The Tale of Tales

by Giambattista Basile

  “When Marchetta heard these caresses and stings, these promises and threats, this washing of the face and lifting of the cape, she would have liked to say that she was missing the key needed to open the door of the queen’s happiness; she would have liked to explain that she was not Mercury, with his caduceus,9 and therefore could not give her the peace that she desired. But, not wanting to unmask herself, she answered that she could not believe that the queen wanted to plant crooked spindles10 on such a worthy king as her husband, and that, moreover, even if the queen was willing to disregard the reputation of her lineage, she herself could not and would not wrong a master who loved her so much. When the queen heard this first replication to the injunction of her longing, she said to Marchetta, ‘Come now, consider this carefully and keep your plow straight, for when my peers beg for something, it’s a command, and it’s when they kneel that they kick you in the neck! So do your calculations well, and you’ll see what a good deal this merchandise can be for you! But enough said, and sufficit. Before I leave let me tell you one more thing, and that is: when a woman of my quality is scorned, she does her best to remove the stain from her face by washing it with the blood of he who offended her.’ And saying this, she turned her back on the girl with a forbidding scowl, leaving poor Marchetta confused and gelid.

  “But after the queen continued her assault on the lovely fortress for a number of days and finally saw that her labors were a waste of time and her efforts thrown to the wind, and that she was sweating without making a spot by throwing her words to the wind and her sighs into the void, she switched register and changed love into hate and the longing to enjoy the beloved object into a desire for vendetta. And thus, pretending to have tears welling up in her eyes, she went to her husband and said, ‘Who could ever have told us, my husband, that a serpent was growing in our sleeve? Who could ever have imagined that a puny little wretch would be so bold? But it’s all because of the excessive kindness you showed him: if you give a peasant a finger he’ll take the whole hand! In short, we all want to piss in the urinal; but if you don’t give him the punishment he deserves, I’m going back to my father’s house, and I won’t want to see you or ever hear your name again!’ ‘What did he do to you?’ asked the king. And the queen replied, ‘Oh, nothing at all! The little scoundrel wanted to be the tax collector of the matrimonial debt that I have with you, and without a bit of respect or fear or shame he had the nerve to appear before me and the tongue to ask for free access to the field that is sown with your honor.’ When he heard this, the king asked for no further testimony so as not to compromise the word and the authority of his wife, and immediately had Marchetta collared by the cops. And in the heat of the moment, without giving her any way to defend herself, he condemned her to see how much weight the executioner’s scales could hold.

  “While she was being carried off to the place of torture, Marchetta, who neither knew what had happened nor realized she had done anything wrong, began to shout, ‘O heavens, what have I done to deserve the funeral of this poor neck before the last rites of this wretched body are celebrated? Who could have told me that, without enlisting under the colors of thieves and delinquents, I would be mounting guard at this palace of Death with three lengths of rope round my gullet? Alas, who will comfort me during this extreme passage? Who will help me in such danger? Who will free me from this haltering?’ ‘Ring,’ answered the echo,11 and when Marchetta heard this manner of reply she remembered the ring she was wearing on her finger and the words the ogress had said to her when she left and, turning her eyes to the stone that she had not yet looked at, she suddenly heard a voice in the air repeat three times, ‘Let her go, she’s a woman!’

  “This voice was so terrifying that there wasn’t a single cop or rag seller who remained near the chef of justice,12 and when the king heard these words, which shook the palace down to its very foundations, he had Marchetta brought before him and ordered her to tell the truth about who she was and how she had ended up in that land. Forced by necessity, she told of everything that had happened during her life: how she was born, shut up inside that palace, and carried off by the wind; how she ended up at the ogress’s house and wanted to leave; what the ogress said and gave to her; what happened with the queen, and how, not knowing what she had done wrong, she found herself in danger of having to use her feet to row the three-beamed galley.

  “When the king heard this story and compared it with what he had once spoken about with his friend, the king of Shaken Valley, he recognized Marchetta for who she was and at the same time became aware of the wickedness of his wife, who had given her this bad reputation. He thus ordered his wife to be thrown without delay into the sea with a millstone round her neck, and after inviting Marchetta’s father and mother to be his guests he took her for his wife, she who gave clear proof that: God finds a port for a desperate boat.”

  7

  THE TWO LITTLE PIZZAS*

  Seventh Entertainment of the Fourth Day

  Marziella is enchanted after she shows kindness to an old woman, but her aunt, envious of her good fortune, throws her to sea, where a siren keeps her in chains for a long time. Finally, she is freed by her brother and becomes queen, and her aunt is punished for her wrongdoing.

  The prince and his lady would surely have affirmed that Antonella’s tale beat all of the others that had been told, had they not feared that Ciulla’s spirits might be dampened. And so, after placing the lance of her tongue in its rest,1 Ciulla aimed at Tadeo and his wife’s ring of pleasure in the following manner: “I have always heard it said that those who do favors find favor; the Manfredonia bell says ‘give to me and I’ll give to you’;2 and those who do not put the bait of courtesy on the hook of affection will never catch the fish of benefits. And if you want to learn the meaning of this listen to this tale, and then you’ll tell me who has always lost the most, the stingy or the generous.

  “Now it is said that there once were two blood sisters, Luceta and Troccola, who had two daughters, Marziella and Puccia. Marziella’s heart was as beautiful as her face; conversely, the heart and face of Puccia were, following the same rule, like the face of illness and the heart of plague. Indeed, she resembled her parents, for Troccola, her mother, was a harpy on the inside and an old hide on the outside.

  “Now it happened that Luceta needed to warm up a few carrots to fry in green sauce, and she said to her daughter, ‘My dear Marziella, go, darling, to the fountain, and fetch me a pitcher of water.’ ‘With pleasure, dear mother,’ answered her daughter, ‘but if you care for me give me a little pizza, which I’d like to eat with some of that fresh water.’ ‘Gladly,’ said her mother, and she went to a bread sack that was hanging on a hook and took from it a lovely little pizza—the day before she had baked bread—and gave it to the girl. Marziella put the pitcher on a head ring and went off to the fountain, which, like a charlatan performing on a marble counter to the music of the falling water, sold secrets for quenching thirst.

  “As Marziella stood filling the pitcher, there arrived an old woman who on the stage of a large hump was acting out the tragedy of Time. Noticing that lovely pizza right when Marziella was about to take a bite out of it, she said, ‘My lovely girl, may the heavens bless you with good fortune if you give me a little of that pizza.’ Marziella, who had the stink of a queen about her, said, ‘Here, you can have the whole thing, my noble woman, and I’m sorry it’s not made of sugar and almonds, in which case I’d still give it to you with all of my heart.’ When the old woman saw how loving Marziella was, she said to her, ‘Go, and may the heavens always make you prosper for the generous love that you’ve shown me! I pray to all the stars that you may always be happy and content, and that when you breathe roses and jasmines may come out of your mouth, when you comb your hair pearls and garnets may fall from your head, and when you put your foot to the earth lilies and violets may spring forth.’

  “The girl thanked her and returned home, where after her mother finishe
d cooking they paid their natural debt to their bodies. And when that day was over—as soon as morning came and in the market of the celestial fields the Sun spread out the luminous wares that it had brought from the Orient—Marziella was combing her hair when she began to see pearls and garnets rain down upon her lap. With great joy she called her mother and they put the jewels in a chest, and then Luceta went off to a money changer, who was a friend of hers, to dispose of a good quantity of them. At the same time Troccola stopped by to see her sister, and when she found Marziella bustling around and all busy with those pearls, she asked her how, when, and where she had gotten them. The girl was incapable of muddying the waters, and perhaps had not heard the proverb that goes, ‘Do less than you can, eat less than you will, spend less than you have, and say less than you know,’ and she told her aunt about the whole business. Troccola didn’t even bother to wait for her sister, since each hour until she returned home seemed like a thousand years to her. Once she got there she gave a little pizza to her daughter and sent her to get water at the fountain.

  “The girl encountered the same old woman, and when the woman asked her for a little bit of her pizza the girl, who was very bad-tempered, answered, ‘As if I have nothing better to do than give my pizza to you! What, you think you made my donkey pregnant and I should give you my stuff? Get out of here; teeth are closer than relatives!’ As she was saying this she gulped down the pizza in four bites, making the old woman’s mouth water. And when she saw that the last bite was gone and her hopes had been buried along with the pizza, the old woman flew into a rage and said to her, ‘Go, and when you breathe may you foam at the mouth like a doctor’s mule,3 when you comb your hair may mounds of lice fall from your head, and wherever you touch your foot to the ground may ferns and thistles grow!’ After Puccia got the water and returned home, her mother couldn’t wait to comb her hair; she spread a fine tablecloth on her lap, pulled down her daughter’s head, and as she started to comb, the stream of alchemical animals that flowed forth was strong enough to stop quicksilver.4 When her mother saw this, the snow of envy was joined by the fire of anger, so that she breathed flames and smoke from her nose and mouth.

  “Now after some time had gone by, Ciommo, Marziella’s brother, found himself at the court of King Chiunzo.5 As the court was conversing about the beauty of various women, Ciommo came forward without being asked and affirmed that if his sister were to appear there, all other beautiful women could go throw their bones off the Ricciardo Bridge,6 since apart from her physical beauty, which played counterpoint to the plainchant of her lovely soul, she also had in her hair, her mouth, and her feet the powers that the fairy had given her. When he heard this praise the king told Ciommo to have her come, and that if he found her to be as exceptional as Ciommo boasted she was he would take her for his wife. This did not seem to Ciommo like a chance to be missed, and he immediately dispatched a courier with a message for his mother, in which he told her what had happened and begged her to come at once with her daughter, so as not to lose this good fortune.

  “Luceta, however, was very ill and, putting the sheep in the wolf’s care, she begged her sister to do her the favor of accompanying Marziella to the Chiunzo court for this and that matter. When Troccola saw that this business was growing in her hands, she promised her sister that she would deliver the girl safe and sound to her brother, and she set off on a boat with Marziella and Puccia. But as soon as they were in the middle of the sea and the sailors were all asleep, Troccola threw Marziella into the water, where, just as she was about to do a duck dive down to the bottom, a splendid mermaid appeared, gathered her up in her arms, and carried her off.

  “Now when Troccola arrived at Chiunzo, Ciommo received Puccia as if she were Marziella, for he had not see her for such a long time that he no longer recognized her, and he immediately brought her before the king. The king had her comb her hair, from which began to rain down those animals that are such enemies of truth that they never fail to offend the witnesses.7 When he looked closely at her face he saw that she was breathing quite heavily after the effort of the journey, and that her mouth was so lathered up that it looked like a washbasin, and when he turned his eyes to the ground he saw a meadow of fetid weeds the sight of which made his stomach turn.

  “And so he banished Puccia and her mother and, out of irritation, sent Ciommo to guard the court ducks. In a state of desperation over all of this and not understanding what had happened, Ciommo took the ducks into the countryside and, leaving them to wander as they liked on the seashore, went off to sit in a straw hut where he wept over his bad fortune until evening, when it was time to go home. But while the ducks ran on the shore every day, Marziella came out of the water and gave them royal almond paste8 to eat and rose water to drink, until they grew as big as lambs and could barely keep their eyes open in all that fat. And when they returned in the evening to a little garden under the king’s window, they began to sing:

  Quack, quack, quack

  the sun is beautiful, and so is the moon,

  but she who takes care of us is more beautiful still.

  “After hearing this ducky music evening after evening, the king called for Ciommo and demanded to know where, how, and what he was feeding his ducks. Ciommo said to him, ‘I feed them nothing but fresh country grass.’ The king, to whom this answer didn’t sound right, sent one of his faithful servants after him so that he could see where he was taking the ducks. The servant followed in his footsteps and saw Ciommo go into the straw hut and leave the ducks on their own. The ducks headed in the direction of the seashore, and when they arrived, Marziella came out of the sea, and I don’t believe that even the mother of that blind boy9—he who, as that poet said, wants no other alms but tears—was as beautiful when she emerged from the waves. When the king’s servant saw this he was dumbfounded and beside himself, and ran back to his master to tell him of the lovely spectacle he had seen on the stage of the sea.

  “The king’s curiosity was given a jolt by this man’s words, which instilled in him the desire to go see this lovely sight in person. And so the next morning—when the rooster, rabble-rouser10 of the birds, incited them to arm all living beings against the Night—Ciommo went with the ducks to the usual place with the king following behind, never letting him out of his sight. The ducks arrived at the sea without Ciommo, who stopped at the same place as always, and the king saw Marziella come out and give the ducks a little basket of fancy cakes to eat and a little pot of rose water to drink. When she was done she seated herself on a rock and began to comb her hair, from which pearls and garnets fell by the handful, while in the meantime a cloud of flowers came out of her mouth and under her feet an Arabian carpet of lilies and violets took shape. Upon seeing this, the king sent for Ciommo and showed him Marziella, asking him if he knew this lovely girl. Ciommo recognized her and rushed over to embrace her and then, in the presence of the king, heard the whole story of Troccola’s betrayal and how the envy of that hideous scourge had reduced this lovely fire of love to living in the waters of the sea.

  “It’s impossible to describe the pleasure the king felt upon acquiring such a beautiful jewel; he turned to Marziella’s brother and told him that he had been perfectly right to heap praise on her and that he himself found that two-thirds or more of what Ciommo had told him was true, and that he thus considered her more than worthy of becoming his wife, if she were content to receive the scepter of his kingdom. ‘Oh, if only the Sun in Leo willed it,’ answered Marziella, ‘and I could come and pay homage to your crown as a servant girl! But can’t you see this golden chain that I wear on my foot, by which the sorceress keeps me a prisoner? When I take too much air or stay too long on the seashore, she pulls me back in. And so she keeps me in rich servitude, enchained by gold.’ ‘What kind of solution might there be,’ asked the king, ‘to free you from the claws of that siren?’ ‘The solution would be,’ said Marziella, ‘to saw through this chain with a silent file and beat it out of here.’ �
�Wait for me tomorrow morning,’ replied the king, ‘for I plan to take care of this matter without delay and bring you home with me, where you’ll be my right eye, the pupil of my heart, and the entrails of my soul.’

  “After they exchanged a down payment on their love with a touch of their hands, Marziella went off into the water and he into the fire of his passion, and such a fire it was that it did not allow him an hour of rest the whole day. And when that black Moor of a Night came out to play tubba catubba11 with the stars, he still was not able to close an eye, and he went about ruminating with the jaws of his memory on Marziella’s beauty and debating with his thoughts on the marvels of her hair, the miracles of her mouth, and the wonders of her feet, and when he tested the gold of her graces on the touchstone of his wisdom, he found that they measured twenty-four carats. He cursed the Night for being so slow to finish its embroidery work of stars, and he cursed the Sun for not arriving soon enough with its coach of light to enrich his home with the goods he desired and bring to his chambers a mine of gold that sent forth pearls and a shell of pearls that sent forth flowers.