"Hans My Hedgehog" () is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm (KHM 108). The tale was translated as Jack My Hedgehog by Andrew Lang and published in The Green Fairy Book.Lang, Andrew. The Green Fairy Book. Longmans, Green. 1892. pp. 304-310. It is of Aarne-Thompson type 441.
The tale follows the events in the life of a diminutive half-hedgehog, half-human being named Hans, who eventually sheds his animal skin and turns wholly human after winning a princess.
Origin The tale was first published by the Brothers Grimm in Kinder- und Hausmärchen, vol. 2, (1815) as tale no. 22. From the second edition onward, it was given the no. 108. Their source was the German storyteller Dorothea Viehmann (1755–1815).
Synopsis A wealthy but childless farmer wishes he had a child, even a hedgehog. He comes home to find that his wife has given birth to a baby boy that is a hedgehog from the waist up. They then name him "Hans My Hedgehog". After eight years, Hans leaves his family riding a shod cockerel (; ) to seek his fortune. He goes off into the woods and sits in a tree and plays his bagpipe and watches the pigs and donkeys mate for a year.
A few years later, a lost king stumbles upon Hans after hearing him play beautifully on the bagpipes. Hans makes a deal with the king: he will show him the way home if the king promises to sign over whatever first comes to meet him upon his return. However, the king thinks Hans is illiterate, and decides to trick him by writing an order that Hans should receive nothing. When they arrive at the kingdom, the king's daughter runs to greet him. The king tells her about the deal Hans has tried to make and how he has tricked him. Unconcerned by the betrayal, Hans continues to tend to his animals in the forest. A second lost king stumbles upon Hans and agrees to his deal. Upon his return, the second king's only daughter rushes out to greet him, and in doing so becomes the property of Hans. For the sake of her father, the princess happily agrees to Hans' deal.
In time, Hans My Hedgehog goes to claim his promises. The first king attempts to withhold his daughter, but Hans forces him to give her up. Hans then makes her take off her clothes, pierces her with his prickles until she is bloody all over, and sends her back to the kingdom in disgrace. The second king agrees to the marriage; the princess holds herself bound by her promise and Hans My Hedgehog marries her. On their wedding night, he tells the king to build a fire and to post guards at his door. Hans removes his hedgehog skin and instructs the guards to throw the skin in the fire and watch it until it is completely consumed. Hans appears black, as if he has been burned. After physicians clean him, he is shown to be a handsome young gentleman. After several years, Hans returns home to collect his father and they live together in the kingdom.
Characters Characters list Hans – Main character, with a tiny human's lower body but quilled head and torso of a hedgehog. Farmer (Hans' father) – Wishes for a son "even if it's a hedgehog" Farmer's wife (Hans' mother) First King – Betrays Hans and breaks his promise reward him with his daughter's hand in marriage. Second King – Fulfills his promise and becomes Hans's father in-law. First Princess – Refuses to marry Hans and is punished by being pricked by Hans' quills until she bleeds. Second Princess – Honors her father's wishes and agrees to marry Hans.
Analysis Tale type The tale is similar to other ATU 441 tales such as Straparola's literary fairy tale Il re Porco ("King Pig") and Madame d'Aulnoy's Prince Marcassin.
Motifs The animal husband Polish philologist Mark Lidzbarski noted that the pig prince usually appears in Romance language tales, while the hedgehog as the animal husband occurs in Germanic and Slavic tales.Lidzbarski, Mark (Hg.). Geschichten und Lieder aus den neuaramäischen Handschriften. Weimar: Verlag von Emil Felber, 1896. p. 82. Also, according to Swedish folklorist and Christine Shojaei Kawan (in Enzyklopädie des Märchens), in type ATU 441 the animal husband may be a hedgehog, a wild boar or a porcupine. The Grimms' notes state that in these fairy tales, "Hedgehog, porcupine, and pig are here synonymous, like Porc and Porcaril".
The animal skin "Grimm's tale, "Hans, My Hedgehog," exhibits motif D721.3 "Disenchantment by destroying skin (covering)".
This motif is found in other Grimm's fairy tales and myths as a symbol of psychological metamorphosis. Hans was born half-hedgehog and he cannot break the spell until he is able to burn his prickly hedgehog skin.
This same motif of the burning of false or alternative skins in the attempt to create a single whole can also be found in the Grimm's tale of "The Donkey" (Das Eselein). In these cases, the groom upon marriage "literally undress from the donkey skin or quills.. casting their skins aside like old garments", according to researcher Carole Scott, who thus counts the animal skin as a sort of "magical dress". By shedding the skin/dress, Hans has assumed a new identity.
Interpretations Deformed dwarf The Hans the Hedgehog character is a half-hedgehog, of clearly tiny stature. In the tale he rides a cock like a horse, and the two together are mistaken for some "little animal". Hans is treated as a "monster" in his folktale world, and thus distinguished from Thumbling or Tom Thumb who are merely diminutive humans. Unlike the other Grimms' tale characters who are portrayed as a fully animal form, Hans is the only half-animal half-human hybrid, thus increasing his overall outlandishness.
Researcher Ann Schmiesing engages in a disability studies analysis of the tale and its protagonist. According to her, the Grimms implicitly suggest Hans's outward appearance as symbolic of "a disease or impairment that stunted physical or cognitive growth", and thus Hans's condition is to be associated with disability as well as deformity. Hans therefore qualifies as being classed as the "cripple", or rather the "super cripple (supercrip)" hero figure. The fairy tale "cripple" is stereotypically ostracized and shunned by society, but even after he turns "supercripple", i.e., demonstrates "extraordinary abilities" and "overachievement", this does not vindicate him in the eyes of other folk in the story, but rather only exacerbates his "enfreakment", according to Schmiesing. To the readership, however, the able underdog is a figure that "defies pity".
In this analysis, his level of "freakiness" is also heightened after he requests bagpipes from his father who is going to the market, as does the rooster that he rides.
Variants According to Swedish folklorist and narrative researcher Ines Köhler-Zülch, tale type ATU 441 is reported in Germany, Baltic Countries, Hungary and among West Slavic and South Slavic peoples (although Liungman mentioned the existence of variants in Sweden, Greece, and Italy).Liungman, Waldemar. Die Schwedischen Volksmärchen: Herkunft und Geschichte. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2022 . p. 103. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783112618004Köhler, Ines. "Hans mein Igel (AaTh 441)" [Hans My Hedgehog (ATU 441)]. In: Enzyklopädie des Märchens Online. Edited by Rolf Wilhelm Brednich, Heidrun Alzheimer, Hermann Bausinger, Wolfgang Brückner, Daniel Drascek, Helge Gerndt, Ines Köhler-Zülch, Klaus Roth and Hans-Jörg Uther. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2016 . p. 496. https://www-degruyter-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/database/EMO/entry/emo.6.103/html. Accessed 2023-01-28. Estonian scholars, in the 2009 edition of the Estonian Folktale Catalogue, state that tale type ATU 441 is not very known internationally, being found in the Baltic Countries, Central and Eastern Europe, and in some parts of Asia.Järv, Risto; Kaasik, Mairi; Toomeos-Orglaan, Kärri. Monumenta Estoniae antiquae V. Eesti muinasjutud. I: 1. Imemuinasjutud. Tekstid redigeerinud: Paul Hagu, Kanni Labi. Tartu Ülikooli eesti ja võrdleva rahvaluule osakond, Eesti Kirjandusmuuseumi Eesti Rahvaluule Arhiiv, 2009. p. 569. .
The Scottish version "The Hedgehurst" recited by Traveller storyteller Duncan Williamson has also been published in book collection.Williamson, Duncan. Fireside tales of the Traveller children: twelve Scottish stories. New York: Harmony Books, 1983. pp. 3-14.
German Another version is "Der Lustige Zaunigel" ("The Merry Hedgehog"; actually "Porcupine") collected by Heinrich Pröhle and published in 1854.Pröhle, Heinrich. Märchen für die Jugend. Halle: 1854. pp. 48-53.
Romance In a Rhaeto-Romance tale titled Il tgiau piertg, translated to German as Der Schweinskopf ("The [One With a] Pig-Head"), published by Caspar Decurtins and collected in Surselva, a man and a woman live together and suffer for not having children. One day, she gives birth to a son with a pig's head. When he is older, they send him to the forest to graze the pigs. At one time, a nobleman loses his way in the forest, and approaches the pig-headed shepherd in search of help. The pig-headed son offers his help, but in exchange for one of the nobleman's three daughters. The noble lord promises to bring one of his daughters in three days' time and is helped out of the forest by the pig-headed son. The lord returns home and forgets his promise, but three days later, the pig-headed son appears at his castle riding a rooster. The lord realizes the creature is there to get one of his daughters as bride, and explains the situation to his daughters. The elder two refuse to marry the pig-headed stranger, save for the youngest, who accepts the deal out of love for her father. The cadette princess joins the pig-headed son in church. The priest, thinking that the bridegroom was not baptized, sprinkles holy water on him. This causes the pig's head to fall off to reveal the most handsome prince alive. The elder princesses feel such envy of their cadette, they hang themselves.Decurtins, Caspar; Ursula Brunold-Bigler, Ursula. Die drei Winde, Rätoromanische Märchen aus der Surselva. Chur: Desertina Verlag. 2002. pp. 184-185 (text for tale nr. 66), 400 (classification). .
Slavic In a South Slavic tale published by Slavicist Friedrich Salomon Krauss with the title Prinz Igel ("Prince Hedgehog"), a childless empress and emperor wish for a child even if he is the size of a hedgehog, so God grants them their wish. Seven years later, the little animal marries a human girl, who is advised to sprinkle the hedgehog with holy water, prickle her fingers on three of his quills and let her blood fall on his body. Following this advice, the girl disenchants the hedgehog into a normal youth.Krauss, Fr. Salomo. Sagen und Märchen der Südslaven. Leipzig: Verlag von Wilhelm Friedrich, 1883. pp. 205-208. The tale was translated as Prince Hedgehog and published in The Russian grandmother's wonder tales.Houghton, Louise Seymour. The Russian grandmother's wonder tales. New York: C. Scribner's sons. 1906. pp. 205-211.