The Spotted Deer (Turkish: Alageyikli) is a Turkish fairy tale published by author Ali Rıza Yalgın. The story is about a princess who marries a youth under an animal disguise, loses him due to her violating his trust, and goes after him at his mother's home, where she is forced to perform hard tasks for her.
The tale belongs to the international cycle of the Animal as Bridegroom or The Search for the Lost Husband, wherein a human princess marries a supernatural husband, loses him, and goes on a quest to find him. It is also distantly related to the Graeco-Roman myth of Cupid and Psyche, in that the heroine is forced to perform difficult tasks for a witch or her mother-in-law.
Publication The tale was originally published by Ali Rıza Yalgın with the title Alageyikli. German folklorist translated it as Der gescheckte Hirsch ("The Spotted Deer").
Summary In this tale, the padishah has three daughters. Each of the princesses orders the Wasir to give a melon to their father, to see their marriageability. The padishah, then, summons every man and youth from the kingdom to the palace, so that his daughters can choose their husbands by throwing apples. The elder two throw theirs and find two Wasir sons as bridegroom, and the youngest throws hers to a person named Keloğlan ("Bald-Headed"). The youngest throws her apple again, and again it falls near the same person, so they believe he is her destined mate. They marry. After they enter the bridal chambers, the youth takes out a feather and shakes it. He becomes a young man. The princess asks him about his origins, and he answers that he is called Alageyik ("spotted deer", "fallow deer"), the son of the Dev-mother ("Dewenmutter") from Mount Kâf; his mother is the Sultana ("Sultanin") Tepegöz, who rules over eighteen mountains; and tells her not to share his secret with anyone, lest he vanishes and she has to seek him.
One day, the padishah becomes ill, and his doctor prescribe he should drink deer milk to cure him. So his three sons-in-law are sent to look for deer milk, Keloglan on a lame mule, and the other two on fine horses. Keloglan burns a feather, teleports to Mount Qaf, gets the deer milk and brings it to his father-in-law. The other two sons-in-law bring milk that is either too sweet, or too bitter, but the milk Keloglan brought heals the king. Later, the padishah organizes an equestrian game with javelins, and a mysterious youth takes part in the festivities, amazing the padishah with his prowess. The youngest princess is proud of the youth's talent, as he is her husband, and reveals her husband's secret. For this, her husband does not return home at night, and she decides to seek him out with iron shoes and an iron cane.
The princess passes by the Copper Palace by the Copper Mountain, where no one knows the "Emir of Mount Kâf" (her husband), and by the Silver Mountain, where she is directed to the land of the Dews, in Mount Kâf. The princess stops by a fountain in a village. Meanwhile, her husband, the Emir, goes to fetch water from the fountain, and sees his wife. He turns her into a ball of yarn and brings it to his house, where he announces to his mother that he has found a maidservant in need of work.
The next day, his mother, who is a man-eating creature, gives the princess a broom decorated with pearls and gemstones and commands her to sweep a room. The princess gets the broom, but it "dissolves" in her hands. Her husband comes to her, uses a feather and the broom sweeps the room. The next day, the Dev-mother orders the princess to fill two vases with her tears. The Emir tells her to mix salt in water. On the third day, the mother orders the princess to go to her sister and get some musical instruments from there for her son's upcoming marriage. The Emir instructs the princess: close an open door and open a closed one; give the grass to a horse and meat for the dog; drink from a fountain of blood and wash her face in a fountain of pus; enter his aunt's house and, while she is away sharpening her teeth, get the bright box and flee. The princess follows the instructions to the letter and brings it to the Dev-mother.
Finally, the Dev-mother decides to marry her son, the Emir, to another Dev-woman. That same night, the Emir takes his human wife and flies away on a flying jug. His mother goes after him on another. The Emir sees her and turns his wife into a poplar tree and himself into a snake coiled around the tree. The Dev-mother tells the pair she wants to give her son a kiss; the Emir, metamorphosed into a snake, spits venom at his mother's mouth and bites her tongue, and she dies. The Emir and his human wife return to her father's kingdom, where they learn the padishah has died, but wanted his third son-in-law to ascend to the throne after him.Die Silberpappel mit den goldenen Früchten und andere türkische Volksmärchen erstmals übersetzt von Otto Spies. Textbearbeitung von Manfred Hesse. Wiesbaden: B. Heymann Verlag, 1976. pp. 8-11 (German text for tale nr. 2), 111 (source).
Analysis Tale type Scholars Wolfram Eberhard and Pertev Naili Boratav, establishers of the Turkish Foltkale Catalogue, classified the episode of the quest for the remedy to the king as tale type TTV 257, Die Löwenmilch ("Lion's Milk"), of the Turkish Folktale Catalogue. The tale then segues into tale type TTV 98, "Der Pferdemann".Eberhard, Wolfram; Boratav, Pertev Nailî. Typen türkischer Volksmärchen. Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1953. pp. 310-311, 311 (section "IV"). German folklorist Hans-Jörg Uther, in a review of Otto Spies's translated book, classified it as Turkish type EB 98.Uther, Hans-Jörg. Spies, Otto (Übers.): Die Silberpappel mit den goldenen Früchten undandere türkische Volksmärchen, 1976 [Compte-rendu]. "VI. Besprechungen". In: Fabula 18 (1977): 268-333 [316-318].
In his monograph about Cupid and Psyche, acknowledged that Turkish type 98 was subtype 425A of his analysis, that is, "Cupid and Psyche", being the "oldest" and containing the episode of the witch's tasks.Swahn, Jan Öjvind. The Tale of Cupid and Psyche. Lund, C.W.K. Gleerup. 1955. p. 23. In the international index, however, Swahn's typing is indexed as type ATU 425B, "The Son of the Witch".Aarne, Antti; Thompson, Stith. The types of the folktale: a classification and bibliography. Third Printing. Folklore Fellows Communications FFC no. 184. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica, 1973 . p. 142 (footnote nr. 1).
Motifs The supernatural husband In most of the variants collected, the supernatural husband is a horse, followed by a man with a donkey's head and a camel. In other tales, he may be a snake, a frog, or even Turkish hero Kaloghlan.Eberhard, Wolfram; Boratav, Pertev Nailî. Typen türkischer Volksmärchen. Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1953. pp. 113-114. In some tales, the heroine chooses her future supernatural husband by throwing an object, like a dart, an arrow or a handkerchief.
The heroine's tasks Another motif that appears in the tale type is that the heroine must travel to another witch's house and fetch from there a box or casket she must not open. German folklorist Hans-Jörg Uther remarked that these motives ("the quest for the casket" and the visit to the second witch) are "the essential feature" of the subtype.
The heroes' Magic Flight According to Christine Goldberg, some variants of the type show as a closing episode "The Magic Flight" sequence, a combination that appears "sporadically in Europe", but "traditionally in Turkey".See footnote 20 in As their final transformation to deceive the ogress mother, the princess becomes a tree and her supernatural husband becomes a snake coiled around it.Eberhard, Wolfram; Boratav, Pertev Nailî. Typen türkischer Volksmärchen. Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1953. p. 113. Although this episode is more characteristic of tale type ATU 313, "The Magic Flight", some variants of type ATU 425B also show it as a closing episode. German literary critic Walter Puchner argues that the motif attached itself to type 425B, as a Wandermotiv ("Wandering motif").Puchner, Walter. "Magische Flucht (AaTh 313 sqq.)". In: Enzyklopädie des Märchens Band 9: Magica-Literatur – Neẓāmi. Edited by Rudolf Wilhelm Brednich; Hermann Bausinger; Wolfgang Brückner; Helge Gerndt; Lutz Röhrich; Klaus Roth. De Gruyter, 2016 . pp. 13-14. . https://www.degruyter.com/database/EMO/entry/emo.9.003/html
Variants Tales about Dev husband Dev Yavrusu In a Turkish tale collected from informant Zeynep Doğan, from Adıyaman, with the title Dev Yavrusu ("The Young Dev"), an old couple walks somewhere and the woman complains about her thirst. She then drinks some water from a dev's footprint, and, nine months later, gives birth to a son in dev form. When he is three years old, he goes to the mountains in the morning, and returns at night. When he is twenty years old, he asks his parents to find him a bride, and suggests the local pasha's daughter. His parents question his choice, but he fills a basin of gold and tells his parents to take is as a gift to the pasha. His mother goes to the palace to give him the basin, but, on finding the monarch in prayer, she leaves the object there and goes home before she is found out. The next day, the giant son gives another golden basin to his mother and sends her again, and again the monarch is in prayer, but this time the concubines spot her. The third day, the woman goes to the palace again with the golden basin, and the concubines capture her and take her to the pasha. She explains her son wishes to marry his daughter. The pasha agrees, but sets three tasks: first, for him to build a palace more magnificent than the pasha's and surrounded by trees, in a way the princess's feet cannot touch the ground; second, furnish the mansion with a carpet so that half remains empty; thirdly, provide a cluster of grapes for his soldiers to eat and not diminish the fruits. The giant son provides the three requests (he uses a neighbour's hand mill for the palace, and asks his mother to buy a carpet and a grape for the other two). Resigned, the pasha marries his daughter to the giant son. On the wedding night, the giant son takes off his skin and becomes a handsome youth, then puts on the disguise in the morning. After six months, the pasha pays a visit to his daughter and asks her about her husband. The princess reveals about the giant's skin, and the pasha suspects the disguise is in the house somewhere. He finds it up a pillar and burns it. The giant son, without his skin, returns at night and discovers his disguise is burnt, then blames his wife for it, telling her he will depart and she will only find him if she wears down a pair of iron shoes. He then leaves. After he vanishes, she dons the iron shoes and makes a long journey, until, feeling tired, stops to rest by a tree. Her husband, Dev Yavrusu finds his wife near the tree and says he is living with a witch who wants to marry him to her daughter, but he will ask if he can take his human wife in. After he explains the situation, the witch agrees to take her in as a servant, and forces her on tasks. First, the witch gives the princess a black cloth and orders her to wash it white, for she will use it to make a quilt for her daughter. The princess takes the black cloth to the river; her husband utters a spell, then throws it in the river, where it becomes white.