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East of the Sun and West of the Moon
- A Symbolic Interpretation
What meaning does this beautiful tale hold?
Let's dive into it!
- A Symbolic Interpretation
What meaning does this beautiful tale hold?
Let's dive into it!
The story begins : A White Bear approaches a poor man's home, asking for his youngest daughter, in return it would give him riches he hasn't even dreamt of - the White Bear is an avatar of the ancestor. You may ask, why is it white?
Old Norse for elf is ''Alfr'', from Proto-Germanic ɑlβɑ-z, meaning ''White One'', cognate to Latin ''albus'', today present as ''albino''.
The elves symbolize the ancestral spirits, they are the white light, our knowledge, which is immortal.
Therefore a White Bear is only suiting. So let us go back to the tale!
Therefore a White Bear is only suiting. So let us go back to the tale!
The poor man eventually agrees, and his youngest daughter sets off on the White Bear's back. They reach an enchanted castle of silver and gold, upon a high cliff.
In this story the gold symbolism is very present, as we'll come to learn further. The golden/silver castle on a cliff reminds of the Thunder Deity, Perun in Slavic sources, as his mythic domain is the fortress of gold up in the mountains.
It's is a way to strengthen the common narrative - the symbolical rebirth, and literal birth.
So the girl settles in the castle, as it becomes her new home. Each night a man comes and lays beside her, but she never sees him in the darkness of the night - it is the White Bear, he becomes human at night.
This pattern is present in other classic tales, as the metamorphosis of a hero from an ''ugly'' monster, to a beautiful prince.
It symbolizes the correlation between the dead ancestor, and the individual, or child, descendant of him, on his path to acquire his ancestral wisdom. A form of reincarnation, and change, signifying the we and our ancestors are in reality One.
She eventually becomes homesick, and asks to return to her home, so she can see her family again. The White Bear agrees, on the notion that she doesn't speak to her mother alone.
She returns, and of course, eventually speaks to her, sharing the entire story, of how the man appears at night and she can't see him.
Her mother gives her a candle stub, to light, so she can see him, warning her to be careful not to drop any tallow on him.
The White Bear takes her back, night cloaks the world, and she proceeds to light the candle, revealing that he's in fact a beautiful prince. She falls in love with him, and proceeds to kiss him, dropping three drops of tallow, and waking him.
The number three is very often present in out fairy tales - three stages of reincarnation, three heads of a monster, the thrice chthonic deity, the city of Troy ( meaning three ).
Had she waited one year, the prince's curse would have been broken, and he'd be in his human form at day too. Now he has to leave for his stepmother that bewitched him, and marry a princess with a nose Three yards long, in a castle East of the Sun and West of the Moon.
The youngest daughter embarks on a journey to find the castle herself, as she can't follow him. She walks many days until she reaches a house upon a high cliff, there an old woman plays with a Golden Apple.
The golden apple is an avatar of knowledge, as we came to know in my previous tale thread. https://twitter.com/Skytallets/status/1243565243495677954
The girl asks for directions, the woman doesn't know, gives her the Golden Apple, a horse and points her to another home. In the next one the same happens but she receives a Golden Carding Comb.
In the next house the same happens yet again, and she gets a Golden Spinning Wheel.
In the next house the same happens yet again, and she gets a Golden Spinning Wheel.
She is pointed to the East Wind, he takes her to the West Wind, who takes her to the South Wind, and eventually she reaches the North Wind - he is the one who can take her to her location.
Now, she asks three humans, and four winds for directions - 3 + 4 = 7. Seven is another number continuously present in our tales - it is ''the age of reason'' for children, and when adult teeth come in - the child begins a form of ''Methamorphosis''.
In Biblical terms, ''God'' creates the world within seven days - a concept originally borrowed from our ancient Pagan tales and myths.
So our heroine is at last taken East of the Sun and West of the Moon, by the North Wind.
There she goes under the castle window, and begins to play with the Golden Apple and the princess with the long nose asks to buy it ( reminds me of another symbolism ). Joke aside, she is too an ancestral image, so of course she'd have an interaction with the Golden Object.
In return for the apple, the girl gets to see the prince at night, but he is unwakeable, for he's been given a sleeping potion.
The same turn of events is repeated, with the Golden Carding Comb, but when she tries with the Golden Spinning Wheel, some prisoners warn the prince beforehand, that she visits him at night, so he doesn't drink the potion, just pretends to, knowing that it induces his sleep.
They reunite during the following night, and think of a plan - as the prince is to wed the long nose princess on the next day, he'll demand that he'll marry only the one who can wash his shirt of the Three tallow drops on it.
The long nose princess, and all the trolls within the castle fail to wash it, the girls turn comes and she succeeds. The princess, the stepmother, and all their trolls exploded in their rage - all these ancestral figures die, and the reincarnating individual triumphs...
...he's defeated them, overcoming them makes him become them. The forefather' wisdom is now his, he has been (re)born - Urah!
As for the girl and the prince, they leave the castle, taking with them all the silver and gold - another indication that the ancestral knowledge has been acquired, remembrance is achieved.
All our tales are similar, and i repeat myself in these posts, however, the key to understand them is always the same.
Thank you for reading!
Thank you for reading!
