Ashputtel

A rich man’s wife grew ill. Feeling death close, she called her only daughter to the bed and said, “Stay good, and I will watch over you from heaven.” Soon she closed her eyes, died, and was buried in the garden. The girl visited the grave every day, wept, and treated everyone kindly. Winter laid snow on the mound; when spring cleared it, her father had already taken a new wife.

That wife brought two daughters—pretty faces, ugly hearts—and life turned hard for the child. “What is this good-for-nothing doing in the parlour?” they jeered. “Bread is for those who earn it; send the kitchen-maid away!” They stripped her fine clothes, dressed her in a grey frock, mocked her, and drove her to the kitchen.

She rose in the dark to haul water, light the fire, cook, and scrub. The stepsisters tormented her at every turn. At night, exhausted, she had no bed—only a place among the hearth ashes. Dust stuck to her, so they named her Ashputtel.

When her father set out for the fair he asked the stepdaughters what gifts they wanted. Fine clothes, said one. Pearls and diamonds, cried the other. “And you, child?” he asked his own daughter. “The first twig that brushes your hat as you turn toward home,” she said. He bought the clothes and jewels; riding home through a green copse, a hazel shoot knocked his hat, so he snapped it off and gave it to her. She planted it on her mother’s grave and watered it with tears until it became a sturdy tree. Daily she came there weeping; a small bird nested in the branches, spoke with her, guarded her, and fetched whatever she longed for.

The king announced a three-day feast at which his son would choose a bride. The stepsisters were invited. They ordered Ashputtel to comb their hair, brush their shoes, and tie their sashes for the dance. She obeyed, then cried because she wished to go, and begged her stepmother. “You?” scoffed the woman. “No clothes, no skill at dancing—and you ask for the ball?” When Ashputtel would not stop pleading, the stepmother flung a dish of peas into the ash-heap: pick every pea out within two hours, and perhaps she might go.

Ashputtel ran to the garden and called the sky-birds—doves, linnets, blackbird, thrush, chaffinch—to hurry down and help her pick. Two white doves entered the kitchen window, then turtle-doves, then a crowd of little birds. They worked peck by peck until the good peas filled a dish and only ashes remained. Well before the two hours ended they flew away.

She carried the dish in, hopeful. The stepmother refused: still no clothes, still no dancing. Under more begging she doubled the task—two dishes of peas in the ashes, one hour only—sure the girl would fail. Ashputtel called the birds once more; they sorted both dishes in under half an hour. The stepmother still said no: Ashputtel would only shame them. She left for the ball with her daughters.

Alone, Ashputtel sat under the hazel and asked it to shake gold and silver over her. The bird flew out with a gold-and-silver gown and spangled silk slippers. Dressed in them, she followed to the feast. Her sisters never guessed who she was; they took her for a foreign princess and assumed Ashputtel was still filthy at home.

The prince claimed her hand and danced with her alone, turning other partners away. Late at night she wanted to leave. He offered to walk her home so he could learn her house, but she slipped off and ran. He chased; she darted into the pigeon-house and barred the door. He waited in the yard until her father returned from the feast and told him the unknown girl had hidden among the pigeons. Father and prince forced the door—empty. Indoors, Ashputtel was already in her grey frock by the ashes, her dim lamp glowing in the chimney, having raced through the pigeon-house to the hazel, left the fine clothes for the bird to carry off, and lain down in the soot as if she had never been away.

On the second feast day, after the others left, she called to the hazel. The bird brought a richer gown than the first. At the ball her beauty drew stares; the prince waited for her at the door, danced with her, and kept other guests from cutting in. When she fled at night he followed into the garden behind her father’s house. A pear-tree heavy with ripe fruit stood there; not knowing where else to hide, she climbed it unseen. He lost her among the leaves and told her father he thought she had sprung into that tree. Wondering if it could be Ashputtel, the father fetched an axe; they cut the tree down and found no one in the branches. In the kitchen she lay among the ashes in her grey frock, having slid down the far side and returned the clothes to the bird at the hazel.

On the third day she called to the tree once more. The bird brought the finest dress yet and slippers of solid gold. Guests could scarcely speak for wonder; the prince danced only with her. At leaving time he meant to hold her, yet she broke free so fast that her left golden slipper tumbled on the stairs.

He kept the shoe and told his father the next day that whoever it fitted would be his wife. Both stepsisters rejoiced—they prided themselves on fine feet. The elder tried first. Her great toe would not enter. Her mother handed her a knife. “Cut the toe off,” she said. “A queen need not walk.” The girl obeyed, forced the shoe on, and rode off beside the prince.

They passed Ashputtel’s hazel. A dove called from the branch that the shoe was too small, that he should look for his true bride, that the rider beside him was false. He dismounted, saw blood, and knew the cheat. He brought her home and said the other sister must try. She fitted all but the heel; her mother jammed it until blood ran, and the prince rode off with her.

At the hazel the dove warned him. Blood soaked her stocking red. He turned back. “Neither is the true bride,” he told the father; “have you any other daughter?” “Only dirty little Ashputtel,” the man said—child of the first wife, surely not the one. The prince demanded her. The stepmother called her too filthy to appear; he insisted. Ashputtel washed, entered, and curtsied. He held out the golden slipper. She slipped off her left work-shoe and set her foot in the gold—it fitted as if made for her. Looking into her face, he knew her. “This is the right bride.” Stepmother and sisters went pale with rage as he lifted Ashputtel onto his horse. At the hazel the dove sang that the shoe was hers and she was the true one at his side. Then it perched on her right shoulder and rode home with them.

Where this tale comes from

“Ashputtel” is the Grimm Cinderella as told in Project Gutenberg’s Grimms’ Fairy Tales (#2591), whose preparer bases the text on the translations of Edgar Taylor and Marian Edwardes. Margaret Hunt translates the German title “Aschenputtel” as “Cinderella” and lists it as number 21.

Charles Perrault’s French “Cinderella” of 1697 has a fairy godmother and a glass slipper. Here the help comes from a hazel-tree on the mother’s grave and the birds that live in it, and the slipper is gold. The elder stepsister cuts off a toe; the younger’s heel is forced into the shoe until it bleeds. Those are the details in the Taylor/Edwardes text. This version ends with the dove riding with Ashputtel and does not add a later punishment of the sisters.

Read the original: Grimms’ Fairy Tales (Project Gutenberg #2591)

Reading guidance: older readers. Includes sustained household abuse, a father failing to protect his child, and a parent urging bodily injury to secure a royal marriage. The bloody shoe tests make this version unsuitable as an unqualified young-child Cinderella recommendation.

Reading the story closely

The stepmother changes the conditions after each completed task. That makes the pea sorting a way to exclude Ashputtel, not an honest test of whether she is ready for the feast. Her father supplies the twig that helps her, yet later dismisses her when the prince asks about another daughter. The story allows those helpful and harmful actions to belong to the same adult.

Write the promised condition and actual response for each sorting task. Then compare recognition through clothes at the feast with recognition through the shoe and face at home. The birds do more than provide finery: they expose a deception that the prince twice fails to notice for himself.

Talk about it

• Why do you think the birds and the hazel-tree helped Ashputtel when no one else would?
• What made the prince realise the stepsisters were not his true bride?
• How is this Cinderella different from other versions you know, and which do you like better?

Related stories

• Cinderella (Aschenputtel) — another telling of the same Grimm tale, with the hazel-tree and the helpful doves
• Cat-Skin — a Grimm princess hides her beauty in a kitchen until a royal ball reveals her
• Mother Holle — another tale of contrasting treatment of two daughters and unequal rewards