The story of Rapunzel is dark and grim, full
of questionable bargains, forceful princes, imprisonment, banishment, blindness etc. But… what if I told you there are even MORE grim
versions of this tale? Older, different, and yes, grimmer than the
Brothers Grimms’? Well, of course that’s why we're here! Today’s treat is a story filled with so
many colorful (and sometimes disturbing!) details, ogres, even WORSE questionable bargains,
ravenous animals, and so so so much more! Do settle in for one heck of a dark fairytale! Our story begins with Pascadozia, who is naturally
pregnant and looking out a window at her neighbor’s garden, craving parsley so much she is about
to positively FAINT! (So far, tracking with Grimm) Problem is,
this neighbor with the lovely garden? Is an OGRESS. Which evidently means that rather than simply
asking to have some parsley please, Pascadozia herself (not her husband) sneaks into the
garden, after creepily spying on the Ogress and ascertaining she has gone, and swipes
a handful of parsley. She gets away with it too! UNTIL… the ogress wants to make some fresh
sauce from her garden and realizes “a sickle had been at work!” She lets out a curse: “May my neck snap
if I don’t collar this thief and make him repent, so that he may learn to eat from his
own cutting board and not to dip his spoon into the pot of others!” I mean, this is very reasonable? Not the neck snapping of course, but it would
be incredibly frustrating to grow and nurture your food just for someone to come along and
swipe it?! Anyway, Pascadozia KEEPS STEALING the parsley
until one day she is predictably caught by the Ogress (who I wish had a name but alas). She’s livid and yells in righteous anger
at Pascadozia who tries to apologize saying it wasn’t gluttony driving her to sin, but
rather she was pregnant and was worried her unborn’s face would be sown with parsley! AND what’s more, at the time of this story,
it was believed that if someone DID NOT give a pregnant person what they craved, that person
would be cursed with a sty in their eyes - making them red and puffy and swollen! So, basically Pascadozia, caught red-handed
(well, green-handed?) stealing says the Ogress is lucky SHE didn’t curse HER with a sty
or two!? But… she never asked directly for parsley,
so how was the ogress NOT providing for her craving and committing this supposed faux
paux? Anyway plot logic aside, the Ogress is unfazed
and feeling a mite murderous, and so threatens to end Pascadozia’s LIFE if she doesn't
agree to give up the baby. Not a fair bargain, but it’s struck nonetheless! I always wonder - why not just ASK for the
plants in these tales? Sigh. TIme passes. Pascadozia gives birth to a beautiful girl,
and names her Petrosinella, which means “little parsley” (aww! adorable!) on account of the birthmark of parsley on
the baby’s chest! This mark again harkens back to some popular
folk beliefs at the time, specifically about why birthmarks appear. That is, if a pregnant person’s craving
WAS NOT MET, whichever part of their body they touched, the gestating baby would have
a mark of the object of that craving on their body in that same spot. It’s of course misguided, but here, Pascadozia
was craving parsley, was denied it, and at that moment must have touched her chest, making
her newborn have that same mark on HER chest. (Which would explain why she was worried about
imprinting parsley on the babe’s face IF she touched her face while mid-parsley-craving,
and why she was so driven to steal it! She was trying to prevent a mark on the babe’s
face.) You don’t mess with pregnancy cravings! Unlike other tales, the Ogress does NOT lay
claim to Little Parsley right away. In fact, 7 YEARS pass, and Pascadozia finally
decides it’s time to send Petrosinella to a teacher. En route, whenever the Ogress sees the kid
Parsley on the road she tells her to “tell your mother to remember the promise!” Which, is kinda grim, right? Petrosinella has no idea of the deathly weight
this promise carries, but it annoys her enough after so many times that she brings it up
to her mother. Pascadozia, living with the constant dread
of being unalived all these years, “couldn’t bear to listen to the music any longer”
tells Petrosinella that next time when the Ogress mentions the promise, to just answer:
“take her!” Which, wowza yeah the mom is basically telling
her kid to tell the ogress to abduct her, but without explaining anything about the
situation, which makes it that much scarier for the poor kid? And, it is scary, because after Petrosinella
tells the ogress to “take her” the ogress grabs her by the hair (ouch!) and takes her
to a forest where the sun doesn't shine much, and locks her in a tower with no doors or
stairs that she spelled into existence. Per usual, the way up and down is Petrosinella’s
hair, which by the way of course is super long (and really strong and healthy?!?!). The story does not say how much time passes,
which would have been helpful for finding out Petrosinella’s age now, alas. Anyway, one day when the Ogress is out, Little
Parsley decides she wants to change up her hair - lighten it up a bit! She sticks her head through the window hole,
undoes her braids and spreads her treated tresses out in whatever sun there is to let
it work its magic! And of course, enter in the Son of the King! Who, when passing by, “saw those two golden
banners summoning souls to enlist in the ranks of Love and noticed that heart-enchanting
face of a Siren amid those precious waves, he became hopelessly infatuated with such
beauty.” LOL I LOVE Baslie’s language! Anyway, Prince decides he must have her, so
begins long-distance “negotiations” aka courting! (UNLIKE Grimm’s prince, who pretends to
be Gothel and basically forces himself into the tower and on Rapunzel) The prince has
max level mime flirting it seams! Over the next few days, he and Parsley bow,
blow kisses, smile, dance, chat, wink and nod, and make tender promises, all from afar! The courting goes so well they make plans
that umm… must take place at night. Petrosinella gives the Ogress a sleeping potion
and then hoists the prince up on her braids where he “made himself a meal of that parsley
of the sauce of Love,” lol and then “lowered himself down on the same golden ladder and
went off to look after his affairs.” As you do. This saucey-time meet up is a regular thing,
and I just have to wonder how the Ogress never suspected a sleeping draught after so many
times? Also that’s one HECK of a potion to keep
her asleep through.. ahem… all of that meal making?! ANYWAY. All would go on and well like this, if not
for a super nosy neighbor “sticking her face in the shift” lol. Tale as old as time. This busy body tells the Ogress that Petrosinella
and the prince are cooking together an awful lot, and he’s there ALL THE TIME and expects
he’ll take her away from the tower one day soon! The Ogress is NOT concerned with Parsley escaping,
because you see, as she so boldly tells the neighbor in a super villain monologue, unless
Petrosinella has the three acorns in her hand, which are hidden in the kitchen rafter, escaping
would be futile. But of course Petrosinella got a bad vibe
from the busy body and listened in to this whole conversation. When the prince next visited, she had him
find the three acorns, which she “knew how to use because she was enchanted by the Ogress”
(like she knew her magic style?). The two love birds make a ladder from string
and run as fast as they can to the nearest town together! It would be TOO easy and happy of a fairytale
were it to end here. And thanks to the nosy neighbor, it dosen’t! The busy body screams so so loudly that it
wakes up the Ogress (even through a sleeping potion, I’m guessing!) The Ogress climbs down the rope ladder and
chases the young lovers “faster than an unreined horse” when Petrosinella remembers
the three acorns! She chucks one on the ground and out pops
a terrifying Corcian hound! It races to the Ogress, ready to eat her in
a single chomp, but she pulls out a loaf of bread (from um where? exactly?) which distracts the rabid dog completely. The Ogress gains once again on the pair, so
Petrosinella throws the second acorn - out of which pops a ferocious lion! Surely there’s no escaping this big kitty
with a maw 2 spans wide and ready to eat Ogress for it’s midnight snack? Time is of the essence, but the Ogress backs
off, finds a donkey in a field, and casually skins it in order to wear its skin... Seems time consuming and messy? Shrug. Wearing her new fresh fursuit she runs back
to confront the lion… who gets so scared of the walking donkey that he is still running
away to this very day!? The Ogress keeps the donkey skin on in case
the lion is on her tail (haha) which turns out to be a bad thing because Parsley’s
third acorn turns into a wolf which, “without giving the Ogress time to find another solution,
gobbled her up as if she really were a donkey”! Yeah wow this got grim. BUT! Our young lovers now walk at a leisurely pace
to the prince’s kingdom, where King dad grants them permission to marry each other! I’m not sure what ends up happening to the
hound and wolf, or the nosy neighbor, or Parsley’s mom, Pascadozia, but I hope they're happy
too. Well, I’m sure they fared better than the
Ogress. And the donkey. Anyway, The End. of Giambastista Basile’s “Petrosinella!” A different twist on Grimm's “Rapunzel.” This Italian story predates their recorded
version by a few centuries, but boy oh boy is it grim in ways of it’s own! Like… Parsley Rapunzel is a murderess?! But there’s so much about this that I adore
- the long-distance courting in particular makes me laugh, and all the little details
are just (chef’s kiss). I do like that Petrosinella later on has,
for the most part, a big say in her own plans, unlike in Grim’s where all the bad stuff
just kind of “happens” to her and she has to deal with it. It’s always so interesting to see what stays
and what changes in fairytales over the centuries. What are some of your favorite details? Let me know in the comments below! Thanks for tuning into hear this delightfully
dark fairytale! Subscribe so you won’t miss the next one,
coming out of the cauldron quite soon. Good bye!
