Friday, September 16, 2011

Russian Childhood Stories: Princess Frog

When I first saw the title, I thought it was going to be kind of like the American story: The Princess and the Frog. But as I was reading it, it was nothing like that story! It was very different from what I expected. The story is about three princes, they make a bow and shoot an arrow into the world and the maiden who brings back their arrow, they shall marry him. The eldest marrys a prince's daughter, the middle marrys a general's daughter, and the youngest marrys a frog because the arrow was shot into a marsh. (It gets even better!). The king sets three challenges or tasks to his new daughter-in-laws. He wanted to find out which one was the better seamtress, the better baker, and the better dancer. The youngest's wife excels in all the tasks. How you ask? well, you need to read the story! you can find it here: http://russian-crafts.com/russian-folk-tales/princess-frog.html  . In any case, the youngest prince sets out to find his wife after a year because he burned the frog skin. He went from the youngest sister's house to the eldest's house. At the eldests' house, he saved his wife from marrying someone else and they went back to Rus.

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