The Snake Prince

In a busy city by the river lived an old woman who was desperately poor. One day she found only a handful of flour left, no money to buy more, and no hope of earning any. Carrying her little brass pot she went sadly to the river to bathe and fetch water, meaning afterward to bake an unleavened cake of what flour remained—and after that she did not know what would become of her.

While she bathed, she left the pot on the bank covered with a cloth to keep the inside clean. When she came up and took the cloth off to fill it, she saw inside the glittering folds of a deadly snake. At once she popped the cloth back into the mouth and held it there. “Oh, kind death!” she said to herself. “I will take you home and shake you out, and you will bite me and I will die, and then all my troubles will be ended.”

With these sad thoughts she hurried home, cloth held carefully; she shut all doors and windows, took away the cloth, and turned the pot upside down on the hearthstone. What was her surprise when, instead of the deadly snake, there fell with a rattle and a clang a most magnificent necklace of flashing jewels! For a few minutes she could hardly think or speak; then with trembling hands she picked it up, folded it in the corner of her veil, and hurried to the king’s hall of public audience.

“A petition, O king—for your ears alone!” When she was alone with him she told how poverty had driven her, how the pot had held a snake that became this necklace, and how she dared not keep what heaven had sent. The king paid her richly and kept the jewel. As soon as he could leave business he showed his wife the prize; she was as pleased as he, if not more. They locked it carefully in a chest.

Soon a neighbouring king sent word that a lovely girl baby had been born, inviting neighbours to the naming feast. The king and queen meant to go—but when he unlocked the chest to choose ornaments, the necklace was gone, and in its place lay a fine baby boy! “Look!” cried the king, dancing with excitement. “Haven’t we always longed for a son? Heaven has sent us one!”

“Are you mad?” cried the queen—until she saw the child and gasped at the darling. “Write to our neighbour,” she said, “and tell him we cannot come. We have a feast of our own and a baby of our own!”

Bells, guns, trumpets, fireworks, and merry-making scarcely rested a week.

Years passed. As the boy and the neighbour’s girl grew, the two kings arranged their marriage with much signing and stroking of grey beards. At eighteen the young prince journeyed to wed her amid renewed rejoicings. The old woman who had sold the necklace had been called in as nurse; though she loved her charge, she could not help talking a little. By-and-by gossip reached the neighbouring palace: there was a strange story about the prince’s birth. The bride’s mother called her daughter. “The first thing you must do is find out that story,” she said, “and to do it, you must not speak a word to him or smile at him until he tells you the secret of his birth.” The princess promised.

After the wedding, when the prince spoke, she did not answer. He could not think what was the matter; even about household things she stayed mute. At last, hurt and puzzled, he begged to know why. Then at last she spoke: “Tell me the secret of your birth.” He was sad and displeased; though she pressed him he would not tell, always answering that if he told she would repent she ever asked. So a cloud lay between them—what should have been fair was dull and sad.

At length he could bear it no longer. “At midnight I will tell you, if you still wish it,” he said, “but you will repent it all your life.” Overjoyed at succeeding, she paid no heed to his warnings. That night he ordered horses, and they rode to the river, to the very spot where the old woman had first found the snake in her pot.

“Do you still insist?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said.

“If I tell you, you will regret it all your life.”

“Tell me!”

“Then know,” he said, “that I am the son of the king of a far country, but by enchantment I was turned into a snake.”

The word “snake” was barely out of his mouth when he disappeared. She heard a rustle, saw a ripple, and in the faint moonlight beheld a snake swimming away into the river. Soon it was gone. She waited alone, with the wind mourning, the night birds crying, a jackal howling, and the river black and silent. Morning found her weeping and dishevelled; no word could anyone learn from her of what had happened, and she went home to live in mourning.

Five long years she wore black and lived apart, grieving for the husband her own curiosity had driven into the river. Then one night a muddy snake came near her bed, reared up, and laid its head on the bedclothes. Frightened, but mastering her fear, she asked, “Who are you, and what do you want?”

“I am the prince, your husband, come to visit you.”

She began to weep, and he said, “Did I not tell you that you would repent? Have you not repented?”

“Oh, indeed I have! I shall repent all my life! Is there nothing I can do?”

“There is one thing, if you dared to do it.”

“Tell me—I will do anything!”

“On a certain night, put a large bowl of milk and sugar in each of the four corners of this room. All the snakes in the river will come to drink, and the one that leads them will be the queen of the snakes. Stand in her way at the door and say, ‘Oh Queen of Snakes, give me back my husband!’ Perhaps she will. But if you are frightened and do not stop her, you will never see me again.” Then he glided away.

On that night she set the four bowls and stood in the doorway. At midnight there came a great hissing and a long rustling from the direction of the river; the ground seemed alive with writhing forms, glittering eyes and forked tongues. Foremost was a huge repulsive scaly creature leading the procession. The palace guards were so terrified that they all ran away; but the princess stood firm in the doorway. Snakes stared with wicked beady eyes; their breath seemed to poison the air. When the leader was within a few feet she cried, “Oh Queen of Snakes, Queen of Snakes, give me back my husband!” The whole writhing crowd seemed to murmur to one another, “Her husband? Her husband?” The queen moved on until her head was almost in the princess’s face, eyes flashing fire. Still the princess never moved, and cried out a second time. Then the queen replied, “Tomorrow you shall have him—tomorrow!” Knowing she had conquered, the princess staggered to the bed and fainted. As in a dream she saw the room full of snakes jostling over the milk until it was finished, then gone.

Early next morning she put off the five years’ mourning, donned bright clothes, swept and cleaned, adorned the house with garlands and flowers as for a wedding. At nightfall she lit woods and gardens with lanterns, spread a feast table, and lit a thousand wax candles. She waited, not knowing in what shape he would come. At midnight there strode from the river the prince, laughing with tears in his eyes; she ran into his arms, crying and laughing too.

So the prince came home, and the next day the two of them went to the palace, where the old king wept for joy to see them. The bells that had hung silent for years were set ringing, the guns fired, the trumpets blared, and there was fresh feasting.

The old woman, the prince’s nurse, became nurse to the prince’s children—at least she was called so, though her part now was to offer them affection rather than undertake their daily care. She was happy to remain part of the family. As for the prince and princess, in due time they became king and queen, and ruled long and prosperously.

Where this story comes from

“The Snake Prince” is one of the Indian tales in Andrew Lang’s The Olive Fairy Book (1907). It ends with the credit ‘Major Campbell, Feroshepore’; Lang’s preface thanks Campbell for tales gathered in India. That brief credit identifies the contributor and his location, but does not name this tale’s narrator or establish where the telling was collected.

The bride who must not ask her husband’s secret, loses him, and wins him back by courage is a pattern found in many lands. Here she faces the Queen of Snakes in a doorway at midnight. The scene is eerie but nobody is harmed, and the story ends with the old nurse loving the prince’s children, as in the source.

Read the original: Andrew Lang, The Olive Fairy Book, 1907 (Project Gutenberg #27826)

Reading guidance: for mature readers. The opening depicts an older woman planning her own death, followed by prolonged separation, frightening supernatural threats and grief.

A closer reading

The nurse links the prince’s strange beginning to his later family life. Poverty first makes her despair; the discovered treasure changes her circumstances, and her continued presence joins three generations. Her affection at the end has value even when she can no longer perform the practical work of nursing.

The marriage begins under competing instructions: the princess’s mother demands the secret, while the prince warns that disclosure will cause loss. The princess can want to understand her husband without that desire being inherently wrong, but withholding all speech turns the question into a test. The later scene reverses that silence: she must speak firmly to a frightening queen. The enchantment belongs to the tale’s supernatural rules, not a lesson that ordinary questions about a partner must be suppressed.

Try this with the story

Compare the princess’s silence after the wedding, her repeated question at the river, and her request in the doorway. For each, identify whose instructions she is following and what she knows about the stakes. Discuss how informed conversation might differ from both silence and pressure.

Talk about it

• Why do you think the princess’s mother told her not to speak until she learned the secret?
• The prince warned her she would be sorry. Why did she keep asking anyway?
• What helped the princess stand firm when the Queen of Snakes came at her? What would you have done?

Related stories

• The Snake-Woman and King Ali Mardan — a Punjabi tale of a snake that takes human form, from Steel and Temple
• The Frog-Prince — a German tale of a prince trapped in animal shape until a princess frees him
• The Five Wise Words of the Guru — another Punjabi story in The Olive Fairy Book, about a young man’s trials