The Three Aunts

Synopsis

A widowed hunter had a pretty daughter who decided to leave home to find work as a servant. She secured a position with the queen and worked so diligently that she became the queen's favorite. The other maids grew jealous. They lied to the queen, claiming the girl boasted she could spin a pound of flax in a single day. The queen ordered the girl to do exactly that. The girl, who had never spun flax before, asked for a private room and fell into despair. An old woman suddenly appeared. After hearing the girl's story, she offered to complete the spinning in exchange for one promise: that the girl would call her "Aunt" on her wedding day. The old woman finished the task.

The queen was impressed with the fine yarn, which only deepened the other maids' envy. They next told the queen the girl claimed she could weave all that yarn into cloth within twenty-four hours. The queen set the new challenge. A second old woman came to the girl's aid under the same terms. Still not satisfied, the jealous maids then insisted the girl could sew all the cloth into shirts in a day. A third old woman appeared and helped her, again for the promise of being called "Aunt."

Delighted with the finished shirts, the queen arranged for her son to marry the girl. At the wedding feast, the three old women arrived, looking worn and tired. The bride warmly greeted each as her aunt. The prince asked how his lovely bride could have such ugly relatives. The women explained that their deformities came from a lifetime of hard labor: the spinner's nose had grown extremely long, the weaver's backside had become massively broad, and the sewer's eyes were perpetually watery and swollen. Hearing this, the prince immediately declared that his bride would never spin, weave, or sew again for the rest of her life.