The Three Daughters of King O'Hara

Norwegian folklorist Reidar Thoralf Christiansen classified the tale as belonging to type 425, "The Search for the Lost Husband", of the international Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index.[3] These tales mostly refer to a human maiden being betrothed to an animal bridegroom, who is actually a prince cursed into a non-human form. For example, the hero of the tale was said to be transformed into a white dog by the druidecht of the Queen of Tir-na-Nog.[4]

Alfred Nutt described the story as a "Beauty and the Beast tale",[5] another type of the ATU index related to the animal bridegroom tales.

The tale also contains type ATU 302, "The Ogre's (Devil's) Heart in the Egg",[6] a set of stories where the villain hides its heart or soul in an external place and can only be defeated if the heroes destroy its external location.

According to Jan-Öjvind Swahn's study on some 1,100 variants of Cupid and Psyche and related types, the motif of the "wishing chair" appears in Celtic, Irish and British variants.[7] In the same study, he concluded that the dog as the animal husband appears "confined to the Germanic and Celtic areas".[8]

An Irish language variant titled Cú Bán an t-Sléibhe ("The White Hound of the Mountain") was published in the academic journal Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie. In this tale, the king's three daughters open a door to a room their father forbid them to enter, and sit on a chair. All three express their wishes for a husband, and the youngest says she will marry "The White Hound of the Mountain", without knowing if he exists or not. They marry and she gives birth to three children of wondrous aspect, who are taken from her by unknown forces. At the end of the tale, the heroine uses golden items she was given on her way to her husband's location to bribe the witch for three nights with him. The witch who cursed him can only be defeated by breaking the egg with her life in it.[9] Reidar Christiansen identified this variant as hailing from Galway, and also classified the tale as types 425 and 302.[10]

In a variant from County Mayo, collected from a sixty-year-old woman named Una Canavan with the title The Hill of Needles, a widowed nobleman has three daughters. One day, he forgets to lock up a certain door of his house, and his eldest daughter enters it. She talks to the chair that she wants to marry an officer. She tells her middle sister, who wishes to the chair for a husband. The third also wishes to the chair, which says a white fawn shall marry her. The promised husbands appear to the ladies, including the white fawn. The lady learns the fawn is a man, who asks her which form she prefers; she answers that he should be a man at night and a fawn by day. She wants to visit her family, but her husband warns her that if she sheds a tear, a coach will not return for her to bring her home to the fawn husband. She goes to her father's house and gives birth to a son, who is taken from her. The next year, she gives birth to a daughter, who is also taken from her. She sheds a tear and the coach does not come. The lady returns to the husband's home on foot and finds only a field of nettles. She sees another coach with her husband inside and follows it; along the road, three houses that she visits, each housing one of her husband's sisters and one of her children. Her sisters-in-law give her scissors, a tablecloth and a comb. Her husband bids her goodbye, since his coach will traverse the Hill of Big Needles and the Hill of Little Needles, reachable only by iron shoes. She throws some blood on her husband's shirt as he departs, and looks for a blacksmith to create on the iron shoes. She reaches the other side, finds a woman crying about the man's shirt with blood and washes it. The lady buys three nights with her husband from the new wife and learns from him that his new wife can inly be killed by finding an egg inside a duck, inside a ram, inside a well, and throw it at her mole.[11]

Scottish folklorist John Francis Campbell claimed that an oral version told in 1812 to a man named John Dewar by a servant woman, was a version of a "popular tale" written in Wales "about 400 years ago".[12] In this tale, titled an t urisgeal aig na righre Righ na thuirabhinn agus righ nan Ailp, the King of Ailp and his kingdom were killed by the druids, leaving only a son and a daughter. His daughter was trained by the druids and gained skin green as moss. The son climbs a mountain name Bean ghloine with his father's sword and scepter. Another druid curses him into animal form (a grayhound). He abandons the items on the mountain and flees to his sister. The prince, then, must remain as a grayhound until a maiden agrees to marry him, and his sister nurses three children and receives a kiss from a king's son. Some time later, the King of the Urbhin, while at war with another king, loses his way into a thick mist and ends up at the greyhound's castle. He kicks up the former king's bones and the grayhound, for this affront, demands the king of Urbhin surrenders one of his daughters as ransom. The king surrenders his daughter and she marries the greyhound. The princess lives with the greyhound and discovers he is a human prince. They marry, and her sisters become jealous. The princess's brother also falls in love with the grayhound's sister, the green girl, after drinking a potion of "mheadair Bhuidh" (yellow mead) from her hand. The princess's sisters conspire with a druid to dethrone her sister and become the greyhound's queen: when the time comes to give birth, for three times the princess's child is taken form her by a green hand in a window, but each child cries and the mother takes the teardrops. The grayhound, now a human prince, announces he will marry the one who can retrieve his father's sword and scepter from the glass mountain. The princess accomplishes it, but her sisters take the credit. Next, they must wash the bloodstained shirts that belonged to those slain by the druids. The princess also washes all but one, and stays three nights on the (now human) greyhound's bed. On the first two nights, he is asleep, but acknowlegdes his wife on the third night, and they return to the former kingdom of Ailp with the green girl (his sister). The tale continues as the "wicked druid" Dubhmalurraidh changes one of the princess's sisters into her shape, to cast the king into confusion. However, the green sister produces her father's sword and scepter (retrieved by her sister-in-law) and her three nephews.[13]

In an Icelandic variant collected by Jón Árnason with the title Sigurður kóngsson ("Sigurd, the King's Son"), a king and a queen with four daughters ruled a great empire. One day, on a hunt, the king gets lost while following a deer, and finds a seemingly abandoned house. He enters it and sees a set table and a bed prepared for someone, but no one in sight, save for a little red-brown dog. He spends some time in the house and leaves, but as soon as he walks down the road, the little red-brown dog stops him. The dog complains that he welcomed the king in his home, and he is leaving without thanking him. The dog threatens him, unless he gives the first thing that greet the king on his way back, saying that he will come in three days to get whatever it is. The fourth and youngest daughter greets her father and the king reveals to his family the incident. The king tries to elude the dog by sending others' daughters in her place, but the dog notices the deceit and returns to claim his prize. She climbs onto the red-brown dog and both run through the forest until reaching a house. The princess notices that the dog is such by day and a man by night. One day, she becomes pregnant and her husband says that their child will be taken from them, and the she must not shed a tear, unless she does it on a kerchief he gave her. The first time, it happens to her daughter: she leans over the child's cradle, as a shadow appears by the window and a vulture snatches the child. In the meantime, the fourth princess and her dog husband visit her family on the occasion of the wedding of her three elder sisters, bearing splendid gifts, but refraining from revealing too much of her new life. When she next gives birth (to another daughter and to a boy), the same happened: the shadow and the vulture come and steal the baby. On the occasion of the wedding of her third sister, the princess is accosted by her mother and reveals to her the whole story, and about the man that comes at night. The queen gives her a flint to light up and see his true face. The princess follows her mother's orders and sees her husband's true face. He wakes up and laments that she couldn't wait a bit more as his curse was nearly breaking. He tells her his story: his name is Sigurd, the son of a king who was cursed by his step-mother for not marrying her daughter; he was to stay a dog during the day, but remain a man at night, for 10 years, unless he found another princess willing to marry him, bear his three children (that would be taken from her as soon as they were born) and to never see his face. The husband disappears and she begins a journey towards his father's kingdom to stop the wedding with the step-sister. She passes by an old man's house, then another's, and meets her children playing with an old woman. She reaches Sigurd's castle, after the wedding, and buys three nights with her husband with a golden comb, a necklace and finally a mirror. For two nights, she pours her heart out to him, who lies asleep, but on the third night, he recognizes her.[14][15][16] Philologist Adeline Rittershaus translated the tale as Der braune Hund ("The Brown Dog") and identified its origin as a manuscript from Pastor Jón Kristjánsson, of Yztafell.[17]

Adeline Ritterhaus summarized another Icelandic variant she named Der zum Riesen verzauberte Königssohn ("The King's Son changed into a Giant"). In this tale, a royal couple has three daughters. One day, the king gets lost in a thick mist, until a giant appears with a proposition: he will save the king's life, in exchange for the king's third daughter. After three times, the king concedes and agrees. He returns home and explains the story to his daughters. The youngest daughter marries the giant. The princess gives birth to three children, two boys and a girl, which are taken from her by a giantess and a red-brown she-dog. At the end of the tale, the giant is disenchanted into his true form, Prince Sigurdur, who reveals that the giantess was his mother and the she-dog his sister, now both restored to their original forms.[18]

In a Swedish tale collected by Eva Wigström (sv), with the title Kung Vollermansson ("King Vollermanson"), a king and queen have three daughters. Before he goes on a journey, the king asks the princesses what they want: the two elders ask for beautiful dresses, and the youngest for three singing leaves she saw in a dream. The king, on his journey, buys the dresses, but the singing leaves are impossible to find. He enters the woods and sees the tree. He snaps a branch and, before he leaves, a black dog appears and admonishes him for taking the branch. The dog demands the king offers in exchange the first thing that greets him on the way back. The youngest does, learns the whole story and offers to surrender herself to the dog. They live a married life, the dog becoming human while in the castle. She gives birth to three children, but they are taken from her by her husband. She hears the wedding bells coming from her father's kingdom and visits her family on the occasion of the wedding of her two sisters and her brother. On the third visit, she confides in her mother about the uncertain fate of the children, and her husband's curse. The queen tells her to prick his skin with a knife at night, in order to draw his blood. The princess does as advised and the dog prince awakes. He tells her that his curse would have ended in a few hours, but now he has to travel to the castle of the witch that cursed him. He changes back into a dog and takes his wife on his back. They reach three houses where she is asked by her husband to asks for food and shelter in the name of Kung Vollermanson, and, if she sees a child, must not kiss them. On the third house, she receives a staff, but, when she exits the house, the dog has vanished.[19]

In a variant from the Faroe Islands, Vetil kongasonur ("Vetil, the King's Son"), a poor farmer promises his daughter to a wolf. They marry and she has three human children, which are taken from her as soon as they are born. After she visits her mother, the girl is advised to use a knife on her husband to confirm if he is human. She does as advised and her husband disappears. She goes on a quest for him and finds her three children. She finally reaches her destination: a glass mountain, impossible to reach on foot. An old man tells her she must wear iron garments, iron boots and iron gloves to climb it. She does and enters a castle, where her husband is to be married to a sorceress. The girl bribes the sorceress with three splendid dresses for three nights with the prince.[20][21]

In a variant from Letcher County, Kentucky collected by Marie Campbell with the title The Girl That Married a Flop-Eared Hound, a widowed king walks in the wood and sees a "fine hound-dog with long flop-ears". He asks the dog what it is doing there and the dog, to the king's surprise, answers that it wants to marry one of the king's daughters. Only the youngest daughter accepts the proposal, with the condition that she can visit her famlily whenever she wants. On their wedding day, the sisters use blindfolds to bear the humiliation of having a dog as brother-in-law, but instead a fine young man appears to marry their sister. One day, the princess is pregnant and wishes to give birth under her father's roof. The dog husband agrees, as long as she never reveals her husband's name. On two occasions, she gives birth to her child (the first a boy, the second a girl), who disappears two days after their birth when "fairy music" plays, leaving only wine and cookies on the cradle. The princess's sisters accuse the dog husband, and insist she reveals his name, but she remains steadfast. On the third visit, however, the princess gives birth to her third child and reveals her husband's name, "Sunshine on the Dew". This time, the child disappears, and so does her husband. She then goes on a quest for him, meeting three old women on the journey who give her a pair of scissors, a thimble and a needle. The princess uses the magical objects as bargaining chips to be able to spend a night with her husband, who is to be married to another woman.[22] The tale was also classified as ATU 425A, "The Animal as Bridegroom".[23]

Africanist Sigrid Schmidt created a whole system of classification for Khoisan folktales. Tale type 425A, in this system, was numbered KH 1048 and named "The girl on quest for her vanished bridegroom, who was a dog during the day and a man at night (AaTh 425A)", or Der Mann in Hundegestalt ("The Husband in Dog-Form").[24][25]

She provided the summary of a Southern African tale: a man takes off its dog skin at night to sleep with the king's daughters, until one day the princesses hide the dogskin and he vanishes. One of the princesses goes after him. On the journey, she helps an old woman by carrying a jug of water and gains a magical pair of scissors. She reaches another kingdom, where the man is married to another wife. The princess trades the scissors for one night with the man, but the new wife puts a sleeping potion in his drink. The princess manages to help him recover his memory by showing him his dogskin, a wedding ring and a photo. Schmidt supposed that this tale might have come from a foreign source, since, according to Swahn, the motif of the dog husband and the magical scissors as the item the heroine receives appear in Celtic tradition.[26]