La Fada Morgana (English: Fairy Morgana) is a Catalan fairy tale or rondalla, first collected by Majorcan priest and author Antoni Maria Alcover.Alcover, Antoni Maria. Aplec de rondaies mallorquines. V. 11. S. Galatayut, 1930. pp. 14-21. It is related to the cycle of the Animal as Bridegroom and distantly related to the Graeco-Roman myth of Cupid and Psyche, in that the heroine is forced to perform difficult tasks for a witch.
Summary A powerful and wise queen named Fairy Morgana wants to marry her son Beuteusell to an equally wise maiden. In order to prove herself, the bride-to-be must pass a series of tests designed by the Queen.
Prince Beuteusell meets a peasant maiden named Joana and asks her father's approval for their marriage. Her father boasts that Joana is even wiser than the queen Fairy Morgana, and a maidservant overhears it. She tells the queen of the boast and she summons father and daughter to her court. The queen dismisses the father, but orders Joana to stay, for she intends to set a difficult task for the girl.
The task is to visit Fairy Morgana's mother and ask the old woman for two boxes containing songs inside: the capsa del Bon Jorn and the capsa del congrás. Beuteusell talks to Joana in secret and gives her information on how to approach his grandmother.
Joana passes through a field and compliments a tree stump, and helps a man that was cleaning a stove.Gelabert i Miró, M. Magdalena. "Les dones i les coves a les rondalles d'Antoni M. Alcover". In: Nom de la monografia: Paisatge i conflicte social: coves, refugis i trinxeres. A cura de Bàrbara Duran Bordoy, M. Magdalena Gelabert i Miró, Caterina Valriu Llinàs. La Vall d’Uixó, 2019. p. 83. . At last, she reaches the seven-gated castle of Fairy Morgana's mother. She announces herself and enters the royal chamber. The old queen asks her some riddles, which Joana answers correctly, and gets the boxes.
As a last hindrance for the couple, Fairy Morgana asks Joana on the wedding day which rooster is crowing, to which Joana answers: "el Ros" - as it was instructed by Beuteusell. Joana and Beuteusell are finally married.
Analysis Tale type The tale is connected to the cycle of Cupid and Psyche, and, more specifically, to the Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index type ATU 425B, "The Son of the Witch" (Catalan: El desencantament del princep: les tasques de la bruixa).Oriol, Carme; Josep M. Pujol (2003). Índex tipològic de la rondalla catalana. Barcelona: Departament de Cultura de la Generalitat de Catalunya. Centre de Promoció de la Cultura Popular i Tradicional Catalana. p. 124 (tale on page 125). .
Catalan scholarship classifies the tale as type ATU 428, "The Wolf",Gelabert i Miró, M. Magdalena. 2018. “El Tractament De La Dona Com a Pensadora En l’Aplec De Rondaies Mallorquines d’Antoni M. Alcover”. In: Estudis De Literatura Oral Popular / Studies in Oral Folk Literature, no. 6 (February): 16. https://doi.org/10.17345/elop201711-26. a type that considered to be only a fragmentary version of his type 425A.Swahn, Jan Öjvind. The Tale of Cupid and Psyche. Lund, C.W.K. Gleerup. 1955. p. 379. Accordingly, German folklorist Hans-Jörg Uther revised the international classification system and subsumed previous type 428 under the new type ATU 425B, "Son of the Witch".Uther, Hans-Jörg. The types of International Folktales. A Classification and Bibliography, based on the System of Antti Aarne and Stith Thompson. Volume 1: Animal tales, tales of magic, religious tales, and realistic tales, with an introduction. Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia-Academia Scientiarum Fennica, 2004. p. 250. .
Motifs The antagonist Morgana The antagonist, Fairy Morgana, has also been compared to her possible namesake, the Arthurian fairy and sorceress Morgan Le Fay.Gelabert i Miró, M. Magdalena. 2018. “El Tractament De La Dona Com a Pensadora En l’Aplec De Rondaies Mallorquines d’Antoni M. Alcover”. In: Estudis De Literatura Oral Popular / Studies in Oral Folk Literature, no. 6 (February): 16-17. https://doi.org/10.17345/elop201711-26.Robles, Lourdes Soriano. "The "matière de Bretagne" in the Corona de Aragón". In: The Arthur of the Iberians: the arthurian legend in the Spanish and Portuguese worlds. Edited by David Hook. University of Wales Press, 2015. p. 174. . Morgana also appears as the name of the female antagonist in other Catalan folktales of type 425B, adapted as a queen named "Mariana", in a courtly scenario.Poveda, Jaume Albero. "Rondalla «El castell d'entorn i no entorn» d'Enric Valor. Anàlisi hermenèutic i folklòrica". In: Miscel·lània Joan Veny. Volume 7. Estudis de llengua i literatura catalanes/LI. L'Abadia de Montserrat, 2005. p. 228. .Manila, Gabriel Janer. Paraula: introducció a la història de la literatura catalana. Edicions Cort, 1984. p. 171. .Valriu, Caterina. "La rondalla". In: Soler i Amigó, Joan (edd.). Tradicionari. Enciclopèdia de la Cultura Popular Catalana. Barcelona: Enciclopédia Cataluna, 2007. p. 186.
The heroine's helper According to Danish scholar Inger Margrethe Boberg, the heroine's helper in type 428 may be a young man cursed to be an animal in Northern Europe, while in variants from Southern Europe her helper is the witch's own son, who falls in love with the heroine. Similarly, according to Russian folklorist , in type 428, the heroine's helper may be a wolf (like in Russian or in Serbo-Croatian texts), a cat or a dog; the animal helper then turns into a human male that marries the heroine.
The heroine's tasks A motif that appears in the tale type is that the heroine must travel to another witch's house and fetch from there a box or casket she must not open. German folklorist Hans-Jörg Uther remarked that these motives ("the quest for the casket" and the visit to the second witch) are "the essential feature" of the subtype. Catalan scholarship locates the motif of the box of musical instruments in Greek, Turkish and South Italian variants.Poveda, Jaume Albero. "Rondalla «El castell d'entorn i no entorn» d'Enric Valor. Anàlisi hermenèutic i folklòrica". In: Miscel·lània Joan Veny. Volume 7. Estudis de llengua i literatura catalanes/LI. L'Abadia de Montserrat, 2005. p. 229. .
Variants Spain Catalan-speaking areas According to Catalan philologist , the tale type was "rarely" found in continental Spain, but has "numerous" variants in the Balearic Islands.Valriu, Caterina. "La rondalla". In: Soler i Amigó, Joan (edd.). Tradicionari. Enciclopèdia de la Cultura Popular Catalana. Barcelona: Enciclopédia Cataluna, 2007. p. 186. Indeed, other Catalan variants of the tale type were located in Mallorca, Catalunya and Eivissa.Oriol, Carme. "Les primeres rondalles d'Enric Valor i la seva catalogació tipològica inèdita". In: Miscel·lània Albert Hauf, Volume 4. L'Abadia de Montserrat, 2012. p. 206. .Llavador, Rafael Beltrán. Rondalles populars valencianes: Antologia, catàleg i estudi dins la tradició del folklore universal. Universitat de València, 2011. p. 599. . Scholar Carme Oriol, however, noted that the two tales printed by Amades are dependent on the Balearic tales collected by Alcover. According to Oriol, the Balearic tales form its own ecotype in the islands, which she catalogued as type 425**A, "La Fada Morgana". Similarly, Swahn, in his monograph about Cupid and Psyche, considered that these tales represented a local Catalan tale type, derived from fragmentary versions of his tale type 425A, which has the heroine's tasks for the witch.
Juana and Fairy Mariana In a Mallorcan tale collected by Alcover in his series with the title Na Juana i la fada Mariana ("Juana and Fairy Mariana"), a poor man has a beautiful daughter named Joana, who he boasts is wiser than Fada Mariana, the queen. A queen's servant hears the boast and reports back to the monarch, who sends for the girl and her father. Fairy Mariana buys Juana from her father and makes the girl the new servant at the palace. Fairy Mariana has a son named Bernadet, who also possesses powers like his mother, and falls in love with Na Juana. One day, the prince gives her a pair of gloves and promises to help her if she calls him with a command. Later, Fairy Mariana orders Na Juana to wash a pile of black wool white, for Bernat's upcoming wedding. Na Juana cries over the task, but summons the owner of the gloves. Bernadet appears to and, after hearing her plea, summons an army of small men and women to fulfill the task. Before Bernadet leaves, he advises Juana to deny having had his help, by saying she has never seen him. Fairy Mariana sees the task is done and accuses Juana of doing it with her son's help, but, just as he instructed, she denies having even met him. Next, the queen gives the girl tons of hemp and wool, and orders her to spin them and sew a garment for her son. Juana summons Bernadet by the gloves and he helps her again by summoning small men and women to perform the task. Lastly, she orders the girl to mend, fold and wash every clothe in the castle, which is done again with Bernadet's help. Seeing Na Juana fulfilled every task she forced on her - despite the girl's adamant denial of her son's involvement -, Fairy Mariana explodes in anger, and Bernadet marries Na Juana.Alcover, Antoni Maria. Aplec de rondalles mallorquines d'en Jordi des Racó. Tom VI. Segona Edició. Giutat de Mallorca: Estampa de N'Antoni Rotger, 1923. pp. 32-41. According to Alcover, the tale was provided by a native of Ciutat de Mallorca, Dona Catalina Tomás Pinya, mother of Mn. Juan Aguiló.Alcover, Antoni Maria. Aplec de rondalles mallorquines d'en Jordi des Racó. Tom VI. Segona Edició. Giutat de Mallorca: Estampa de N'Antoni Rotger, 1923. p. 32fn. The tale was also classified as type 425B, "El desencantament del príncep: les tasques de la bruixa".Grimalt Gomila, Josep Antoni. «Oriol, Carme i Pujol, Josep M. (2003): Índex tipològic de la rondalla catalana. Barcelona: Generalitat de Catalunya, Departament de Cultural, 405 p.». In: Estudis Romànics, [en línia], 2005, p. 508, https://raco.cat/index.php/Estudis/article/view/177376 [Consulta: 1-04-2022].
The Maiden Rosana and The Old Mariagna
In a Catalonian tale published by folklorist Joan Amades with the title La donzella Rosana i la vella Mariagna ("The Maiden Rosana and The Old Mariagna"), queen Mariagna is a powerful witch, who dislikes having someone being wiser than her. One day, Rosana's poor father passes by the queen's house and boasts that his daughter is wiser than the queen, which the maidservants hear and report to their mistress. Queen Mariagna then makes an offer to Rosana's father that she will buy his daughter and bring her to her castle. The man agrees and Rosana is brought to live with the queen and is forced to perform tasks for the witch queen: first, to bleach a piece of dark gray wool ("lana burella"), then to weave and sew clothes for the prince in one night with a cartload of linen. However, the maiden prevails with the help from the queen's son, prince Joan, who gives her a magic ring to fulfill the queen's tasks. At the end of the tale, they marry.
Queen Joana