Extra Credit Reading Notes: Celtic Fairy Tales, Part A

Gold-Tree and Silver-Tree

Gold tree. Source: Pixabay

This story is a lot like the dark version of Snow White, except instead of an evil stepmother, it's an evil mother.  Silver-tree goes to ask a trout (who I'm assuming is magical) in a well if she is "the most beautiful queen in the world."  The trout tells her that Gold-tree, her daughter, is the most beautiful.  Then, the queen tries to kill her own daughter, three times, three years apart.  And each time she thinks that she succeeds.  The first time, Silver-tree asks her husband, the king (and Gold-tree's own father!) to bring her her daughter's heart and liver to eat.  Coincidentally, a prince had just come in to town to ask for the Gold-tree's hand.  So the king sends Gold-tree with the prince and gives the queen the heart and liver of a goat.  The third time, the queen goes to where Gold-tree is to try to poison her with a drink.  But Silver-tree ends up drinking the poison herself and dies.  So Gold-tree lives happily ever after.

One thing I wish this story had was a little more background and Gold-tree and the prince's relationship.  Maybe the king didn't want to give his daughter to him but felt he had no choice because he had to protect her from the queen.

Bibliography: Gold-Tree and Silver-Tree by Joseph Jacobs