Pinocchio in Scandinavia: the roots of the fable in the Kalevala and in the Edda

Everyone knows "The Adventures of Pinocchio" by the Florentine writer Carlo Collodi; but many are unaware that he used archetypes, episodes and scenes to write himΒ drawn from the legendary and fabulous heritage of Northern Europe.


di Pier Vittorio Formichetti

It seems that most citizens in the US believe that Pinocchio is only the cartoon produced by the company of Walt DisneyΒ [1] and you completely ignore the original Italian tale of Carlo Lorenzini (1826-1890), which took the pseudonym of Collodi in homage to his mother's hometown. The directors and screenwriters who created the animated film in 1940 took a lot of philological liberties with respect to the book: Β«Blue FairyΒ», to the name of Mangiafuoco which becomes the stage name of Stromboli, from the clothing of Geppetto and Pinocchio himself, which more than being that of mid-XNUMXth century Tuscany is the traditional South Tyrolean one, with a pen on the hat and braces Lederhosen, to the shark that becomes a whale, indeed, judging by the shape of the head, precisely a sperm whale.

Obviously there is no doubt that the original work is the Italian one. However, it is possible, indeed likely, that Collodi created his own masterpiece using at least part of some extraneous or marginal elements compared to the classic fabulous tradition: archetypes, episodes and scenes, adapted «in a domestic, humble, childish form» [2], taken from legendary and fabulous heritage of northern Europe, and particularly from what is considered the traditional Finnish poem: Kalevala. This work, the title of which means «The homeland of Kaleva», consists of a series of «runes» (i.e. of songs, recited passages) handed down orally for centuries until they were transcribed and published by Elias Lânnrot (1802-1884) between 1835 and 1849.

Il Kalevala was first translated into Italian by Paolo Emilio Pavolini in 1910, when Collodi had been dead for exactly twenty years, but had already been translated into French by LΓ©ouzon Le Duc in 1867 and then in 1879, with the addition of the eighteen Β«runesΒ» discovered by LΓΆnnrot before '49. In these same years, Collodi had translated into Italian and published, with the title Fairy Tales (1876) an anthology of French fables by Charles Perrault (1628-1705), Marie Catherine D'Aulnoy (1650-1705, author of the four volumes of Fairy Tales) and Jeanne Marie Leprince de Beaumont (1711-1780, author of the most famous version of The beauty and the Beast): so Collodi was quite familiar with French legendary-fable literature, and probably also Northern European and Scandinavian literature.. Among some stories from the Kalevala and some episodes of the Adventures ofΒ  Pinocchioin fact, there are analogies and similarities that can hardly be pure coincidences.

Gallen_Kallela_Kullervos_Curse.jpg
Callervo

One of the protagonists of the Kalevala he is Kullervo, descendant of Kaleva, a precocious child endowed with superhuman strength (like the Greek Heracles). His father Kalervo and his uncle Untamo were born from two parts of the same piece of wood, the trunk of a tree split in two [3]; in the same way, Pinocchio is created from a piece of wood (chap. III). The two brothers Kalervo and Untamo quarrel (Β«runeΒ» XXXI), as well as at the beginning of Pinocchio (chap. II) there is a fight between the two neighboring carpenters, master Antonio called Ciliegia Β«because of the tip of his nose, which was always shiny and purple like a ripe cherryΒ», and master Geppetto known as Polendina, Β«because of her yellow wig that looked a lot like the cornmeal. Geppetto was very bizarre: woe to call him Polendina! He immediately became a beast and there was no way to keep himΒ». The quarrel of theΒ  Kalevala however it ends with the murder of Kalervo by Untamo, who then, aware of Kullervo's future desire for revenge, tries to kill the child: first with fire, throwing him on a burning pyre: but the child survives and is foundΒ [4]

sitting in the ashes up to his knees,
in the embers up to the elbows;
he was holding a poker in his hand,
and thus he revived the fire;

then with water, throwing it into the sea: again in vain; finally hanging him from a tree (an oak), butΒ [5]

Kullervo has not yet perished, nor is he dead on the gallows.

Similarly Pinocchio, in one of his first misadventures

he sat up, placing his soaked and packed feet on a cauldron full of burning embers. And there he fell asleep, and as he slept, his feet, which were made of wood, caught fire and, very slowly, became his ashes. (chap. VI)

And Geppetto makes them new to him (chap. VIII). Water will follow: after the stunts in the Land of Toys, Pinocchio transformed into a donkey (chapter XXXII) is bought by the director of a circus company Β«to teach him and make him jump and danceΒ»; during the exhibition, Pinocchio-donkey becomes crippled and is resold to a buyer who wants to drown him and then makes a drum with his skin: he then hangs a stone around his neck and throws it into the sea, then waiting for it to die (chap. XXXII ), but Pinocchio in the water becomes a living puppet again and runs away swimming (chap. XXXIV).

However, it is in chapters XIV-XVI that we see the protagonist escape the same series of deadly threats in the same order. The two Assassins - the Fox and the Cat masked - they want to rob him, Pinocchio climbs Β«up the trunk of a very tall pineΒ» and here he takes refuge among the branches; the murderers, Β«collected a bundle of dry wood at the foot of the pine, they set fire to itΒ». Pinocchio jumps down, runs off and runs into Β«a wide and very deep ditch, all full of filthy waterΒ», but he does not drown in it because he manages to jump over it, and resumes his flight; when the Assassins reach him, they stab him, but again without his succumbing; they then decide to hang him:

They tied his hands behind his shoulders and, passing a slipknot around his throat, they attached him dangling to the branch of a large plant called the Great Oak.

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The hanging of Pinocchio

Il Β«runeΒ» X of Kalevala describes actions similar to those "included" in Pinocchio's escape from the Assassins: the divine blacksmith, Illmarinen, climbs along the tall spruce with flowering foliage; the fir, feeling touched, speaks (to complain about Illmarinen's daring who wants to reach the sun, the moon and the stars), as well as at the beginning of Adventures of Pinocchio the log not yet sculpted speaks, frightening Mastro Ciliegia and Mastro Geppetto who do not understand where that Β«voiceΒ».

In Kalevala, Therefore, Kullervo survives assassination attempts [6]Β and announces that at the right moment he will avenge the killing of his father; in the same way, Pinocchio, thanks to the intervention of the Fairy with blue hair who sends a hawk to break the rope, is saved and sets out in search of his Β«dadΒ» Geppetto, who in turn wants to find his missing puppet-son. In chapter XXIII, a talking pigeon will reveal to Pinocchio that Geppetto,

three days ago on the sea beach, he made himself a small boat to cross the ocean. That poor man has been traveling the world for more than four months in search of you: and not having been able to find you, he has set out to look for you in the countries of the New World.

The pigeon takes Pinocchio in flight to the beach; similarly, in runo VII of Kalevala Vainamoinen, one of Kaleva's sons and Kullervo's ancestor, comes carried in flight on the back of an eagle to the northern beach of Pohjola. Geppetto, already set sail, recognizes Pinocchio and wants to go back, but

the sea was so big that it prevented him from working with the oar and from being able to approach the land. Suddenly a terrible wave came and the boat disappeared.

Pinocchio will throw himself into the sea to try to save his father: in both narratives there is a son who wants to re-establish a bond with his father who is "beyond": Kalervo in the world of the deceased, Geppetto beyond the sea, or perhaps on the bottom of the ocean, also dead. In the Kalevala, Untamo, having failed all three attempts at infanticide, is forced to keep the unbeatable Kullervo with him, or to entrust him to others: a shepherd or a blacksmith (according to the two versions of the myth), but Kullervo becomes the author of far worse disasters than Pinocchio's pranks: he kills a child he should have cradled, clears a forest, tears a boat to pieces, destroys a cornfield, breaks a cow's horn. He is then kicked out and Β«sent to Estonia to bark under the fenceΒ» of Illmarinen, the blacksmith of the gods; it's hereΒ [7]

He barked a year, another year, a little of the third, two years he barked at the blacksmith as at his uncle, at the blacksmith's wife [or servant] as his daughter-in-law.

A very similar fate awaits Pinocchio: hungry, he enters a vineyard and tries to steal grapes, but is trapped in a beech-marten trap and is found by the farmer:

β€œSince the dog that guarded me at night died today, you will immediately take his place. You will be my watchdog ”. No sooner said than done, he slipped a thick collar all covered with brass spikes around his neck and squeezed it so that he could not take it off by passing his head through it. A long iron chain was attached to the collar, and the chain was attached to the wall. […] β€œAnd if by misfortune the thieves come, remember to stand up straight and to bark” (chap. XXI).

The beech martens arrive, trying to corrupt Pinocchio as they did with Melampo, the real dog; but the puppet Β«barking just as if it were a guard dog, with his voice bu-bu-bu-bu!Β» (chap. XXII). As a reward for his loyalty and the thwarted theft, Pinocchio is freed and goes back to looking for Geppetto.

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Transformed into a donkey in the Land of Toys and become a puppet again after being thrown into the sea by the man who wanted to make a drum from his donkey skin, Pinocchio flees by swimming,

when suddenly a horrible head of a sea monster came out of the water, with its mouth wide open like a chasm and three rows of fangs that would have been frightening even to see them painted. That sea monster was neither more nor less that gigantic Shark [...] who, due to his massacres and his insatiable voracity, was nicknamed "the Attila of fish and fishermen" (chap. XXXIV),

about which Pinocchio had already heard terrible things say from a talking dolphin:

β€œIt's bigger than a five-story building, and it has one
big mouth so wide and deep that the whole train would pass through it
ofΒ 
railway track with the car running "(chap. XXV).

Pinocchio doesn't have time to escape him: the shark swallows it and the puppet finds himself in his stomach with Β«everywhere a great darkness […] black and deepΒ». Following a dim light, it is here that Pinocchio finds Geppetto, who has been living there for about two years thanks to the stocks of a merchant ship sunk by the same storm that had engulfed his miserable rowboat:

The sailors were all saved, but the vessel sank to the bottom, and the Shark, who had an excellent appetite that day, after having swallowed me, also swallowed the whole vessel (ch. XXXV).

Pinocchio-Book-Summary

An image still coming from the Scandinavian context comes to mind:Β that of giant monsters of the Atlantic Ocean that attack theΒ vessels in the Marine card of 1539 of the Swedish bishop Olaf Mansson, moreΒ known by the Latinized name Olaus Magnus [8], philologicallyΒ dependent on the many ancient and medieval legends about sea monstersΒ (for example the infamous Kraken, an octopus so huge that it can be confused with an island) [9]. Now, however, the food is running out, and Geppetto must necessarily try to escape from the bowels of the Shark: father and puppet go up the body of the sleeping monster up to the gaping mouth, but as they walk on his tongue, the Shark sneezes and pushes them back. On the second attempt, the twoΒ manage to get out:

always walking on tiptoe, they went up together up the throat of the monster: then they went up all the tongue and climbed over the three rows of teeth (ch. XXXV).

This arduous test - the shark's fall into the belly and the escape - through which Geppetto and Pinocchio pass, is located in the penultimate chapters of the book, but it too has an interesting parallel in the Kalevala, where, however, the story is located in runo XVII,Β  in the background to the adventures of Kullervo, when the child-hero does not yet exist: Vainamoinen, one of the three sons of his ancestor Kaleva,Β [10]

undertakes the construction of a boat, but when it comes to inserting the bow and stern, he discovers that his runo [the song whose magical power would have helped him in the construction] requires three words which, despite theΒ his assiduous research remains unknown to him. […] A shepherd himΒ then he says to look for them in the mouth of Antero Vipunen, the giant ogre.Β […] The giant lies underground, trees grow on his head.Β [...] Waking up, he opens his huge mouth, and Vainamoinen slips into it,Β and is swallowed up, but it has just come into its vastestΒ stomach, which is already thinking about how to get out. Build a raft and sailΒ up and down the bowels of the giant: this is what theΒ tickle, […] but he doesn't give him even a magic word.

Vainamoinen then builds a forge, and beats with anvil and hammer; Antero Vipunen - figure which, in part, he may have suggestedΒ  in Collodi the character of the voracious Green Fisherman, who Β«instead of hair he had a very thick bush of green grass on his headΒ» (chap. XXVIII) - yields, and sings for days and nights his runo, which also contains the three magic words, untilΒ [11]

Vainamoinen treasures everything and eventually agrees to go out.
Vipunen opens his huge jaws, the hero comes out
and can finallyΒ 
build his boat.

AWe are Vainamoinen building a boat for himself, and this also reminds us of Geppetto who ventures into the ocean to look for Pinocchio. Vainamoinen is also swallowed, not by the Shark but by the giant, and manages to get out after a given time. In this regard it can be noted that the escape with the raft built during the stay in the belly of the giant reappears exactly in the Pinocchio of Disney, where perhaps a "remnant" of the forge is also found: the fire with which Pinocchio decides to inflame the organism of the Whale until it coughs and sneezes and thus allows itself to be expelled and saved. L'team up disneyana, unlike most readers of Pinocchio all over the world, he had perhaps identified the analogy, or rather, recognized the linkΒ  existing between the episode of Pinocchio and that of Vainamoinen in Kalevala?Β 

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Bindolo Pinocchio drawing Mazzanti
The Bindolo designed by Mazzanti.

At this point the similarities between the Kalevala e PinocchioΒ  they may be finished, but one last oddity emerges just a few pages before the puppet finally transforms into a real kid. The elderly Geppetto, who escaped with his son at the Pescecane, falls ill and needs hot milk. To buy milk for his father, Pinocchio is forced to work at the gardener Giangio, taking the place of the donkey who drives il Bindolo, a Β«wooden device used to bring up the water from the cistern, to water the vegetablesΒ» (chap. XXXVI). Extracted Β«one hundred buckets of waterΒ», Pinocchio will be able to have a glass full of milk.Β Henry Mazzanti (1850-1910), the illustrator who made the drawings for the first edition of Pinocchio (Florence, Paggi, 1883), only hinted at the overall structure of the Bindolo. Mazzanti, like Collodi himself, almost seems to pose a puzzle to the reader: what is Bindolo really? A device with this name is not only the fruit of the Tuscan writer's imagination: it is oneΒ [12]

machine for lifting water for irrigation purposes. ISΒ  formed by a noria arranged vertically inside a well and moved, by means of a gear transmission, by a riding school to which a quadruped is attached.

This instrument, called by different names in the different Italian regions and characterized by the basic structure of gears (although of a shape not always corresponding to a single model), was quite widespread in the Italian countryside until the first half of the twentieth century. [13]. The bindolo designed by Mazzanti, however, has some anomalies. Della noria - i.e. the hex wheel (F) equipped with trays or quadrangular vases (G) oriented with the opening in the same direction - above the well (K) of the tank (M), only the left half is visible for the reader, but it is also noticed that its hub (the central cylinder) is not crossed by a horizontal pole (I) which would be necessary to hold the big wheel and allow it to move. The horizontal pole should also fit into a vertical pole (J) of support, which in Mazzanti's drawing would be "cut" out of the view to the right of the well (and of the observer).

Bindolo Pinocchio drawing my completion
The Bindolo designed by the Author.

It is therefore not clear how the entire Bindolo machine can hold up and function. The mechanism involved is the same as that of a wind or water mill, but functioning in reverse: the movement is not generated by the large wheel (equipped with blades in the case of the windmill, with collecting tanks in the case of the water one) which drives the internal gear system, but the internal gear (B) operated by the horizontal bar (A) pushed by human arms or pulled by the donkey, which by means of a horizontal pole (C) equipped with a toothed wheel or a pulley, transmits the movement to the noria by means of a chain or a transmission belt (D) which connects the pulley to a hub extension (E) of the wheel. According to Mazzanti's drawing, a chain is attached to one of the six sides of the latter (H) going down into the well, presumably with the bucket attached (L) to fill. But then why are the parallelepiped vases (or almost) fixed to the six sides of the noria equally, with the opening on one of the two smaller faces? The vases, orΒ  trays, do not reach the water (N), which does not reach the edge of the well: otherwise why hang a bucket on the noria to be lowered into the well?

The Bindolo is then a Β«deviceΒ» excessively complicated, at the same time incomplete and contradictory. It is therefore not clear why Collodi and Mazzanti have given way to such a mechanism, materially feasible, but technically rather odd, when to extract a given quantity of water from an underground or semi-underground well, a simple pulley mechanism, a lever, would suffice. with central fulcrum or, at the limit, a Β«Archimedes' screw Β», and not a machine which, in an absurd way, is at the same time a noria and a pulley (!). The author may have included here, adapting it, another typical element of the Scandinavian mythological and legendary heritage: the gigantic mill - symbol, in the eyes of protohistoric and ancient man, of the rotation of the Earth around its axis and of the apparent movement of the constellations - object of the volume by Giorgio de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend Hamlet's mill.

In Kalevala, the mill is called SampoΒ - name to be traced back to Sanskrit skambha, namely Β«stickΒ» o Β«pillarΒ» - which indicates Β«the mill tree [which] is also the axis of the worldΒ», built by the blacksmith Illmarinen (Β«runeΒ» X), with which Kullervo had taken the place of guardian dog [14]. In Grottasongr, poetic piece included in theEdda by Snorri Sturlusson (1178-1241) but probably Β«the oldest document of classical poetry that has survived, far prior to Snorri's storyΒ», appears Frodhi, Β«owner of an enormous mill, or grindstone, which no human force could moveΒ», called Grotti, that is Β«the crusherΒ». FrΓ³dhi convinced Β«out of greed, to work day and nightΒ» at the Grotti two giant girls, Fenja and Menja, who, despite their strength, struggled enormously to turn the millstone [15]; so Pinocchio adapts to spin the strange Bindolo,

but before he had raised the hundred buckets of water, he was all dripping with sweat from head to toe. An effort like that had never lasted (chap. XXXVI).

in Adventures of Pinocchiotherefore, themes and situations are found and intertwined whose resemblance to those present in the Germanic and Scandinavian mythological and legendary traditions can very hardly be a casual coincidence. The same intuition of the links between Collodi's fable and Northern European mythology, followed by some quite valid hypotheses, has recently expressed it. Eugenio Dario Lai in Pinocchio, the Nordic path, a short book that the writer ignored, until he discovered it, in a completely unexpected way, when this article was already almost finished. Lai's text is based on other tales of the legendary Germanic and Scandinavian heritageΒ [16]Β and only mentions the Kalevala, four verses about the giant Vipunen [17]:

A hundred words you can get,
a thousand magic formulas you can find
in the mouth of Vipuno,
in the belly of the rich with advice;

perhaps ignore Hamlet's mill by de Santillana and von Dechend and passages from Kalevala cited in it, and indulges a certain self-satisfaction for the desecration of Collodi's fable, but it certainly deserves reading. Lai believes, all in all, certain the presence of important Norse mythological figures in the "humble" role of the main characters of the Adventures of Pinocchio. The puppet would be modeled on the god Loki, liar and mocking, but also on some aspects of Odin - hanging from a huge tree - and of Thor: he wields the hammer with which he kills the Jiminy Cricket, an action that the Author connects to killing of the sun god Baldur (who, like Jiminy Cricket, represents wisdom) by Loki, who hits him with a mistletoe branch unknowingly thrown by the blind god HΓΆdr, but which has a closer parallel with theEdda of Snorri, where it is said that Thor fought the serpent of Midgard as long asΒ [18]

he threw the hammer at him, and some say he broke the monster's head, hurling it to the bottom of the sea, but it is almost certain that the monster is still alive, at the bottom of the sea;

the Jiminy Cricket, similarly, is fatally hit in the head, but he will be found alive, in the role of one of the three Animal Doctors, at the bedside of the rescued Pinocchio in extremis from the hanging (chap. XVI). In Geppetto, Lai finds Odin as a creator (the god creates the first human couple from two pieces of wood) and as a wandering elderly man (Geppetto Β«travels the worldΒ» for months in search of Pinocchio).

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According to the author, the Fairy with blue hair reveals characteristic attributes of the goddess Freya: knowledge of the world of the dead (when she first appears, the Fairy presents herself as a dead child; later she will make Pinocchio believe that she has died of pain; when Pinocchio refuses the medicine, she orders that the four black rabbits enter. they carry the coffin for him); obedience on the part of animals: the Hawk (Freya has a cloak of hawk feathers, the Fairy sends the Hawk to break the noose that keeps Pinocchio hanged), the Rabbits, the bum Medoro, the white mice that pull his carriage; magical power e Β«shamanicΒ» to transform herself into an animal: the Fairy, in chap. XXXIV, shows itself in the form of a woolen goat Β«of a dazzling blue colorΒ» in Scandinavian mythology one of Freya's symbolic animals is the goat, because of her own Β«lustΒ».

There is therefore to seriously consider the probability that Carlo Collodi really wanted to retrace a Β«Nordic trailΒ», through the extraction from their original context and the functional relocation to the plot of Pinocchio, of Β«broken clues, fragments that can only be correctly identified if they are stuck in the correct place of the fairy tale puzzle he created " [19].

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Note:

[1]Β See for example http://blog.terminologiaetc.it/2012/05/31/pinocchio-e-il-castoro/, and http://anni70-latvdeiragazzi.over-blog.it/2015/03/pinocchio-1947-non-quello-della-disney-ma-quello-italiano.html.

[2]Β Elemire Zolla, cit. in Carlo Collodi, The adventures of Pinocchio, edited by Marina Paglieri, Milan, Mondadori, 1981, p. 11 (all subsequent citations from Pinocchio are taken from this edition).

[3] This is in keeping with the quote from Kalevala, trad. it. by Paolo Emilio Pavolini cit. (with some adaptations) in Giorgio de Santillana, Hertha von Dechend, Hamlet's mill. Essay on the myth and the structure of time, Milan, Adelphi, VIII ed.-2000. According to the prose version by Gabriella Agrati and Maria Letizia Biagini (Kalevala. Myths, spells, heroes in the great saga of the Finnish people, Milan, Mondadori, 1988) the two brothers assumed human form after being two swans, or two doves, separated at birth.

[4]Β Kalevala, transl. it. cit., in Hamlet's mill cit., p.Β  51.

[5] Ivi.

[6]Β In the Agrati-Magini version of Kalevala (cit.) the first two death traps that Kullervo escapes appear in reverse order: first Kullervo is thrown into the waves, then an attempt is made to burn him.Β 

[7]Β Hamlet's mill cit., p. 53.Β  This episode is absent in the prose version of the Kalevala Agrati Magini cit .; in theory it should be placed between the end of the XXXI run and the beginning of the XXXII.

[8]Β Also partially reproduced in Hamlet's mill cit., p. 437 (figure 15).Β  Β  Β 

[9]Β See for example Anthony S. Mercatante, Universal Dictionary of Myths and Legends, Rome, Newton & Compton, 2001, p. 376.

[10]Β Hamlet's mill cit., pp. 134-135.

[11]Β Ivi.

[12]Β The little Treccani. Encyclopedic dictionary, vol. II, Rome, Institute for the Italian Encyclopedia, 1995, p. 197.

[13]Β See Nino Giaramidaro, On the side of the senia scecco, "Mediterranean Dialogues", 1 November 2014: http://www.istitutoeuroarabo.it/DM/dalla-parte-dello-scecco-di-senia/.

[14]Β Hamlet's mill cit., pp. 1 and 130.

[15]Β There, p. 118.

[16]Β Taken from the summaries of Massimo Centini, The Nordic traditions, Milan, Xenia, 2006, and by Gianna Isnardi Chiesa, The Nordic myths, Milan, Longanesi, 1991.

[17]Β Eugenio Dario Lai, Pinocchio, the Nordic path, Turin, Miraggi editions, 20, p. 60. These are the words with which a shepherd advises Vainamoinen to look for the buried giant.

[18]Β Cit. in Merchant, Universal Dictionary of Myths and Legends cit., p. 564.

[19]Β ED Lai, Pinocchio, the Nordic path cit., p. 28.Β 


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