The Nettle Spinner is a Flemish and French fairy tale collected by Charles Deulin in Contes du roi Cambrinus under the title La Fileuse d'orties.
A great lord was so cruel to his peasants that they called him Burchard the Wolf.
His wife was kind and generous, and would secretly do good for those whom her husband wronged.
He told her that she must spin nettles instead, to make her shift and his shroud, because she would not marry until he was laid in his grave.
She found she could make good thread of them, and when Burchard came by again, she showed him her shift.
The Count had himself carried to the cottage—he was too ill to walk—and tried to shoot her, but the bullet rebounded harmlessly.
Another year went by, and Burchard fell ill again, though Renelde had not started spinning again.