Youngest Son - Youngest Daughters

Youngest Daughters

Heroines in fairy tales are more often marked out as stepdaughters, but sometimes they appear as the youngest daughter. In Molly Whuppie, it is the youngest who outwits the ogre. The White Bear in East of the Sun and West of the Moon marries the youngest daughter; in the Black Bull of Norroway, the heroine's older sisters set out to seek their fortunes before her. She may be the only one willing to fulfill a promise that their father made, as in Beauty and the Beast. In The Little Mermaid, it is the youngest daughter of King Triton who falls in love with the prince after she saves him from drowning.

Sibling rivalry may also spring up in these stories, but usually over the youngest daughter's marriage. They may incite their sister to break the taboo her husband has laid on her, as in Cupid and Psyche, or make it appear that she has killed her own children to make her husband hate her, as in The Dancing Water, the Singing Apple, and the Speaking Bird.

Youngest daughters may also appear as not the heroine of the tale, but the bride of the hero; when there is more than one princess, the bride is almost always the youngest, as in King Kojata, The Hairy Man, The Magician's Horse, or Shortshanks. A ballad may feature three sisters solely so that the youngest of them can be preferred. The choice of a younger and prettier sister may also cause intrafamily friction in a ballad.

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Famous quotes containing the words youngest and/or daughters:

    I now thinke, Love is rather deafe, than blind,
    For else it could not be,
    That she,
    Whom I adore so much, should so slight me,
    And cast my love behind:
    I’m sure my language to her, was as sweet,
    And every close did meet
    In sentence, of as subtile feet,
    As hath the youngest Hee,
    Ben Jonson (1572–1637)

    When the LORD your God brings you into the land that you are about to enter and occupy...and you defeat them, then you must utterly destroy them. Make no covenant with them and show them no mercy. Do not intermarry with them, giving your daughters to their sons or taking their daughters for your sons, for that would turn away your children from following me, to serve other gods.
    Bible: Hebrew, Deuteronomy 7:1-4.