The Golden Crab is a Greek fairy tale collected as "Prinz Krebs" by Bernhard Schmidt in his Griechische Märchen, Sagen and Volkslieder.
[4] Bernhard Schmidt (de) stated that his version was originally titled "Οἱ δώδεκα ἀετοί" ("Oí dódeka áetoi"; "The Twelve Eagles") by the narrator.
The king, guessing he was an enchanted prince, demanded that the crab build a wall in front of the castle, higher than the highest tower, and blooming with flowers, and then a garden with three fountains that played gold, diamonds, and brilliants.
When he threw her the golden apple, her mother boxed her ears, demanding to know why even that knight did not please her, and the princess confessed it was the crab.
In Megas's tale, titled in Modern Greek: Ο κάβουρας, romanized: O kávouras, and translated as Der Krebs ("The Crab"),[6] a priest and his wife lived near a king and queen.
German linguist Paul Kretschmer collected a similar tale from the island of Lesbos with the title Die Krebs ("The Crab"), which was translated by Richard McGillivray Dawkins in his book Modern Greek Folktales.
The princess orders the construction of an inn and a tailor's workshop, where people can come, eat, tell stories and get finer clothes.
This type refers to a human girl marrying a supernatural husband in animal form; she betrays his secret and he disappears.
[13] American folklorist D. L. Ashliman classified tale The Crab as type 425D, "A wife finds her lost husband by keeping an inn".
[15][16] In the same vein, Swedish scholar Jan-Öjvind Swahn [sv] identified among the "motifs characteristic of subtype D" the bath-house, the inn, or places where the heroine goes to hear stories or news about her husband.
In 1975 the Institute published a catalog edited by Alberto Maria Cirese [it] and Liliana Serafini reported 5 variants of subtype 425D, under the banner Notizie del marito scomparso apprese aprendo una locanda (o un bagno) ("Hearing news about lost husband by opening an inn or bath house").
[21] Austrian consul Johann Georg von Hahn collected an Albanian tale titled Taubenliebe: a king wants his only daughter to find a husband.
Suddenly, a window opens, and ten pigeons come in, become men and sit at the table, waiting for their brother Bucăţică.
[27][28] The Bulgarian Folktale Catalogue registers a similar narrative, indexed as type 425D, "Невяста научава къде е изчезналият й съпруг като отваря фурна, раздава хлеб срещу разказване на чудии преживелици"[29][30] or "Eine Frau erfährt, wo ihr verschwundener Mann ist.
Sie eröffnet ein Backhaus und gibt Brot für das Erzählen von wundersamen Erlebnissen"[31] ("Bride learns of missing husband by opening bakery and offering bread in exchange for wondrous tales").
Suddenly, the gourd begins to talk and tells the thorn-seller, whom he regards as his adoptive father, to court the king's princess as a wife for him.
An old woman comes and tells a curious story: when she was going to the river to wash her clothes, she saw a rooster coming out of the river; she held onto the rooster's tail and was carried off to an underwater castle, inside, 40 doves came to a pool near the castle and became maidens, then a man came and cried over a lost love.
[35] Scholar Heda Jason [de] described a similar narrative, present in the Jewish Oriental tale corpus and which she named AaTh 425*Q, "Marvelous Being Woos Princess".
[37] In an Israeli tale titled The Camel's Wife, a barren woman is instructed by a stranger to go to the desert and drink from a certain well.
One day, a woman comes to the bath house and tells a strange story: on a moonlit night, one the way to the market to buy thread, she saw a camel and a beetle and followed them to a cave; inside the cave, bread was baking by itself in the oven; three doves came with a tablecloth, opened it and exhorted the house to cry and weep with them.
The fellahin woman narrates her tale: on a moonlit night, by an olive tree, she saw 40 birds; the birds took a bath, ate, drank and flew away; a hen and a rooster told the wind and the rain to come; a man lamented to three children about his wife Warde (Rose) who had betrayed his secret.
She enters Jumail's chambers; he reveals he is a man under the camel skin, the son of the king of the jinns, and that she cannot betray his secret.
Zainab decides to find the rooster, of a golden plumage and scarlet comb, and follows the bird into a hole in the ground that leads to a cave.
After some time, she sells her jewels and opens up a coffee house, where people can have meals in exchange for sharing a sad tale.
One day, an old woman comes to the coffee house and tells Zainab she saw a rooster walking in the orchard and weeping about someone who struck him with a comb.
The gourd falls down the shelf and cracks open, and a handsome youth named Mhemmed Xan appears to his wife.
[47] In his Catalogue of Persian Folktales, German scholar Ulrich Marzolph [de] located a similar tale from Azerbaijan region, in Iran, which he classified as a new Iranian type *425D, Tierbräutigam durch Geschichtenerzählen wiedergefunden ("Animal Husband found by telling stories").
His army victorious, the three sons-in-law return for a celebratory parade, and he third princess throws a rose to a mysterious man that rides along with the two princes.
In this tale, a sultan's daughter buys a magic mirror from a Jew and peers into it to discern her future: her destiny is with a dog that passes by the garden.
The following morning, the now human dog youth cannot find his disguise, and decides to depart to regions unknown.