Household Tales · Chapter
The Cunning Little Tailor explained
A proud princess sets a riddle for suitors, promising marriage to whoever solves it.
What happens
A proud princess sets a riddle for suitors, promising marriage to whoever solves it. Three tailors attempt it; the youngest, a seemingly foolish little tailor, correctly guesses that the princess has silver and golden hair. The princess then sets a second task: spending the night with a bear. The tailor outwits the bear by tricking it with pebbles instead of nuts and trapping its claws in a vise, then sleeps safely. The princess is forced to marry him, and the tailor escapes a final attack from the freed bear by bluffing it away.
Themes in this chapter
Virtue Rewarded and Vice Punished
The cunning little tailor, though lowly, succeeds through cleverness and is rewarded with marriage to the princess, while the envious older tailors fail.
Jealousy and Envy
The two older tailors envy the little tailor's success and attempt to sabotage him by releasing the bear.
Social Class and Marriage
A lowly tailor marries a princess, challenging class boundaries through wit and luck.
Characters to notice
- the princess
Extremely proud, sets riddles for suitors; forced to marry the tailor after he solves her riddle and survives the bear.
- the maiden
The princess is the maiden in this tale, though she is not a passive figure; she actively tries to thwart the tailor.
- the boy
The little tailor, though not a boy, is referred to as a 'little' and 'useless' figure; he is the cunning protagonist.
- the servants
The two older tailors who accompany the little tailor; they are envious and later release the bear to attack him.
- Bear
The bear in the stable, used by the princess to try to kill the tailor; it is outwitted and trapped by the tailor's tricks.
Key passages
“The princess has a silver and a golden hair on her head, and those are the two different colors.”
The little tailor correctly guesses that the princess's hair is both silver and gold.
This is the solution to the riddle that wins the tailor the princess's hand in marriage.
“The tailor was quick and stood on his head, stuck his legs out of the window, and cried, 'Dost thou see the vise? If thou dost not be off thou shalt be put into it again.'”
The tailor bluffs the pursuing bear by pretending his legs are the vise that trapped it earlier.
This clever trick saves the tailor from the bear's attack.