Spinning and Cannibalism in the Greek ‘Cinderella’: Symbolic Analogies in Folktale and Myth

Abstract

The Greek ‘Cinderella’ (with 254 versions recorded in the Catalogue of Greek Magic Folktales) is articulated around an ambivalent female spinning pair of mother and daughter(s), their intimacy menaced by matricide and/or cannibalistic nuances, explicit or implicit. This rich material is here studied framed by the relevant folkloric data with which traditional Greek audiences of the tales were familiar, as well as by older symbolic layers of myths, beliefs, and rituals regarding spinning, which were juxtaposed, inverted, or disguised in the process of their transmission.