleine escapes in a Flemish ship to Sluis (Port de l'Ecluse), where she enters a convent. Antonius, in his rage, takes ship after her, and sails through every sea of Europe in vain quest. She lives for many a year in her retreat, till Cantebron, King of Sluis, who has become enamoured of her, directs his body guard of Saracens to storm the convent and carry her to his seraglio. Heleine flees in a Spanish ship sailing to Catalonia. But the ship is wrecked, and all save Heleine perish, she being cast ashore on the English coast. King Henry of England, taking his pleasure on the sea, is astounded at her beauty and the richness of her attire, and he rescues her. His offer of marriage she accepts, though she declines to reveal her descent, and will only say that she is "la plus noble Damoiselle de la Chrétienté". The marriage takes place against the wish of Henry's mother. Once more the Saracens threaten, and Pope Clement seeks the aid of the King of Great Britain. He gives it in person, leaving the Duke of Gloucester as regent, and confiding Heleine to his care. Then follows the birth of the children, which the mother, who waylays the messenger at Dover, pretends are puppies, and the fraudulent letters. The Duke of Gloucester cannot make up his mind to burn Heleine, as the false letter directs, so, after cutting off one of her arms, for some unexplained purpose, he puts her to sea. A niece of the duke's, named Marie, offers herself to be burned with two straw dolls in the place of the queen and her sons. The hand of the queen, which had been cut off, is put in a box, and hung round the neck of one of the children. The boat lands them in Brittany. Whilst Heleine sleeps, a lioness (in Northern France!) and a female wolf from the forest make away with her children. She seeks them in vain, wandering at length to the neighbourhood of Nantes, where she takes refuge in a deserted hut, and lives on the alms of the passers-by. A woodland hermit saves the children, and calls one Leo and the other Bras ("Arm"), for having been nursed by a lioness and wearing the severed hand round his neck, respectively. Meanwhile, King Henry has slain the Saracens, freed Pope Clement, and returned to London, to learn the sorrowful fate of his wife and children. He is still bewailing his misfortunes, when his grieving leads to an unexpected revelation. The Duke of Gloucester reveals the truth, and, convinced of the guilt of the queen-mother, the king orders her banishment. London being hateful to him, Henry joins the Kings of Scotland and Constantinople in the war against the heathen of Europe. They first vanquish Clovis, King of Bordeaux, who allows himself to be baptised, and then joins in the crusade. The hermit, meanwhile, has brought up the children, and when they are sixteen years of age he sends them forth to discover, if possible, their parentage. They come to Tours, where the archbishop himself receives them, and changes the name of Leo into Martin, and of Bras into the more suitable Brice. Heleine, too, comes to Tours, and receives rich alms from Martin, who does not know her. And the allied kings come to Tours, where the two promising youths are presented to them. When the King of England opens Brice's box and sees the hand, he is convinced that he has found his two sons. Martin seeks the poor, one-handed woman whom he supposes to be his mother; but, on the arrival of the kings, she had fled in alarm over the Alps. Here, in the Vatican, she is supported by the Pope, her unknown uncle. Brice is taken to London, there to make manifest the innocence of his mother, and then goes with the four kings to Palestine to fight against the Saracens, whilst Martin remains at Tours with the archbishop. When the Saracens are subdued the conquerors journey, whereupon Heleine flees to Tours, revealing in a letter to the Pope that she is his niece. The King of England learns through this letter that his wife is still living, and is at length reunited to her. The archbishop of Tours permits Martin to place his mother's severed hand on the stump, and the two are united by a miracle. Antonius, with Brice and his wife Ludiene, goes back to Constantinople, Henry and Heleine live with Pope Clement in the Vatican, and Martin remains in Tours, where he becomes archbishop.
The chap-book romances of Genoveva, Griseldis, Hirlanda ^{(of Arthurian legend)}, and Florentia (la Bonne Florence, also known as Crescentia or Zumurrud) may be referred to as variants of the story of the innocent persecuted wife, though it is unnecessary to cite them ii connection with the Catskin story.
The episode is related almost identically in the thirteenth-century romance of Mai and Bêaflôr.
They fit out a ship and put her on board with provisions for two or three months, and with all the valuables inherited from her mother. Bêaflôr comes to "Meienlant", where Count Mai receives her, and gives her into his mother's care. Presently, after he has married her, contrary to his mother's wish, Mai is bent for to help his uncle in Spain against the heathen. During his absence, Bêaflôr bears a son; the news is sent to the count, but the messenger is intercepted by the mother-in-law at Claremont (Klaremunt), where she has gone to reside, and robbed of his letter whilst he is drunk, a false letter being substituted. On his return, he is again waylaid, and the count's letter is exchanged for one ordering the death of Bêaflôr. She is, however, rescued from this fate, and put in a boat with her child. Mai returns, and, learning all, stabs his mother and banishes the messenger. Bêaflôr drifts away to her own shores; the shipwright Thibalt recognises the boat he had built for her foster parents. Bêaflôr is again received into their home. Her child is taken to the cathedral to be christened by the Pope, receiving the name of Schoifloris (though in the course of the poem he is only called Lois). Mai comes
after some years, to soothe his conscience, and Lois is sent to meet him. In this way he is subsequently re-united to Bêaflôr. Mention must here be made of the similar case of the Countess of Anjou. (Manuscrits de la Bibliotheque du Roi, by Paulin Paris, vol. vi, p. 40).
After many wanderings, and all sorts of adventures, she marries the Count of Bourges, but the Countess of Chartres, his aunt, is furious at the misalliance--for she is ignorant of his wife's rank--and she plays the role usually assigned to the mothers-in-law.
I have reserved one other version of the ancient romance, this time attaching to the daughter of a Czar of Russia. Again, as in the folk-tales, this is a case of O matre pulchra filia pulchrior. Her story is said to have been composed by Giovanni Enenkel in the thirteenth century. I have taken it from the Gesammtabenteuer of Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen (Stuttgart and Tubingen, 1850, ii, 590). It is called "Deu tochter des Kuniges von Reuzen".
The barrel in which the heroine is marooned gets carried to Greece, where the king espies it and has it landed. He marries the heroine. Then follow the incidents of the king's absence at the war, and the calumniated wife and intercepted letters. The heroine is put back into the barrel with her newborn child, and the waves carry her, where she is rescued by a nobleman. Eventually her husband finds her when he comes to do penance.
A drama, entitled "Un Miracle de Nostre-Dame", the author of which has taken his subject from the Roman de la Manekine, is published in the Theatre Francais au Moyen Age (publie d'apres les Manuscrits de la Bibliotheque du Roi, par MM. L. J. N. Monmerque et Francisque Michel [xi-xiv siècles], Paris, 1842. Pp. 481-500).
The following is an outline of the plot as disclosed by the dramatis personae. 
[···] Heroine is put alone in ship; is found by the provost of the king of Scotland. King questions her as to her parentage, etc. She says she is called Bethequine. Queen-mother befriends her, and she serves as chamber-maid. Presently queen ill-treats her, thinking she aspires to marriage with her son. King asks why she has been weeping; will marry her at Chester, and proclaim her queen. His mother is very angry. He is to attend tournament at Senlis; leaves his wife in provost's care; when her child is born they are to inform him by sealed letter. After king's departure, heroine bears a son. King's mother intercepts messenger, who is carrying news to king, makes him drunk, and changes letter for one announcing that young queen has borne a monster, which they have burned, and that they await orders whether to burn young queen also. King reads letter; sends written order by messenger, who is again intercepted by queen-mother, made drunk, and robbed of letter directing that queen and infant shall be kept apart in secret till his return. Queen-mother substitutes letter commanding that queen and progeny be instantly burned. Courtier, who reads king's letter, is filled with pity, and tells queen, who is dismayed and full of wonder, and prays to Virgin. Chevalier and provost take counsel together, and determine to save queen's life. They put her in a boat without rudder or helm, that she may be at the mercy of God. Lady insists on sharing her fate. She is rescued by a senator, who takes her to his wife, who befriends her, and lets her live with them. King of Scotland returns; inquires for wife and child. Chevalier says they have been burned according to his order. King says lie gave orders for them to be confined in a tower till his return. Letter is shown to him; he questions messenger; sends for mother, who, on being threatened, confesses, and is imprisoned for life. King will punish with death by burning the two courtiers who executed queen-mother's orders. They confess they disobeyed, and spared the young queen's life. He takes them with him, and sets out to seek her. They make pilgrimage. Senator meets the king of Scotland; takes him to his house. Queen hides, being afraid to meet her husband. King sees the child playing with a ring which he recognises as one he gave his wife. Senator tells him how he found the child's mother, and how he has taken care of her. King embraces his wife. They attend the service at which the Pope is to give absolution to penitents. Service is about to commence. Clerk enters in great alarm to say he can get no drop of water from the river, because of a hand which keeps floating up to his bucket. He brings the hand to the Pope; queen says it is hers, and tells the Pope her story. He touches her arm with the hand, which immediately is reunited to it.
The same subject has found dramatic treatment in Italy, in La Rappresentazione di Santa Uliva (Pisa, 1863. The date of the 1st edition is not known). Alessandro d'Ancona has given an account of this play, which he publishes in his Sacre Rappresentazione dei Secoli, xiv, xv, xvi (Firenze, 1872. Vol. iii, pp. 235 seq.). The commencement is almost identical with that of the Manekine, except that the damsel cuts off both her hands. She falls in with the king of Britain, who takes her to his palace, and gives her charge over the infant prince. A baron becomes enamoured of her, and, in repelling his advances, she upsets the cradle, which, as she has no hands, she is unable to replace. The baron accuses her of murdering the child, who has been killed by the fall. She is condemned to death, but the seneschal takes pity on her, and leads her to the forest in which she had been found. The Virgin appears to her, restores her hands, and points her to a convent where she can find shelter. A wicked priest accuses her of stealing a chalice. She is placed in a boat, and abandoned to the waves. Certain merchants come across her, and take her to the king of Castile, who marries her, and shortly afterwards leaves her to go to war. In the meantime Uliva bears a son, and receives precisely the same treatment from her mother-in-law as does Joie in the Manekine. Uliva is once more exposed in a boat, and arrives at length where she finds her husband, who has come to seek absolution for having caused his mother's death in his wrath against her for her wicked machinations. The King of Castile recognises his wife, and all ends happily.
The Rappresentazione di Stella, also published in D'Ancona's Sacre Rappresentazione, has much the same incidents as the story of St. Uliva.
Stella is the stepdaughter of a French queen, who is very jealous of her beauty and popularity. The assassins to whom she is delivered spare her life, but cut off her hands to take as token to her stepmother (notice the Snow White opening!). The Duke of Burgundy finds Stella in the forest and weds her. It is the stepmother of Stella in this case who exchanges the letters.The history of the daughter of the King of Dacia (Novella della figlia del re di Dacia. Pisa, i. 1866. Introd. by Wesselofsky) differs but little from the foregoing up to the point of her first marooning. There a German prince, the Duke of Apardo, sees her, and falls in love with her. The miracles follow. Elisa recovers her hands; directed by celestial voices, Apardo inclines to wed the lovely stranger; and the marriage takes place, leading to the usual plots against the young wife. Once more on the shore from where she was first marooned, Elisa is engaged by another German nobleman as nursemaid to his son. The Duke of Apardo, visiting her master, recognises her as his wife.
The greater part of these incidents are met with again in a Catalonian version,⁵² Historia del rey de Hungria, cited by le Comte de Puymaigre (Documentos de la corona de Aragon, vol. xiii. Documentos leterarios en antiqua lingua catalana. Siglo xiv y xv. Barcelona, 1857, pp; 53-79). In this the heroine, with her hands cut off, lands at Marseille. The Count of Provence marries her in spite of his mother. Learning his wife's story, the count visits Hungary, her country, where he is detained so long at the court that the wicked mother-in-law, during his absence, has time to carry out the usual plot against the young wife. The countess is set adrift on the sea, and lands near to a convent, where the abbess admits her. Five years afterwards, when one day she is at her orisons, she sees a priest who is wanting to say Mass, but has no one to serve it. She is filled with desire to assist him, and suddenly perceives two beautiful hands, which unite to her arms as she stretches them forth. Meanwhile, the count had returned to Marseille; but, feeling angered against his mother, had determined to quit his estates only to return when he had found his wife. After thirteen years' quest, he finds her at the convent, and takes her back to Marseille. They have many children. One of their daughters marries a king of France, another a king of Castile, and a third a king of England.

In the fifteenth century, Bartolomeo Fazio di Spezia wrote a story entitled De origine belli inter Gallos et Britannos, which he acknowledged to be based upon an ancient text in the vernacular^. This professed history of the origin of the Hundred Years' War was forthwith related in Italian by Jacopo di Poggio Bracciolini,^.in a story which was published under the title Storia dell' origine della guerra tra i Francesi e gli Inglesi (Florence, 1542), republished as Novella di incerio autore (Florence, 1834), and as Novella della Pulzella di Francia dove si racconta l'origine delle guerre fra i Francesi e gli Inglesi (Lucca, 1850).
The princess of England is sent for her safety to a convent in the French town of Vienne under the charge of trusty servants. It is the custom of the dauphin of France to frequent this same nunnery in the company of a young nobleman, who is the abbess's brother. One day, the latter catches sight of the young princess through a grating, and every day, under pretence of praying, he comes to look at her. He falls ill, and confides the reason to the dauphin, who at length asks the abbess to interfere in her brother's behalf. Seeing him in danger of death, she is prevailed upon she talks to the princess, pointing out the difficulties and dangers inseparable from monastic life, and persuades her that marriage will ensure greater peace of mind. But the princess cannot consent to break her vows. Hearing of the girl's answer, and wishing to judge whether she who had caused his friend's illness merited so much love, the dauphin determines to have a look at her. Then he falls in love with her himself; and sends proposals of marriage, which she at first rejects, but eventually accepts. The dauphin's mother tries secretly to poison his bride, with the aid of some friends in Vienne. The King of France dies, and the dauphin must go to Paris to attend his funeral and be made king. His mother wants him to abandon his wife, who, she says, is some unknown waif. He is indignant at the request; and his mother, hearing from her friends in Vienne that the queen is too well guarded for them to poison her, bids them calumniate her to her husband. The young queen escapes with her little son and finds shelter. The Emperor Henry sees her, and engages her as nursemaid to his infant. Meanwhile, the dauphin, now king, having heard the false news of his wife's death, and of all his mother's infamous schemes, declares war against her. After three years he defeats her and slays her. Full of remorse, he journeys to seek absolution from the Pope. Dining one day at a feast, he is charmed with the graceful bearing of a young boy, and wants to take him away with him. It is the son of the nursemaid, in whom he recognises his wife. They return in triumph to his kingdom. When another son is born to him, he decides that the elder shall reign in France, and the younger shall succeed to the English throne, which his wife has inherited on the death of Edward. Furthermore, the king enacts in his will that every year, at Easter and at Christmas time, the King of England shall come to Paris and serve at the table of the King of France. This arrangement is observed for a number of years; but one day the King of Great Britain, ill-advised by his ministers, refuses to submit to the performance of such an act of homage; and this was the cause of the great wars, and of the animosity between the two kingdoms, which lasted up to the times of the author of this story.
The collation of similar legends and romances might doubtless be still extended. It seems, however, unnecessary to devote further space to the examination of this class of literature, more especially as the various motifs which it shares in common with the folk-tale are of such a nature as to need, unhappily, neither myth nor fiction to account for their origin, or to explain their application in any particular connection.
"Non ragionam di lor, ma guarda e passa."

30: An analysis of la Manekine is given in l'Histoire litteraire de la France, t. xxii, p. 864. See also t. xv, p. 394; t. xxii, p. 228; t, xxiii, p. 680.

31: This is the Philippe of Beaumanoir who wrote the Coutumes du Beauvoisis and the Blonde d'Oxford. Suchier thinks (see op. cit.) that he most probably visited England in his youth, and there made acquaintance with the Manekine. He considers it improbable that the Vita Offa Primi was his source, as Philippe's version does not share in its disfigurements.

32: Nicolas Trivet was art English Dominican friar. He is said to have been educated in his early years in London, and afterwards to have studied at Oxford. He informs us, in the prologue to the Annales Regum Angliae that he spent some time in study in Paris.

34: For the chief alterations see preface to Trivet's Life of Constance in Originals and Analogues of some of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, edited by Furnivall, Brock, and Clouston, p. vi.
37: See Clouston on "The Innocent Persecuted Wife", in Originals and Analogues, pp. 367 ff.
40: See Graesse, Die Grossen Sagenkreise des Mittelalters. 
42: Heleine's adventures are thus made to take place in the fourth century, if she was the mother of Saint Martin, Bishop of Tours (374).

43: For further details, see Gorres, op. cit., p. 138; and Ch. Nisard, Histoire des livres populaires, i, pp. 415 ff. The same legend is told also in Backstrom's Svenska Folkböcker, i, 188, "Helena Antonia af Constantinopel"; and in R. Nyerup's Morskabstasning: Danmark og Norge (1816), p. 138, "Den talmodige Helene". (See Merzdorf, op. cit., pp. 18 ff. for references to Dutch, Danish, and Swedish translations.

Dieses Märchen „entstammt der Mondmythologie und zeigt in eindrucksvollen Bildern, was Leid, Widersprüche und Enttäuschungen positiv bewirken und wie sie uns im Leben voranbringen können. [… Es geht] um die Balance von Männlichem und Weiblichem, um Festhalten und Loslassen.“

Nun einige Lesemöglichkeiten zur Subjektwerdung:

Immer matter werdend – wir sehen dieses grausame Mondphasenspiel allmonatlich am Himmel – findet sie – das sehen wir allabendlich – ihren Prinzgemahl, die Sonne. Die äußerste Erschöpfung bringt als Leidensende die hochzeitliche Vereinigung beider; Aus der schmalen Mondsichel steigt allmonatlich das gemeinsame Kind, der wachsende Mond. Leid wird zu Glück und Regeneration, um wieder im neuen Lauf zu versinken. Was dabei nicht zu sehen ist, ist die Hoffnung wider alle Hoffnung auf ein Ende des Schicksalslaufes, auf bleibendes Glück, auf wahre Vollendung. Diese naturmythologische Deutung löst Eugen Drewermann in eine tiefenpsychologische: Der Wald als Ort des Unbewussten, wo der Mensch seinem Schatten begegnet; der Weg als Irrweg und Zuflucht des Menschen; der Baum des Lebens (Erkenntnis und Wahrheit): Dies sind quasi die Zutaten des Märchens. Die Personen darin: der Teufel als die innerste Eigenversuchung (unschuldig schuldig), das Mädchen als innerste Lebenshoffnung (das Selbst, das es zu verlieren gilt; die Macht der Verwandlung und die Eigenverantwortung; die Seele wie die Freiheit, die es oft schmerzlich zu erringen gilt),  der Priester (Er sollte den Geist anreden. An dieser Figur ließen sich religiöse Behinderungen wie auch Freisetzungen an der Subjektwerdung weiterdenken.), die Mutter (Gnadenhaftigkeit des Daseins), der König (symbolischer Vater, der zunächst die Krüppelhaftigkeit nur verlängert). 

Sie geht in die Welt hinaus und wünscht als Nicht-Handeln-Könnende Mitleid der Anderen, wissend dies ist kein Leben. Sie richtet sich’s also in den eigenen Hemmungen zunächst ein und findet dadurch ihren König (Übertragungsliebe). In einem umgekehrten Sündenfall (Gen 3, 24) lernt sie die Erlaubtheit des Verbotenen (Sitte und Entschuldung) und Mut zur Schuld. Sie lernt erstmals um. Die Großzügigkeit des Königs muss ihr göttlich vorkommen, erzeugt aber Schuldgefühle und Missverständnisse, als lebten sie in entfernten Ländern und der Teufel verdrehe jedes Wort. Aber es sind des Königs Gaben, die an ihr wachsen, nicht die eigenen Hände zunächst. Die Gültigkeit dieser Liebe ist noch keine. Sie muss wieder ausziehen: Diesmal aus dem selbst zum Selbst. Und dies gelingt ihr transzendierend in der Hinwendung von vermeintlicher Verlässlichkeit der Menschen hin zu einem absoluten Seinsgrund. Nicht Menschen sind einander alles! Den Halt in einem Nichtmenschlichen zu finden, ermöglicht ein Leben unter Menschen. In so einem Weltenhaus wohnt ein jeder frei!

Ohne Schuld kann das Mädchen etwas in die Hand nehmen (auch sein eigenes Leben). Der ewigen Vereinigung mit dem König steht nun nichts mehr entgegen.

Die in Zürich tätige Psychodramatherapeutin und Psychologin, Maja Storch, macht uns Frauen hier mit der analytischen Pschyologie von C.G. Jung „vertraut, und erklärt, warum wir starken Frauen in der heutigen Zeit in dem romantischen Dilemma stecken. [...]
Sie versucht alleine zurecht zu kommen und trifft den Mann, den sie liebt und er liebt sie. Sie kommen zusammen und trotzdem funktioniert es nicht. Irgendwie führen sie die Ehe der Eltern weiter, beide wollen es nicht, er flüchtet bzw. zieht in den Krieg und sie... verschwindet sie auch. Beide begeben sich auf die Suche zu sich selbst. Und immer wieder kommt der Teufel ins Spiel, stellt sie auf die Probe. Der starke Mann begibt sich endlich auf die Suche nach ihr und sie lebt mit ihrem Kind Scherzensreich alleine in einer Hütte im Wald. Und irgendwann findet er die Hütte im Wald. Müde von der Suche ruht er sich aus und legt sich ein Tuch über das Gesicht. Und nun erkennt sie dieser Mann, der sie sieben Jahre gesucht hat, ... Auch der Mann, sieht seine Frau nun anders. Sie ist nicht mehr die schwache Frau, der die Hände fehlen. Sie hat die Entwicklung zur starken Frau abgeschlossen, und hat wieder beide Hände. Er sieht nun, sie braucht nicht mehr seine Hilfe um sich in der Welt zurecht zufinden. Dies ist nun die Grundlage um neu zu beginnen.“Anders als bei Drewermann liegt hier in der Jung´schen Interpretation der Ermöglichungsgrund der Selbstwerdung des Mädchens nicht außerhalb/außerweltlich gleichsam, sondern die freisetzende, erkennende, Geschichte überdauernde, aneinander sich wandelnde Liebe in diesen beiden Menschen ermöglicht für beide die Selbstwerdung.

Der Weg vom Ego zum Selbst zum SELBST

Stufe

Stationen

Männlicher / Maskuliner Aspekt DOMINANZ

Weiblicher / Femininer Aspekt UNTERWERFUNG

3.	Bewusst Stumm – Tabuwahrend	Mann/König Ambivalent suchende Persona	Schwiegermutter Differenzierende Verbündete
4.	Bewusst Ausgesprochen Tabubrechend	Durch Schmerz gewandelter neuer Mann	Geheilte neue Frau Heil gewordene, wieder handlungsfähige Genesende

BOSOM SERPENTS

In Irish Celtic lore (The Wooing of Étaín), a sorcerous queen in her autumn years, seeing how her husband prefers a decades younger maiden, turns her rival Étaín (pronounced AY-deen) into a pool of water. The snag is that Étaín can also cast magic, and turns herself into a caterpillar or a dragonfly larva (different versions), that subsequently pupates...
Decades later, a flying bug (a dragonfly or butterfly, depending on the version) flutters into the Great Hall and starts garnering a lot of the king's attention. And of course the queen goes: FOLLOW THAT BUG! And all the warriors getting their butterfly nets ready... Sounds familiar? (Yes, just like in the Three Oranges/Lemons tale.)
Well, she catches that flying bug indeed, in some versions of the tale. But not in the expected way. So, Étaín flies away as fast as her little wings can take her. Either the rival queen or a chieftain's wife, a descendant of hers (in case this is a centuries-old dragonfly or butterfly) gets Bug!Étaín in her cup and drinks her. Must have been either too thirsty or too distracted, or most likely both, to notice that she had swallowed a living bug until it was too late.
Wincing and coughing and retching to get the little winged pest out of her system is to no avail. And what's most relevant is that the next day she gets morning sickness...
...and of course, nine months later, she births a healthy baby girl, whom she decides to name Étaín...
...she alit on the rooftree of a house in Ulster where folk were drinking, and she fell into the golden beaker that was before the wife of Étar, the champion from Inber Cíchmaine, in the province of Conchobar, so that she swallowed her with the liquid that was in the beaker, and in this wise she was conceived in her womb and became afterwards her daughter. She was called Étaín daughter of Étar. Now it was a thousand and twelve years from the first begetting of Étaín by Ailill until her last begetting.

In a similar manner, in the same mythology, Cú Chulainn is conceived when Ulster princess Deichtine (Dectera), sister to King Conchobar, quenches her thirst, a mayfly or a little humanoid of light having landed in her cup before it was drained; nine months later, due to the doubts about the child's parentage, Setanta -the future Cú Chulainn, before killing Culainn's watchdog- is raised in various foster homes. 

But the time came for her(Deichtire) to be married, so a match was made with Sualtim, who was of noble blood and her equal in every way. But while her fifty maids prepared the bride-to-be, she took a cup of wine, and so caught up as she was in the preparations that she didn't notice the mayfly she had swallowed with the same draught!

She swiftly fell into a deep sleep, and her maids along with her, and while she slept she dreamed of a tall young man with uncannily long arms, who introduced himself as Lugh, one of the Sidhe. He had been in the form of a mayfly, he said, when she had swallowed him, and he told them they had to come away with him.

At the feast, Dechtire was thirsty af (same tho), so they gave her some wine, but a mayfly flew into the cup and she swallowed it.

Afterwards she went to take a nap in her sunny parlor, accompanied by her 50 maidens. In her sleep, the god Lugh of the Long Hand appeared to her and said “Yo whaddup, it’s me, the mayfly. From the cup? Funny story- You and your maidens must come with me.”

But, as Sualdham passed the cup to her, a small white mayfly fell into the drink. Deichtire was so thirsty she drank it all down. She felt the mayfly in her throat, coughed and gasped, but by then it was too late to do anything but swallow it. They gave her more wine immediately.

After a while, whether from the wine or from the chase or from some property of the mayfly, she grew sleepy and left the festivities to take a nap. Conchovor ordered Deichtire's fifty female attendants to go with her to be sure she was all right.

Left alone inside the fortress, Deichtire fell asleep and began immediately to dream that a strange man approached her. He had radiant eyes and skin so bright she could not look long upon him. This man told her that he was Lugh Long-Arm. He had come to her disguised as the mayfly so no one would know him. Lugh wanted Deichtire to come away with him because she had such a gentleness about her that she brightened any place she went. He held out his hands to her and she reached out and touched him.

The parallels between Étain's conception and that of Cú Chulainn cannot be clearer, since they imply the same circumstances. In both cases, a thirsty royal maiden swallows a bug with her drink and subsequently finds herself expecting a supernatural demi-divine child.

----------------------

But this is not the only mythology in which such strange things happen. The oldest fairytale in the world, the tale of Anubis and Bata, written in hieratic (stylized hieroglyphic) script, found in the d'Orbiney papyrus from Pharaonic Egypt, ends on a similar note. But what led up to this was equally bizarre:
So, there are two brothers on a farm. Older brother Anubis, married and childless, the heir to the estate; and little brother Bata, a young bachelor and farm worker. One day during sowing season, Anubis's cougar (lioness?) wife makes advances on Bata (who had come to the barn where she was resting, to fetch more grain) and then pulls a Wounded Gazelle Gambit to make it appear like he (Bata) was the one making advances on her. Of course Anubis believes his wife's little yarn and, after some honest fighting, the brothers split up, a disowned Bata leaving home.
(So far, just like the biblical Joseph son of Jacob/Yosef ben Yakov, or Hippolytus in classical myths. Tale as old as time in its oldest version recorded.)
So Bata goes to live in a secluded valley in Phoenicia (Lebanon) and decides to take his heart out of his chest and hide it in a cedar treetop as a cedar cone (basically, making the very first Horcrux ever in written records). As long as that tree is not felled and the heart is kept alive by the sap, heartless --though not emotionless!-- Bata will be alive. Should he die, as he explains to Anubis during their leave-taking, the older brother's mug of beer will completely foam over, leaving no liquid within.
Right, so Bata lives a more or less lonely hunter-fisher-gatherer existence in the Valley of Cedars in Phoenicia until the gods decide to make him a wife, out of the blue. So this turns into an idyllic young couple living in peace with nature and with themselves, like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden... (more biblical parallels!) until a serpent enters this paradise. The Wadjet cobra serpent on a royal crown, that is...
You see, a sharp branch accidentally cut a lock of the maiden's soft and scented raven hair, and the winds carried said lock across the sea and up the Nile to the reigning pharaoh's royal gardens. The still single ruler was smitten and hell-bent on making the owner of that soft and finely-scented lock of hair his queen, so he dispatched messengers, even whole regiments of warriors of both foot and chariot, to seek out the maiden... and they found her in the Valley of Cedars. Of course the Pharaoh was even more smitten after hearing the full description of such a beauty... and thus a whole royal expedition sets off lock, stock, and barrel for Phoenicia... not only bringing armed men with spears, and bows, and chariots... but also jewellery to bribe the maiden. She was so dazzled by the brightness of the gold and gems that she agreed to lead a courtly life and even told the Egyptians that her husband could only die if the cedar with his heart for a cone was felled. And thus, faster than you can say "TIMBER!!" both the young man and the heart-tree staggered and fell lifeless to the ground.
(Again, more biblical parallels, this time to Samson and Delilah!)
Back in Egypt on the farm, a widowed Anubis (whose wife had just committed suicide, unable to bear the remorse of her wicked deeds --just like Lady Macbeth!) found that all the beer he was served just foamed out of his cup. Time to rescue his li'l brother... So off he set with provisions, and even weapons for self-defense...

He entered the tower of his younger brother, and he found him lying upon his mat; he was dead. And he wept when he saw his younger brother truly was lying dead. And he went out to seek the soul of his younger brother under the acacia tree, under which his younger brother lay in the evening.

He spent three years in seeking for it, but found it not. And when he began looking in the fourth year, he desired in his heart to return into Egypt; he said in his heart, "I will go tomorrow morning". Now when the land lightened, and the next day appeared, he was spending his time in seeking the flower. And he returned in the evening, and laboured at seeking it again. Then he at last found a seed. He returned with it. Look, this was the soul of his younger brother. He brought a cup of cold water, and he threw the seed into it: and he sat down, as he usually did. Now when the night came his soul of his brother sucked up the water; Bata then shuddered in all his limbs, and he looked on his elder brother; his soul was in the cup. Then Anubis took the cup of cold water, in which the soul of his younger brother was; Bata drank it, his soul stood again in its proper place, and he became as he had been. They embraced each other, and they spoke together.

It doesn't just stop here, with a heart being lodged back into its owner's chest by getting poured down his throat with a cool drink.
There is also a similar ingesting-pregnancy motif in the second half of the story:
The resurrected Bata comes to and realises that his wife betrayed him. So he tells Anubis: "We head back into Egypt and I'll turn into such a lovely and healthy young bull that the royals will keep me as a pet." Said and done. (Wait... in classical myth, the royals of Crete did the same before it went disastrously wrong!)
But the Queen is in for a shock when her bull suddenly stops mooing and begins to speak, at least to her (everyone else at court must have been hearing this as mooing!), accusing her of her betrayal. So of course the arms race between Bata and the Queen is on. So she gets depressed, like really listless, and tells her husband that the only thing that may raise her spirits would be eating the liver of her pet bull. Of course the Pharaoh waits upon her hand and foot, and commands that the young ruminant should be sacrificed to the bull-god Apis, but the liver be cooked and served to his queen at the next supper feast.
Said and done as well.
Now you may expect that eating the liver leaves the Queen knocked up with human Bata. It does NOT.
However, as Bull!Bata was sacrificed and his throat was slit, two streams of his blood ran down to the left and right entrance pillars of the Apis temple, flanking the gate. Where two saplings instantly shot up...
About a lustrum later, nay, a decade, two decades, the teak trees, all grown up, entwined over the gate to the temple of Apis. It was then the Queen, now middle-aged and still childless, heard rustling in their branches about her betraying her true love and having a heart tree cut down.
Once more, she looked as depressed as before eating her pet bull, but this time she told her spouse that the cure for her melancholy would be having some nice teakwood chairs at the palace... made from the teak trees at the gates of Apis. Her will be done, as usual.
However, when the Queen is inspecting the cutting down of the teak trees from up close to verify that it's done right and that annoying soul won't resurrect...

...the royal wife, was standing looking on, and they did all that was in her heart unto the trees. But a chip flew up, and it entered into the mouth of the Queen; she swallowed it, and after many days she bore a son. And one went to tell His Majesty, "There is born to you a son." And they brought him, and gave to him a nursemaid and servants; and there were rejoicings in the whole land. And the King (the Pharaoh) sat making a merry day, as they were about the naming of him, and his majesty loved him exceedingly at that moment, and the king raised him to be the royal son of Kush (Crown Prince of the Upper Nile).

Now after the days had multiplied after these things, His Majesty made him heir of all the land.

So he is reborn into royalty and acknowledged as crown prince.

-----------------

The villainess in this Pharaonic tale has ironically rebirthed her own rival. So does, quite relevantly, the sorceress Ceridwen in Welsh myths (we're back in Celtic lore!) to Taliesin, at first her little orphan assistant Gwion. Ceridwen had a potion meant for giving immense powers to her own son Afaggdu, but Gwion accidentally downed the first drops, as he sucked his hands to cool his burned fingertips upon which the potion had splashed... and the chase was on. The shape-shifting interspecies arms race of a chase. The boy turned himself into a bunny to hop away faster than his mistress could run... and... voilà, she was a female greyhound hot on his heels. Taking advantage of the surging river nearby, Rabbit!Gwion plunged in as he turned into a salmon... too bad Greyhound!Ceridwen had become an otter darting off like a torpedo in pursuit of the salmon whose fish-tail had already begun to feel weary. So off he hopped back on land, turning himself into a grain... as Otter!Ceridwen leapt on terra firma, turned into a black hen, and did the very first thing you think a hen does upon spotting grain on the ground:
Then she transformed herself into a high-crested black hen, and went to the wheat and scratched it with her feet, and found him out and swallowed him. And, as the story says, she bore him nine months, and when she was delivered of him, she could not find it in her heart to kill him, by reason of his beauty. 
But of course Ceridwen was far brighter than the Egyptian queen above. So, after resuming humanoid shape, having downed the grain, and then awakened the next day with morning sickness, and the customary nine months (in late October, around Samhain; or in mid-April, around Beltane --again, sources vary), she tucked her newborn into a leather sack and shoved it downstream --down the same stream where the otter-vs.-salmon leg of their race had been swum--, in true Moses style. Fortunately, the new-reborn Gwion was fished up and happily adopted; significantly, on Samhain/Beltane (depending on the version) itself! He would become a great bard and enchanter, even Merlin's own master.
------
In the Kalevala, "Marjatta, the fairest maiden..." a young girl afraid to death of commitment, does some berry divination about her fortunes when a lingonberry ("marja," notice the similarity to her name) suddenly seems to have developed a life of its own, popping into her mouth and down her throat:

Marjatta, korea kuopus, meni matkoa vähäisen, 
meni marjan katsantahan, punapuolan poimintahan
hyppysillähän hyvillä, kätösillä kaunihilla.

Keksi marjasen mäeltä, punapuolan kankahalta: 
on marja näkemiänsä, puola ilmoin luomiansa, 
ylähähkö maasta syöä, alahahko puuhun nousta!

Tempoi kartun kankahalta, jolla marjan maahan sorti. 
Niinpä marja maasta nousi kaunoisille kautoloille,
kaunoisilta kautoloilta puhtahille polviloille, 
duhtahilta polviloilta heleville helmasille.

Nousi siitä vyörivoille, vyörivoilta rinnoillensa, 
rinnoiltansa leuoillensa, leuoiltansa huulillensa; 
siitä suuhun suikahutti, keikahutti kielellensä, 
kieleltä keruksisihin, siitä vatsahan valahti.

Marjatta, korea kuopus, tuosta tyytyi, tuosta täytyi, 
tuosta paksuksi panihe, lihavaksi liittelihe.

Alkoi pauloitta asua, ilman vyöttä völlehtiä, 
käyä saunassa saloa, pime'issä pistelläitä.

Marjatta, korea kuopus, tuop' on tuohon vastoavi: 
"En ole miehen naimattoman enkä nainehen urohon. 
Menin marjahan mäelle, punapuolan poimentahan, 
otin marjan mielelläni, toisen kerran kielelläni. 
Se kävi kerustimille, siitä vatsahan valahti: 
tuosta tyy'yin, tuosta täy'yin, tuosta sain kohulliseksi."

Marjatta the petted damsel, 
Went a very little distance, 
Went to look upon the berry, 
And the cranberry to gather, 
With her skilful hands to pluck it, 
With her beauteous hands to pluck it.

On the hill she found the berry, 
On the heath she found the cranberry; 

'Twas a berry in appearance, 
And it seemed to be a cranberry, 
But from ground too high for eating, 
On a tree too weak for climbing. 

From the heath a stick she lifted, 
That she might pull down the berry; 
Then from ground the berry mounted 
Upward to her shoes so pretty, 

From her pretty shoes arose it, 
Upward to her knees of whiteness, 
Rising from her knees of whiteness 
Upward to her skirts that rustled. 

To her buckled belt arose it, 
To her breast from buckled girdle, 
From her breast to chin arose it, 
To her lips from chin arose it, 
Then into her mouth it glided, 
And along her tongue it hastened,

From her tongue to throat it glided, 
And it dropped into her stomach. 

Marjatta the petted damsel, 
After this had chanced grew pregnant, 
And it soon increased upon her, 
And her burden soon was heavy. 

Then she cast aside her girdle, 
Loosely dressed, without a girdle, 
Secretly she sought the bathroom, 
And she hid her in the darkness. 

Marjatta the petted damsel, 
Then replied to her in this wise: 
" Neither with a man unmarried, 
Nor with any married hero, 

But I sought the hill of berries, 
And I went to pluck the cranberries, 
And I took what seemed a berry, 
And upon my tongue I laid it, 
Quickly in my throat it glided, 
And it dropped into my stomach. 
Thus it is that I am pregnant, 
Thus it comes that I am pregnant." 

----------------

It's even more enticing to find this motif in the New World First Nations lore as well. In a Pacific Northwestern tale (found all the way from Northern California to Alaska), the Raven takes on the role of Prometheus, stealing the light by means of freeing the sun and the moon. To do so, he needs to get closer to those who hoard the luminaries for themselves. And he does so by turning into a conifer needle that drifts downstream as a thirsty maiden of that clan approaches the stream with her drinking cup in hand:

Se changeant alors en aiguille de pin, il se laissa tomber dans le flot et descendit le courant juste à point pour être pris dans le seau qu'elle remplissait. Même sous cette dimension réduite, Corbeau était encore capable d'exercer ses pouvoirs magiques, assez tout au moins pour donner si soif à la jeune personne qu'elle but une grande gorgée d'eau et avala l'aiguille.
Quand il eut dégringolé bien au fond de son petit ventre chaud, Corbeau se nicha dans un coin confortable, se transforma une fois de plus, cette fois en un minuscule être humain, et partit pour un long sommeil. Tout en dormant, il se mit à grandir.

(le Corbeau) prend la forme d’une aiguille de pin, se retrouve dans le seau d’eau et, rapidement, dans le ventre de la jeune fille. Quelque temps après, elle met au monde un enfant étrange qui parvient avec ruse à faire ouvrir le coffre...

Se changeant alors en aiguille de pin, il se laissa tomber dans le flot et descendit le courant juste à point pour être pris dans le seau qu'elle remplissait. Même sous cette dimension réduite, Corbeau était encore capable d'exercer ses pouvoirs magiques, assez tout au moins pour donner si soif à la jeune personne qu'elle but une grande gorgée d'eau et avala l'aiguille. 
Quand il eut dégringolé bien au fond de son petit ventre chaud, Corbeau se nicha dans un coin confortable, se transforma une fois de plus, cette fois en un minuscule être humain, et partit pour un long sommeil. Tout en dormant, il se mit à grandir. 

Un jour il reconnaît les pas plus légers de la jeune fille, la suit ! Comme Corbeau est un très grand magicien, il se transforme en aiguille de pin et se laisse glisser à la surface de l'eau juste au moment ou la jeune fille plonge le seau dans la rivière... Et Corbeau qui a toujours ses pouvoirs fait en sorte que la jeune fille eut très très soif, elle boit une gorgée du seau et avale l'aiguille de pin qui s'enfonce le plus loin possible et le plus au chaud dans son corps...
Au fil des mois la jeune femme se transforme, son ventre s'arrondit...

Even in his much diminished form, the Raven was able to make at least a very small magic -- enough to make the girl so thirsty she took a deep drink from the basket, and in so doing, swallowed the needle.

The Raven slithered down deep into her warm insides and found a soft, comfortable spot, where he transformed himself once more, this time into a very small human being, and went to sleep for a long while. And as he slept he grew.

The young girl didn't have any idea what was happening to her, and of course she didn't tell her father, who noticed nothing unusual because it was so dark -- until suddenly he became very aware indeed of a new presence in the house, as the Raven at last emerged triumphantly in the shape of a human boy-child.

The Raven, a supernatural being, decided to transform himself into a

pine needle. The chief’s daughter would come out to draw water at the

waterhole. Soon she did, as she was thirsty. She was just about to drink,

when she saw the pine needle in the water. Though she wanted to blow it

away, it kept drifting to her mouth. In her impatience she finally swallowed

it. Soon she became pregnant, and eventually gave birth to a boy.

needle... [which got] caught in the basket the girl was dipping in the river...she took a deep drink from the basket, and in doing so, swallowed the needle... [Raven] went to sleep for a long while... [emerging] triumphiantly in the shape of a human boy child...

As she drank from the basket, she swallowed the needle. It slipped and slithered down into her warm belly, where the Raven transformed himself again, this time into a tiny human. After sleeping and growing there for a very long time, at last the Raven emerged into the world once more, this time as a human infant.

When she took a deep drink from the basket and swallowed the needle, the Raven slithered down into her belly. There, he transformed himself once more, this time into a very small human being, and went to sleep for a long while. And as he slept he grew. Months later, the Raven emerged triumphantly inside the house in the shape of a human boy-child, albeit a strange-looking one. 

He transformed himself into a conifer needle and slipped into a bucket of water. When the daughter drank the water and swallowed the needle, Raven changed himself into a tiny person inside her. He grew and grew until she gave birth. Raven-child looked strange indeed...

At length he (Raven) hit on a plan. He noticed that the daughter

went to the well every day for a supply of water. While there she often had a drink. So he

turned himself into the needle-like leaf of the spruce tree and floated on her drinking water

and was swallowed by her. In due season she gave birth to a son who was none other than

Ne-kilst-lass or Cauch (Ravenchild), who by this means was born into the family.

The Raven flew around the girl’s compartment but did not

see her. He stood outside and waited. Soon he saw her coming out of the

house. He turned himself into a pine-needle, fell into the water she was drinking,

and was swallowed. The young woman became pregnant, and gave

birth to a boy.

So Raven feeds himself as a needle of fir or pine through the River 
and is consumed by the thirsty Daughter that he might gain access 
into the house he could not get into. Therewithin the daughter
births Raven, and their small family, being in darkness, does not 
see that it is Raven. 

Somehow the Daughter is impregnated ...this process allowed the
Daughter through her journeys to the River...this being BY Raven THROUGH
the River. This "impregnation" may be comprehended as the knowledge
OF THE LIGHT as understood through her thirst for it, as magnified by
the River: metaphorically... Raven becoming the seed and eventually
the son (the sun).

Raven transformed himself into a Spruce Needle and floated into her basket as she dipped it into the water. Being very thirsty she drank some of this water and carelessly swallowed the 'Needle'. It is through this, a magical conception, that she became pregnant and gave birth to Raven inside the Longhouse.

He transforms himself into a single (conifer) needle, floats down river into the daughter's dipping basket, gives her thirst so that she drinks him down, and enters the house inside of her. Having symbolically impregnated her, Raven emerges as a human child who begins to grow up, as all spoiled children do...

The baby-Raven, known as Ravenchild, cajoles his elders to let him play with the luminaries as toys, throwing hissy fits until he gets those bright balls in hand, and then throwing them away with a strength unlikely of any infant... thus placing the sun and the moon in the sky for everyone to see.

------------

Now let's move on to more recent times, in fact, to last decade. As a tween or pre-teen, I read in an online Swedish newspaper (Aftonbladet, 29th of June 2004) of an Iranian mother of two who had birthed a frog --a frog with nailed fingers and a human tongue-- for a third child. She said she must have ingested the tadpole when swimming in a murky pool:

Tvåbarnsmor påstår sig ha fött en - groda

En iransk kvinna påstår sig ha fött en groda. Hon säger att hon fått i sig grodlarver när hon simmat i en smutsig pool och de sedan måste ha utvecklats inne i hennes kropp.

Doktor Aminifard, som sett grodan, säger till tidningen Etemaad:

- Den har vissa mänskliga drag, fingrarnas form och tungans storlek och form.

Grodan ska undersökas av genetikexperter.

Kvinnan har tidigare fött två vanliga barn.

The woman’s gynaecologist confirmed that the lady in question, whose period had stopped for six months, had undergone sonography in May which showed she had a cyst in her abdomen and that following severe bleeding, she gave birth to a live grey frog accompanied with mud.

Numerous news outlets subsequently carried the story, but in the manner of reporting that an Iranian paper had run the item, not as a confirmation of the facts of the account.

But the yarn --in which the heroine accidentally drinks frog spawn, octopus eggs, or even human sperm which a previous male swimmer had ejaculated!-- was already known in post-30YW Saxony, with a peasant woman, Katharina Geisslein, who had a full frog-pond ecosystem: bugs, frogs, and even snakes inside her gut. Only that she vomited the insects and herptiles instead of birthing them. Moreover, she drank frequently from her village pond.
The rumour spread, and soon both a Leipzig University lecturer and the Court Physician of Denmark were researching on Katharina, to see if it was possible through the scientific method. But all they could yield, using themselves and Frau Geisslein as test subjects, were dead, partially digested herptiles after consuming an emetic; and it turned out to be a hoax, with Katharina having swallowed her animals very shortly in advance before she chucked them up.

---

In the medieval parable Patience, Jonah dwells for those three days in a hyrne (nook or corner) of what is called the "wombe" of the whale or sea monster (whose gender is never specified), but is actually most likely its duodenum (having entered through the mouth and down the throat, and then wound through the belly into a sharp bend). This is even more confirmed when this place is referred to as both "wombe" and "gutte" later on in Patience. The womb and the gut conflate, like in all of these mystical pregnancy tales, in other words...
...and so may do the chest through which the gullet runs as well, the thoracic esophagus being conveniently right behind the heart as it plummets from right to left. Why is it called heartburn, and why the stabbing pain right in the chest, at heart height, upon downing a cold drink in haste? Or that cozy warmth from within after drinking liquor in haste? It's as if it went right into the heart --instead of the gut--, or at least somewhere else inside the chest. Isn't there where we feel that life throbs, as heartbeats and breathing? My witness be (aside from Bata in that Pharaonic papyrus) Calderón de la Barca as he explains, in La vida es sueño, the way a drugged prince loses consciousness:

Viéndole ya enfurecido
           con esto, que ha sido el tema
           de su dolor, le brindé     
           con la pócima, y apenas
           pasó desde el vaso al pecho
           el licor, cuando las fuerzas
           rindió al sueño, discurriendo
           por los miembros y las venas 
           un sudor frío, de modo
           que, a no saber yo que era
           muerte fingida, dudara
           de su vida.  En esto llegan
           las gentes de quien tú fías   
           el valor de esta experiencia,

Después en las plantas superiores, una progresión se afirma: la región abdominal más cercana al suelo, cargada de transferencias de la materia viva, con las funciones de conservación y crecimiento por la nutrición y la sexualidad. A partir del diafragma, esta vida primaria, puesta al servicio del pensamiento individual, en el misterio de las funciones de los pulmones y del corazón.

---

Which brings us further "up north" in the human system, towards the nightmare-inducing description of the Eighth Plague in Théophile Gautier's Roman de la momie, with locusts getting stuck in people's tracheae, entering through their mouths and their nostrils as they breathe in:

[···] elles se succédaient par tourbillons, comme la paille que disperse l’orage ; l’air en était obscurci, épaissi ; elles comblaient les fossés, les ravines, les cours d’eau, éteignaient sous leurs masses les feux allumés pour les détruire ; elles se heurtaient aux obstacles et s’y amoncelaient, puis les débordaient. Ouvrait-on la bouche, on en respirait une; elles se logeaient dans les plis des vêtements, dans les cheveux, dans les narines; leurs épaisses colonnes faisaient rebrousser les chars, renversaient le passant isolé et le recouvraient bientôt...

They followed each other in swarms like the straw blown about by the storm; the air was darkened; they filled up the ditches, the ravines, the streams; they put out by their mere mass the fires lighted to destroy them; they struck against obstacles and then heaped up and overcame them. If a man opened his mouth, he breathed one in; they found their way into the folds of the clothing, into the hair, into the nostrils; their dense columns made chariots turn back; they overthrew the solitary passer-by and soon covered him.

---

Moving away from the realm of mystical pregnancies and the effect of drugs, there are also the stories of joint-eaters, parasitic magical creatures that are unwittingly ingested by unaware hosts... and have them consume far more than the host can handle, giving rather rapid metabolism but also constant fatigue. From the Japanese gaki to the Celtic alp-luachra, the joint-eaters can be seen as an irrational explanation of what real-life endoparasites, unseen in the olden days, do to their hosts. Sometimes the naughty little things even spawn inside their hosts!
The most effective method, time and again, for all kinds of joint-eaters is making the host thirsty, thus making the joint-eaters thirsty as well, but having the host refrain from drinking until the little newt-like or frog-like beasts are forced out through this war of attrition --through the mouth, just as the first one entered.

---

All of these tales might be considered variations of the “bosom serpent” legend, described by Harold Schecter as a tale in which “through some unfortunate circumstance or act of carelessness . . . a snake. . . is accidentally ingested by, or grows inside the body of, the unlucky individual, where it remains until it is expelled or in some way lured out of the victim’s body.” This motif remains popular in films such as Alien, which features a crew member “impregnated” by an alien creature; once the incubation period is complete, the alien lifeform is “born” by bursting out through his chest. As Schechter notes, “like the traditional, oral versions that have been popular for hundreds of years, [the] only purpose [of the birth scene in Alien] is to produce emotional response: shock, revulsion, morbid fascination.”

After all, our own inner workings were thought to be sacred for ages, leaving yet another frontier (aside from the skies and the oceans) on which the establishment could write HERE BE DRAGONS.
What's it like in there? Warm, soft, throbbing... and dark, and generally unknown. Prime territory for fantasies of both humans entering oversized monsters and undersized monsters entering humans.
It was normal for people to have fantasies about evil spirits within them, invasion of their innermost privacy, as normal as it is now... in spite of our whole system being charted down to the last synapses. There is a certain anxiety, especially if the bosom serpent is drunk or breathed in by its host --after all, we are conscious of how important it is not to thirst or suffocate to death--, that the invasion cannot be avoided: it's ineluctable. It may strike us when we least expect it, when our guard is down...