Creditor
The Creditor
A wealthy man dies, leaving his clever, well educated daughter as his only heir. She decides that she will marry only a man of equal wealth, cleverness, and discretion. Any suitor must lie beside her and bring them both sexual satisfaction on the first night. If they fail to do so, they must pay her a hundred marks of silver, and leave; any who can successfully bring her pleasure she will marry. But every night she places a charm upon her pillow (in some versions, and enchanted owl's feather) that causes them to fall asleep, so her wealth grows, and none succeed. A young man decides to try for her hand, but like all the rest, he falls sleep once he lies down; angry, he goes to borrow money from a serf to make another attempt. Long ago, the young man had cut off the serf’s foot in a fit of rage – and so the serf offers him the money on the condition that he must replay it within a year, or the serf may cut off flesh and bones equal to the weight of a hundred marks. The youth agrees. Back at the heiress's house, he removes the pillow from the bed, stays awake, and the two bring each other pleasure all night. They are soon happily married. The young man forgets his creditor and does not pay within the year. The crippled serf is overjoyed at this chance for vengeance, and brings a complaint against the young man to the king. The youth offers twice the amount in payment, but the serf refuses to accept anything other than his flesh and bones. Despairing, the man tells his wife everything before he is lead off to face his punishment. Once he has left, his wife dresses in men’s clothing, disguised by magic, and presents herself in the king's court as a foreign knight expert in all the workings of the law. The king explains the case for her, and she directs the serf to go ahead and cut off a weight of flesh exactly equivalent to the marks; however, she warns that if he should cut away any more, even one drop of blood too much, he would be liable for the man's murder. Unable to achieve this, the serf agrees to free the youth from his debt, and all ends happily.
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Nishimura notes a number of motifs and analogues for this narrative: Motifs and Types: TMI D1364.6 Feather causes magic sleep; D1972 Lover’s magic sleep at rendezvous;K1825.2 Woman masks as lawyer (judge) and frees her husband; J1161.2, ATU 890, TU3867, Pound of Flesh. Analogues: Ser Giovanni Fiorentino, Il Pecorone, 4.1; Gesta Romanorum, 195 'Die Jungfrau und der Ritter'; Wesselski, Mönchslatein, 138; Altdeutsches Dekamerone, 5.4 'Die Tochter des Kaisers Lucius'; Jewish Folktales, 152 'The Young Man, and the Princess Disguised as a Lawyer'; Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice; Choi In Hak, A Study on Korean Folktales, 634 ‘A Pound of Human Flesh’; Kim Bong-ko, Folktales of Korea, 'The Famous Trial of Shido'; NHK, Comedy Oedo de gozaru; 'Tonchi ni mukau Yaiba nashi', 27, 1997. Reference stories, etc.: Gesta Romanorum, 63 'Der Todesgarten'; Pentamerone, 3.9, ‘Rosella’; Grimm’s Fairy Tales, KHM 218 ‘Die treue Gräfin’; Afanasjew, Russian Folktales, 338 ‘Von der Zarin, die Gusli spielte’. |
| Critical Literature |
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| Nishimura (2001), Clouston (1884), Marzolph (2023) |
| Creditor appears in the following versions and secondary versions |
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| Creditor is narrated in the following occurrences | ||||
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| Creditor appears in the following manuscripts |
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| This inset story appears in no manuscripts of the database |