The Tale of Tales

by Giambattista Basile

  “Now consider the state of poor Cannetella’s heart; she cursed the hour and the moment she had mentioned any of this. Cold and icy, she made meals of tears as often as she lacked food; she damned her fate and blamed the stars for demoting her from the royal palace to the stable, from perfumes to the stink of manure, from mattresses of Barbary wool to straw, and from delicious, mouth-watering morsels to horses’ leftovers. Several months of this life of hardships passed; the horses were given their feed to eat—you couldn’t see by whom—and she subsisted on the scraps from their table.

  “After much time had gone by, she was looking out through a hole when she saw a splendid garden with so many espaliers of bitter orange trees, so many grottos full of citron trees, and so many flower beds and fruit trees and grape pergolas that it was a joy to behold. And she got a craving for a lovely bunch of Ansonic5 grapes that she had caught a glimpse of, and said to herself, ‘I’ll go out very, very quietly and snitch some of those grapes, and whatever happens will happen, even if the sky falls. What can it possibly matter a hundred years from now? Who would want to tell my husband? And even if by accident he found out, what would he do to me, after all? These are Ansonic, not horned grapes!’ And so she went out and revived her spirits, which had grown thin with hunger.

  “But a short while later, before the appointed time, her husband came back and one of the horses accused Cannetella of having taken the grapes, so that Fioravante became indignant and took a knife out of his pants, intending to kill her. But she kneeled on the ground and begged him to still his hand, since hunger had driven the wolf from the woods, and she talked at such length that Fioravante said to her, ‘I’ll forgive you this time and I’ll give you your life in alms, but if the evil spirit tempts you again and I find out that you’ve seen the light of day, I’ll make a stew of your life! So take heed of what I say: I’m going away again and I really will be there for seven years. You’d better toe the line or you won’t ever get an even deal again and I’ll make you pay for the old and the new!’

  “That said, he left. Cannetella wept a river of tears, and slapping her hands, pounding her breast, and pulling out her hair, she said, ‘Oh, if only I had never been born into this world, seeing that I was to have this bitter fate! Oh, my father, how you’ve drowned me! But why am I complaining about my father if I did the harm myself, if I am the one who fabricated this bad fortune? There you have it: I wanted a head of gold so that I could fall like a piece of lead and die in the irons! Oh, this is what I deserve: I wanted teeth of gold, and now my own tooth is turning gold!6 This is a punishment from the heavens, for I should have done my father’s wishes and not had so many whims and tantrums! Those who do not listen to mother and father take a road unknown!’ There wasn’t a day when she didn’t repeat this refrain, and her eyes had turned into two fountains and her face had become so gaunt and yellow that it inspired pity. Where were those sparkling eyes? Where were those rosy apples? Where was that mouth’s little laugh? Her own father wouldn’t have recognized her.

  “Now after a year had gone by, the king’s sewer cleaner chanced to pass by the stable and was recognized by Cannetella. She called him over and came out, but the poor girl was so transformed that when he heard himself called by name he didn’t recognize her and was dumbfounded. But once he heard who she was and the reason why she had changed so much from her previous state, in part out of pity for the girl and in part to earn the king’s graces, he put her in an empty barrel that he was carrying on his beast of burden and trotted off toward Lovely Knoll, where he reached the king’s palace at four o’clock in the morning. He knocked at the door and the servants came out, and when they realized it was the sewer cleaner they gave him a double-soled scolding, calling him an animal with no discretion for coming at that hour to ruin everyone’s sleep, and telling him that he was getting a good deal if they didn’t bean him with rocks and boulders.7

  “The king heard the noise and was told by a valet who it was, and immediately had the sewer cleaner let in, thinking that if he was taking this liberty at such an unusual hour something important must have happened. Once he had unloaded his beast of burden, the sewer cleaner split open the barrel and out came Cannetella, though it took more than words for her father to recognize her; if it hadn’t been for a wart that she had on her right arm she would have had to get right back in. But as soon as he was certain of the fact, he hugged her and kissed her a thousand times and immediately had her drawn a hot bath, and when she was all clean and tidied up he had her served breakfast, for she was faint with hunger.

  “And then he said to her, ‘Who would ever have thought, my daughter, that I would see you like this? What happened to your face? Who has reduced you to this miserable state?’ And she answered, ‘This is how it went, my dear lord. That Barbary Turk made me suffer torments fit for a dog; I found myself with my spirit between my teeth at every moment. But I don’t want to tell you everything I went through, because just as it surpassed human endurance, so it goes beyond the belief of common man. Enough: I’m here, my father, and I never want to leave your feet again. I’d rather be a servant in your house than a queen in someone else’s; I’d rather be a rag where you are than a gold cloak far from you; I’d rather turn a spit in your kitchen than hold a scepter under the royal canopy of another.’

  “Meanwhile, Fioravante had come back from his travels and was told by the horses that the sewer cleaner had stolen Cannetella away inside a barrel. When he heard this he was humiliated by shame and boiled with rage, and ran off to Lovely Knoll, where he encountered an old woman who lived across from the king’s palace, to whom he said, ‘How much will you charge, madam, to let me see the king’s daughter?’ She asked him for a hundred ducats, and Fioravante put his hand in his bag and counted them right out for her, one after the other. When she had taken the sum she led him up to the terrace, from which he could see Cannetella out on a loggia drying her hair. As if her heart had spoken to her, she turned in his direction and became aware of the ambush; hurling herself down the stairs, she ran to her father, shouting, ‘My lord, if you don’t make me a room with seven doors of iron right this instant, I’m done for!’ ‘I should lose you for so little?’ said the king. ‘Even if it costs me an eye, may this lovely daughter of mine be contented!’ and—no sooner said than done—the doors were immediately forged.

  “When Fioravante found out about this he went back to the old woman and said to her, ‘Tell me what else you want from me, and go to the king’s house with the excuse of selling a pot or two of rouge, and when you go in to where his daughter is, carefully stick this little piece of paper between the mattresses. As you’re putting it there say, under your breath, “May everyone fall asleep, and only Cannetella stay awake!”’ The old woman agreed to do this for another hundred ducats, and then she served him a fine relish. Oh, wretched are those who open their houses to those ugly skunks, who with the excuse of bringing makeup tan your honor and your life until it’s as dark as cordovan leather! Now when the old woman had done him this nice service, everyone in the house fell into such an extraordinarily deep sleep that they looked like they had all been massacred. Only Cannetella still had her eyes open, and it was for this reason that when she heard the doors being broken down, she began to shriek as if she were being cooked on an open fire. But there was no one to come running at her cries and Fioravante was able to knock down all seven doors, and when he entered the room he grabbed Cannetella with all of her mattresses and made as if to take her away.

  “But as her fate would have it, the little paper that the old woman had put there fell out, and when the powder spilled the whole house woke up. Hearing Cannetella’s shrieks, everyone came running, even the dogs and the cats, and when they had gotten hold of the ogre they made salami8 out of him. And thus he fell into the same trap that he had prepared for the unfortunate Cannetella, proving at his own expense that there is no worse suffering than being killed by one’s own weapons.”

  2


  PENTA WITH THE CHOPPED-OFF HANDS*

  Second Entertainment of the Third Day

  Penta disdains marriage with her brother, and she cuts off her hands and sends them to him as a present. He has her thrown to sea in a chest, and when she ends up on a beach a sailor brings her to his home, where his jealous wife throws her back into the sea in the same chest. She is found by a king and marries him, but because of the trickery of that same wicked woman she is driven out of the kingdom. After undergoing many hardships she is found by her husband and her brother, and they all end up happy and satisfied.1

  After hearing Zeza’s tale they were all of the opinion that Cannetella had deserved this and even worse for having split hairs like that. Nonetheless, they were greatly comforted to see her extricated from such suffering, and they reflected on how although all men stunk to her she was reduced to bowing down before a sewer cleaner so that he would remove her from such great hardship. But when Tadeo signaled to Cecca to set her tale free she did not hesitate to speak and began in this manner: “In times of trouble virtue is put to the test; the candle of goodness shines brightest where it is darkest; hard labor gives birth to merit, and merit has honor attached to its navel. Those who triumph do not stand around with their hands at their sides but spin their spoons, as the daughter of the king of Dry Rock did when she built the house of her happiness by sweating blood and putting herself in mortal danger. And I’ve got it in my noggin to tell you the tale of her good fortune.

  “Seeing as the king of Dry Rock had remained a widower and without wife, a little demon put it into his head to take Penta, his own sister, for his wife. For this reason he called her one day and, when they were alone, said to her, ‘It is not the act of a judicious man, my sister, to let what is of value leave his house, and, moreover, you do not know how it will turn out if you let strangers set foot there. Thus, after chewing this matter over thoroughly, I have decided to take you for my wife, since you’re of the same breath that I am and I know your character. Be content, then, to make this inlay, this shopkeepers’ agreement, this uniantur acta,2 this misce et fiat potum,3 and both of us will see good days.’

  “When Penta heard this minor fifth she was beside herself, and one color left her face as another entered it, for she never would have thought that her brother could be subject to these sudden changes in mood and that he would try to give her a couple of rotten eggs while he himself was in need of a hundred fresh ones.4 After remaining silent for a long time while she thought about how she should answer such an impertinent and inappropriate demand, at last she unloaded the beast of burden of her patience and said to him, ‘Even if you have lost your mind, I don’t want to lose my modesty! I’m amazed at you, that you allow those words to come out of your mouth! If they’re in jest they’re worthy of an ass, and if they’re in earnest they stink like a billy goat. I’m sorry that you have the tongue to say those ugly and shameful things, and that I have the ears to hear them. Me, your wife? Who did this to you? What kind of trap is this?5 Since when have people made these blends?6 Since when these stews? These mixtures? And where are we, at Ioio?7 Am I your sister or cheese cooked in oil?8 Get your head on straight, for the life of you, and don’t let any more of those words slip out of your mouth or else I’ll do things you wouldn’t believe, and if you no longer respect me as your sister then I won’t consider you for what you are to me!’

  “As she was saying this she slipped away into another room, barred the door behind her, and didn’t see her brother’s face for more than a month, leaving the miserable king, who had gone off with a face like a maul to slow down the balls,9 as humiliated as a little boy who has broken a jug and as confused as a servant girl whose meat has been stolen by the cat. But after many days, when she was summoned anew by the king to pay the tax10 of his unreined desires, she decided to find out down to the very last detail what it was about her that the king had taken a fancy to, and, leaving her room, she went to find him and said, ‘My brother, I have looked long and hard at myself in the mirror, and I have found nothing in this face that could merit your love, since I am not such a delectable morsel that I send people into fits.’

  “And the king said to her, ‘My Penta, all of you is beautiful and flawless, from your head to your toes, but your hand, more than anything else, is what makes me swoon: your hand, serving fork that pulls my entrails out of the pot of this chest; your hand, hook that lifts the bucket of my soul from the well of this life; your hand, vise that grips my spirit while Love files it! O hand, o lovely hand, ladle that dishes out sweetness, pincer that tears out my desires, stick that sends this heart spinning!’11 He was intending to say more when Penta answered, ‘All right, I heard you! Wait, don’t move a hair, I’ll be back in a minute!’ And she went back to her room and called for a slave who didn’t have much of a brain, handed him a large knife and a handful of old coins, and said, ‘My dear Ali, you cut my hands, me want make nice formula and get more white!’12 The slave, thinking he was doing her a favor, cut them clean off with two blows. She had them placed on a Faenza platter13 and sent them, covered with a silk cloth, to her brother, with the message that he should enjoy what he most desired, along with good health and baby boys.

  [E]d essa, fattole mettere a no vacile de Faienza, le mannaie . . . a lo frate, co na ’masciata che se gaudesse chello che chiù desiderava co sanetate e figlie mascole. [She had them placed on a Faenza platter and sent them . . . to her brother, with the message that he should enjoy what he most desired, along with good health and baby boys.]

  “When the king saw how he had been betrayed, he was so infuriated that he flew into a frenzy and immediately had a tarred chest made into which he stuffed his sister and had her thrown to sea. Carried forth by the waves, the chest ended up on a beach, where it was pulled in by some sailors who were casting their nets, and when they opened it they found Penta, much more beautiful than the moon when it looks like it’s spent Lent in Taranto.14 And so Masiello, who was the one in charge and the ringleader of the men, took her home with him, telling his wife Nuccia to treat her kindly. But no sooner had her husband gone out than Nuccia, who was the mother of suspicion and jealousy, put Penta back in the chest and threw her to sea again.

  “Tossed by the waves, the chest drifted here and there for so long that it finally crossed the path of a vessel in which the king of Green Earth was traveling. When he saw this thing floating amid the waves, he had the sails lowered and a dinghy thrown into sea. His men retrieved the chest and opened it, and upon discovering the wretched girl the king, who saw a living beauty inside a coffin, believed he had found a great treasure, even if his heart wept for the fact that a writing box full of so many amorous joys had been found without handles. And he took Penta to his kingdom and gave her to the queen as a lady-in-waiting, and she did every imaginable job with her feet, even sewing, threading a needle, starching collars, and combing the queen’s hair, and for this she was held as dear as a daughter.

  “But after several months the queen was issued a summons to appear at the bank of the Parcae15 to pay her debt to nature, and she called the king to her and said, ‘My soul has only a little longer to wait before it dissolves the marriage knot between itself and my body. And so take care of yourself, my dear husband, and let’s be sure to write; but if you love me and want me to go happily to the world beyond, you must do me a favor.’ ‘I’m at your command, my pretty little face,’ said the king, ‘and even if I cannot give you the double testimony16 of my love while you’re alive, I will give you a sign of the affection that I have for you when you’re dead.’ ‘All right then,’ replied the queen, ‘since this is your promise, I beg you with all my heart: after I’ve closed my eyes in the dust, you must wed Penta who, even if we know neither who she is nor where she comes from, reveals that she is a thoroughbred horse from the brand of her good manners.’17 ‘May you live for another hundred years,’ answered the king, ‘but if by chance you have to say good night and my day tu
rns bad, I swear to you that I will take her for my wife. And it does not matter to me that she is scrawny and without hands, for one should always take only a small amount of the unpleasant.’18 But he mumbled these last words under his breath so that his wife wouldn’t hear them, and when the queen had snuffed out the candle of her days he took Penta for his wife, and on the first night he grafted a baby boy onto her.

  “But since the king needed to go on another sailing trip to the kingdom of High Cliff, he took his leave of Penta and pulled up anchor. Nine months later Penta gave birth to a lovely little baby boy; the whole city was decorated with light displays, and the council immediately sent off a sloop for the express purpose of notifying the king. The boat met up with a storm, though, so that first it found itself thrown onto the mantle19 of the waves and bounced up to the stars, then rolled down to the bottom of the sea, and at last, as the heavens willed it, it landed on the shore where Penta had been rescued by the compassion of a man and cast out by the cruelty of a woman. And there the captain of the sloop had the misfortune to encounter that same Nuccia, who was washing her son’s diapers. Curious to hear of other people’s business, as is women’s nature, she asked him where he was coming from, where he was headed, and who had sent him. And the captain said, ‘I come from Green Earth and I’m going to High Cliff to find the king of my land and give him a letter. It is for this that I have been sent; I believe it is his wife who writes to him, but I could not tell you precisely what it is about.’ ‘And who is the wife of this king?’ replied Nuccia. The captain answered, ‘From what I understand they say that she is a very beautiful young woman named Penta with the Chopped-Off Hands, on account of her hands, which are both missing. I hear that she was found floating in the sea in a chest and had the good luck to become the wife of this king, and I don’t know what she is writing to him about with such urgency that I need to rush at full sail20 to get there quickly.’