Calvino has been described as Italy’s Brothers Grimm but at almost 800 pages of his Italian Folk Tales I think he’s outdone them. They are a diverse mix, many of which include elements from the Bible and other folk tales. But my favourite is The Canary Prince.

A widowed king remarries, but the new queen was jealous of her stepdaughter so convinces him to exile her to a castle in the forest where she was ignored by her ladies in waiting so spent her days staring at the forest. A handsome prince dressed in yellow falls in love with her and a helpful witch delivers a magic book to the castle for the princess. By turning the pages forward, she turned the Prince into a canary and flew to the princess’s tower. She turned the pages back and he became human.

There’s more to the story but what intrigues me is that the magic is from turning the pages, a physical process rather than any spells or words. It seems the story was written and spread by people who didn’t know what the books contained, or their purpose. In a way this was true.

The Black Death showed the weakness of the Christian Church. No amount of prayers or good works provided protection against it, so clerics began investigating what relics were. They began investigating and categorising them to form Curiosity Cabinets. A late addition to these were books, decorated with jewels and bound in the finest leathers. Since the public had no access to these libraries, it seems myths arose about them and the power held by the physical books. This suggests The Canary Prince is older than the more famous Rapunzel story.