The Girl with the Horse’s Head or the Silkworm Goddess

Long, long ago an old man set off on a journey, leaving no one at home but his only daughter and a white stallion. Every day the daughter fed the horse, but she was lonely and missed her father.

One day she said to the horse, half joking, “If you bring my father home to me, I will marry you!”

The moment the horse heard this, he broke loose and galloped away. He ran until he reached the place where her father was. The father was pleasantly surprised to see him, caught him, and climbed onto his back, and the horse turned around and headed back the way he had come, neighing without stopping.

“What can be wrong with the horse?” the father thought. “Something must have happened at home!” So he let the reins hang loose and rode back. Because the horse had been so clever, he gave him plenty of good feed, but the horse would not eat. And whenever he saw the girl, he kicked at her with his hooves and tried to bite her. The father was puzzled. He questioned his daughter, and she told him exactly what had happened.

“You must not say a word about this to anyone,” her father said, “or people will gossip about us.” He took down his crossbow, shot the horse, and hung its skin in the yard to dry. Then he set off on his travels once more.

One day his daughter went for a walk with a neighbor’s daughter. When they came into the yard, she nudged the horsehide with her foot and said, “What a foolish animal you were, wanting to marry a human being! You got what you deserved!”

Before she had finished speaking, the horsehide stirred, rose up, wrapped itself around the girl, and rushed away with her. Horrified, her friend ran home to her father and told him what had happened. The neighbors searched everywhere, but the girl could not be found.

At last, some days later, they saw her hanging from the branches of a tree, still wrapped in the horsehide. Little by little she turned into a silkworm and spun a cocoon, and the threads she spun were strong and thick. Her friend took down the cocoon and let her slip out of it, then spun the silk and sold it for a good profit.

But the girl’s family missed her terribly. So one day she appeared riding through the clouds on her horse, followed by a great company. “In heaven I have been given the task of watching over the raising of silkworms,” she said. “You must not long for me anymore!”

The tale ends by saying that people built temples to her in her homeland and offered sacrifices during the silkworm season to seek her protection. The Silkworm Goddess is also called the Girl with the Horse’s Head.

Where this tale comes from

This legend belongs to the “Legends of the Gods” in The Chinese Fairy Book, compiled by Richard Wilhelm and turned into English by Frederick H. Martens (New York: Frederick A. Stokes, 1921). Wilhelm’s note places it in the time of the Emperor Hau and suggests the legend began in Setchuan.

His note proposes a different explanation of the name through an association between the horse and the silkworm season. This is the historical editor’s interpretation; the plot itself explains the horse connection through the marriage promise and horsehide. He adds that the wife of Schen Nung, the “Divine Husbandman,” is also honored as a goddess of silk culture and was believed to have first taught women its methods, and that popular belief speaks of three silkworm goddesses who take turns, the second bringing the best silk.

Read the original: Free online text of The Chinese Fairy Book (Project Gutenberg)

Best for older readers with an adult — includes threatened forced marriage, a horse killed and skinned, abduction and a disturbing bodily transformation.

Reading the story closely

The girl’s wish brings her father home but sets off a conflict none of them resolves through conversation. The horse attacks her, the father kills it to prevent gossip, and the hide carries her away. Calling the outcome simply a lesson about promises overlooks the father’s secrecy and the violence directed at her.

Follow the horsehide through three roles: remains of the animal, means of abduction, and covering associated with the cocoon. Then compare the girl’s disappearance with her later public appearance as a goddess. Does the new honor compensate for the loss of her former life? The story leaves that question open; a joking promise cannot justify forced marriage or violence.

Questions to ask

• What does the girl intend by her promise, and how do the horse and her father respond?
• How did the father try to keep the matter secret, and did it work?
• What does this legend explain about silk and the silkworm season?

More stories like this

• The Fire-God — another legend explaining how a god came to be worshipped
• The Herd Boy and the Weaving Maiden — another Chinese legend about weaving and the heavens
• The God of War — a mortal who becomes one of the gods of the empire