The New Murrey and Blue blog

There have been previous posts on Murrey & Blue about fairy tales, nursery rhymes and so on, from their original meaning to when they first emerged. Some of them are much younger than I’d always thought, so when, in the course of my writing, I wished to allude to The Sleeping Beauty, or at least to the trope, I immediately searched for its history. My story is set in the late 14^th century, and lo! The Sleeping Beauty theme goes back to the 14^th century.

If you look here you will come to a reference to a prose romance called Perceforest, in which a princess named Zellandine pricks her finger on a spindle and falls into an enchanted sleep, waiting for a prince (this one is named Troylus) to happen along to awaken her. According to Wikipedia this story was written in French in around 1340 and is a late-Arthurian romance. These lovers are not Troilus and Cresyde.

If you go here you’ll read much more about the original tale….in which the dashing prince doesn’t stop short at a kiss. With the result that nine months later the still-sleeping Zellandine gives birth to a baby boy! It is from this baby, named Benuic, that Sir Lancelot is descended.

So, certainly not a tale for children back then!