Three sisters brag about what each of them would be able to do if the king were to take them as his wife. The eldest would bake bread for a whole army just from a single kilogram of flour, the second one would provide food for the whole population with just one cabbage head. The youngest would give the king two golden boys. The king takes all three sisters to his palace and marries the youngest, who gives birth to two golden boys. While the king is out hunting, her jealous sisters replace the boys with puppies and put the two new-born babies into the cowshed. The king, being furious about his wife’s failure, has her blinded and put in the pillory. Every passer-by has to spit on her. The king then marries the second-eldest sister.

Since the cows refuse to tread the children to death, the latter are buried alive in the dunghill from which two trees sprout. The sister, who is now the (unlawful) queen, has the trees felled and two beds made from them. When the king and queen are sleeping in them, the two beds complain about their burdens. The queen hears this and makes the king burn the beds, whereby two sparks escape through a keyhole and turn into two lambs. The queen has them slaughtered and their intestines cooked. But when the maid is washing them, she cuts off two pieces by mistake, which drift down the river and become the two golden sons again.

Saint Peter, sent by God, gives them clothes, and the golden boys set out for the king’s palace. As they refuse to spit on their mother in the pillory, they are taken to the king. They tell him their story and the king frees his lawful wife and has the other two sisters killed.

The fairy tale ‘Duj somnakune raklorre’ [Two golden sons] originated in the Orient and today is known almost everywhere in the world. Variants of this tale (the basic version catalogued as ‘The Three Golden Sons’ labelled (AaTh 707) can be found in India, in the Persian fairy tales from One Thousand and One Nights, in the popular fairy tales in Europe, North and South America as well as from narrators belonging to various groups of Roma.

It consists of a series of separate episodes that are also to be found in the variant of the storyteller Vilma Gábor, for instance the magical transformation of murdered people into animated objects (tree, bed, spark). The punishment by blinding is another Oriental element of fairy tales. In Vilma Gábor’s version, several unusual transformations are combined with one another. The episode with God and Saint Peter is added to the fairy tale as contrast with the original theme of magic. Vilma Gábor was deeply religious: in her conversations, she spoke about her belief and God’s assistance in misfortune. This belief may have been the reason for the change in the series of episodes.

The personal style of the narrator manifests itself in interspersed optative set phrases for the audience such as ‘čumidav tjo ilo’ (literally, ‘I kiss your heart’, sound recording at minute 05:12), her interest in what happens, thus, for example, ‘No, de akana xal le e fena, te xal le žungale pheja!’ (‘The devil take the disgusting sisters!’ at 04:16) as well as in the artful introductory passage with personal reference to her grandfather (00:00-00:28):
‘Sah pe katar nah pe: Dejšto ljumê, dejšto them, ljumê împêracije ši akolo ši vitezije, kaj marla muro papo le mačhen. Kêren mišto thaj ertin, Romalej! Patjivale manušendar ašundjom la, patjivale manušehke phenav la.’ (‘It was and it was not: The tenth world, the tenth country, a kingdom and heroism, where my grandfather caught fish. Make yourselves comfortable and excuse me, Roma! I heard this story from honourable men and I am passing it on to an honourable man.’)

References

Aarne, Antti; Thompson, Stith. 1961. The Types of the Folktale. A Classification and Bibliography (= FF Communications LXXV), Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia.

Mode, Heinz; Hübschmannová, Milena (ed.). 1983–1985. Zigeunermärchen aus aller Welt. 4 Bände, Leipzig: Insel-Verlag.

Fennesz-Juhasz, Christiane; Cech, Petra; Halwachs, Dieter; Heinschink, Mozes F. (ed.). 2003. Die schlaue Romni, Märchen und Lieder der Roma / E bengali Romni, So Roma phenen taj gilaben. Klagenfurt: Drava Verlag (transcript and German translation: pp. 140–53).