A sorceress in a dark forest turns Jorinda into a nightingale and carries her up to a chamber of seven thousand baskets of birds. Joringel hunts nine days for a blood-red flower, touches the little basket and the old woman with it, and Jorinda stands before him; then he touches each basket until the birds are girls.
Long ago there stood an old castle deep in a great dark forest, and in it an old woman lived entirely alone. She was a sorceress, and there was none more powerful in the world.
By day she went about as a cat or as an owl. In the evening she took her own human shape again. She could call the wild creatures and the birds to her, and none of them ever came home.
Whoever came within a hundred paces of the castle had to stand still where he was. He could not stir from the spot until the old woman gave him leave to go.
And if a young girl stepped inside that circle, the sorceress changed her into a bird, shut her in a wicker basket and carried the basket up to her chamber. Seven thousand such baskets stood there already, full of rare birds.
Now there was a girl called Jorinda, and she was lovelier than any other. She and a fine young man named Joringel were promised to each other. They were in the days of their betrothal, and their greatest happiness was simply being together.
One day, so that they could talk quietly on their own, they went walking in the forest.
“Take care,” said Joringel, “that you don’t go too near the castle.”
It was a beautiful evening. The sun shone between the tree trunks into the dark green of the wood, and the turtle doves sang mournfully in the old beeches.
Yet Jorinda kept stopping to cry. She sat down in the sunshine and grieved, and Joringel grieved with her. They were as frightened as if they had been told they must die.
When they looked about them at last, they had lost the path, and neither of them knew the way home. The sun stood half above the hill and half below.
Joringel looked through the bushes and saw the old wall of the castle close beside him. He went cold with fear.
Jorinda was singing:
My little bird with the ring of redsings sorrow, sorrow, sorrow;he sings the dove will soon be dead,sings sorrow, sor… jug, jug, jug.
Joringel turned to look at her. Jorinda was gone, and in her place sat a nightingale, singing, “jug, jug, jug.”
An owl with glowing eyes flew three times around her, and three times it cried, “to-whoo, to-whoo, to-whoo!”
Joringel could not move. He stood there like a stone. He could not weep, he could not speak, he could not stir hand or foot.
Now the sun was down. The owl flew into a thicket, and out of the thicket stepped a crooked old woman, yellow and thin, with great red eyes and a hooked nose whose tip reached to her chin.
Muttering to herself, she caught the nightingale and carried her off in her hand. Joringel could not say a word and could not move from the spot. The nightingale was gone.
At last the old woman came back and said in a hollow voice, “Greetings, Zachiel. When the moon shines into the little basket, loose him, Zachiel, at the right hour.”
Then Joringel was free. He fell on his knees before her and begged her to give him back his Jorinda, but she told him he would never have her again, and she walked away.
He called after her, he wept, he pleaded, and none of it was any use.
“Oh,” he said, “what is to become of me?”
So Joringel went away. He came at last to a village where nobody knew him, and there he kept sheep for a long, long time. Often he walked round and round the castle, but never too close.
Then one night he dreamed. He found a blood-red flower with a great and beautiful pearl in the middle of it. He picked it and carried it to the castle, and everything he touched with that flower was set free from the enchantment. In the dream he won his Jorinda back that way.
When he woke in the morning, he set out over hill and valley to look for such a flower. He searched until the ninth day, and then, early in the morning, he found it: the blood-red flower, with a dew-drop in the middle of it as big as the finest pearl.
Day and night he carried that flower to the castle. When he came within a hundred paces, nothing held him. He walked on to the gate, and his heart leapt. He touched the gate with the flower, and it sprang open.
He crossed the courtyard and went inside, and stood listening for the birds. At last he heard them. He followed the sound and found the hall, and there was the sorceress, feeding the birds in her seven thousand baskets.
When she saw Joringel she was angry, very angry. She scolded him and spat venom at him, but she could not come within two paces of him.
He paid her no attention. He walked down the rows of baskets and looked at the birds. But there were many hundred nightingales there. How was he ever to know which one was his Jorinda?
While he was looking, he saw the old woman quietly lift down one small basket with a bird in it and make for the door.
In a flash he sprang after her. He touched the little basket with the flower, and he touched the old woman too. Her power went out of her, and she could never enchant anyone again.
And there stood Jorinda, with her arms around his neck, as beautiful as she had ever been.
Then Joringel went down the rows and touched the baskets one by one, and all the other birds became girls again.
And he took his Jorinda home, and they lived together long and happily.
Retold by Talerie, Source: Household Tales by Brothers Grimm (opens in a new window)
License: Public domainCopy this text, adapt it, use it however you like. A link back to Talerie is appreciated but never required.CC0 1.0 (opens in a new window)