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Tale Summary

A young King and Queen are sad because they have no children. On a walk one day, the Queen encounters an “ugly old woman” and tells the old woman that she is upset because she and the King have no children. The old woman promises to set this right if the Queen follows her orders exactly: tonight at sunset, the Queen should take a drinking cup with two handles and place it bottom-up in the northwest corner of the garden. The next day at sunrise, the Queen should find two roses under the cup; she should eat the red rose if she wishes to give birth to a boy, and eat the white rose if she wishes to have a girl, but she should not eat both roses, or she will be sorry. The Queen returns home and follows the old woman’s instructions, but she does not know which rose to eat; if she has a boy, he may be sent to war and killed, but if she has a girl, she will eventually be married off. She decides to eat the white rose, but because it tastes sweet, she ignores the old woman’s warning and also eats the red rose. While the King is away at war, the Queen gives birth to both a healthy baby boy and a serpent-like Lindworm. The Lindworm quickly wriggles away and the Queen assumes it was a dream. The King is pleased with the birth of an heir, and nobody mentions the Lindworm.

When the young Prince is old enough to marry, the King sends him out to find a suitable wife. The Prince is blocked at a crossroads by a gigantic and terrifying Lindworm. The Lindworm forces the Prince to turn back home with the words, “A bride for me before a bride for you!” The Queen admits to her son that the Lindworm is his older twin and must marry before the Prince does. To find a bride for the Lindworm, the King writes to a distant land asking for a Princess to marry his son. A Princess is sent, but she is not allowed to see her husband until the wedding when it is too late to refuse the marriage. The next morning, the Princess is gone, and it is evident that the Lindworm has eaten her. The Prince tries again to seek a bride for himself but is once again blocked by the Lindworm and told that the Lindworm must be married first. Another Princess is sent to marry the Lindworm, and again this Princess is eaten.

The Prince encounters the Lindworm at the crossroads a third time. This time, the King does not expect to find another Princess to marry the Lindworm, because no Princess would dare come after what happened to the first two. However, the King asks his shepherd if he will marry her daughter to the Lindworm in exchange for lifelong riches for the shepherd. The shepherd refuses, but the King eventually persuades him to give up his daughter. The girl is distraught and wanders through the woods, where she encounters the old witch-woman and tells the old woman that she has to marry the Lindworm and will be eaten. The old woman tells her to follow her instructions exactly: after the wedding, the girl should ask to be dressed in ten white shifts, and then ask for a tub of lye, a tub of milk, and an armful of whips to be brought into the bedroom. She should then ask the Lindworm to shed his skin, whip him with lye and wash him with milk. Then she should hold him in her arms, even if only momentarily. The girl does not want to hold the Lindworm, but the old woman assures her that everything will go well if she follows the orders.

The girl follows the old woman’s instructions to obtain lye, milk, and whips, and she and the Lindworm are married. The Lindworm asks the girl to shed one of her ten shifts, and the girl asks him to shed his skin. They repeat this exchange until the Lindworm has shed all of his skin and the girl has removed all of her shifts. The girl then dips the whips in lye and whips the Lindworm, and washes him with milk. She holds him and then falls asleep. The next morning, the King finds the girl alive, with the Lindworm having been transformed into a handsome prince. The King and Queen rejoice at the marriage and the rescue of their oldest son.

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