{"id":14041,"date":"2013-03-31T05:13:41","date_gmt":"2013-03-31T09:13:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/lovejoyfeminism\/?p=14041"},"modified":"2013-03-30T23:04:46","modified_gmt":"2013-03-31T03:04:46","slug":"the-three-weavers-part-v-the-princes-come-riding","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/lovejoyfeminism\/2013\/03\/the-three-weavers-part-v-the-princes-come-riding.html","title":{"rendered":"The Three Weavers, part V: The Princes Come Riding"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

So with her father\u2019s blessing light upon her, she rode away beside the prince; and ever after, all her life was crowned with happiness as it had been written for her in the stars.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In part I<\/a> of this series I offered some background to Annie Fellows Johnston\u2019s 1904 short story\u00a0The Three Weavers,<\/em>\u00a0and in part II<\/a> the story began as three weavers\u2014Herthold, Hubert, and Hildgardmar\u2014who live side-by-side and have similar fortunes, bore three infant daughters\u2014Hertha, Huberta, and Hildegard. At each girl\u2019s christening, a fairy appeared and declared that the girl would marry a prince\u2014if she could weave him a royal mantle.<\/p>\n

In part III<\/a> the three fathers took very different courses of action in introducing the magic looms and weaving\u2014here an analogy for love and sex\u2014to their daughters. Hertha shamed his daughter for asking about her loom, and she is now weaving in secret. Huberta\u2019s father gave her her loom with a laugh, and told her to have fun with it however she pleased. Hildegarde\u2019s father spoke seriously with her about her loom, giving it to her along with a silver yardstick and careful instructions.<\/p>\n

In part IV<\/a> the girls went about their weaving: Huberta gave out woven mantles hither and yon, to the shepherd boy and a passing troubadour; Hertha wove in secret, working on a mantle to fit a page she believed had a royal and princely demeanor; and Hildegarde wove with her father as her confidante, reminding her that a passing man and a wandering knight did not fully fit the yardstick he had given her.<\/p>\n

At last it came to pass, as it was written in the stars, a prince came riding by to ask for Hertha\u00a0as his bride. Old Herthold, taking her by the hand, said, \u2018Now\u00a0I will lead thee into the inner room and teach thee how to use the fairy\u2019s sacred gift. With me for a teacher, thou canst surely make no mistake.\u2019<\/p>\n

When they came into the inner room there stood only the empty loom from which the golden warp had been clipped.<\/p>\n

\u2018How now!\u2019 he demanded, angrily. Hertha, braving his ill-humour, said, defiantly, \u2018Thou art too late. Because I feared thy scorn of what thou wast pleased to call my childish foolishness, I wove in secret, and when my prince came by, long ago I gave it him. He stands outside at the casement.\u2019<\/p>\n

The astonished Herthold, turning in a rage, saw the long-haired page clad in the mantle which she had woven in secret. He tore it angrily from the youth, and demanded she should give it to the prince, who waited to claim it, but the prince would have none of it. It was of too small a fashion to fit his royal shoulders, and had been defiled by the wearing of a common page. So with one look of disdain he rode away.<\/p>\n

Stripped of the robe her own fancy had woven around him, the page stood shorn before her. It was as if a veil had been torn from her eyes, and\u00a0she no longer saw him as her fond dreams had painted him. She saw him in all his unworthiness; and the cloth of gold which was her maiden-love, and the rosy day-dreams she had woven into it to make the mantle of a high ideal, lay in tattered shreds at her feet. When she looked from the one to the other and saw the mistake she had made and the opportunity she had lost, she covered her face with her hands and cried out to Herthold, \u2018It is thy fault. Thou shouldst not have laughed my childish questions to scorn, and driven me to weave in ignorance and in secret.\u2019 But all her upbraiding was too late. As it was written in the stars, her heart broke, as broke the shattered mirror of the Lady of Shalott.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat same day came a prince to Hubert, asking for his daughter. He called her from the garden, saying, gaily, \u2018Bring forth the mantle now, Huberta. Surely it must be a goodly one after all these years of weaving at thy own sweet will.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cShe brought it forth, but when he saw it he started back aghast at its pigmy size. When he demanded the reason, she confessed with tears that she had no more of the golden warp that was Clotho\u2019s sacred gift. She had squandered that maiden-love in the bygone years to make the mantles\u00a0she had so thoughtlessly bestowed upon the shepherd lad and the troubadour, the student and the knight. This was all she had left to give.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018Well,\u2019 said her father, at length, \u201dtis only what many another has done in the wanton foolishness of youth. But perchance when the prince sees how fair thou art, and how sweetly thou dost sing to thy lute, he may overlook the paltriness of thy offering. Take it to him.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen she had laid it before him, he cast only one glance at it, so small it was, so meagre of gold thread, so unmeet for a true prince\u2019s wearing. Then he looked sorrowfully into the depths of her beautiful eyes and turned away.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe gaze burned into her very soul and revealed to her all that she had lost for evermore. She cried out to her father with pitiful sobs that set his heartstrings in a quiver, \u2018It is\u00a0thy\u00a0fault! Why didst thou not warn me what a precious gift was the gold warp Clotho gave me! Why didst thou say to me, \u201cIs\u00a0this\u00a0the lad? Is that the lad?\u201d till I looked only at the village churls and wove my web to fit their unworthy shoulders, and forgot how high is the stature of a perfect prince!\u2019 Then, hiding her face, she fled away, and as it was written in the stars,\u00a0her heart broke, as broke the shattered mirror of the Lady of Shalott.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen came the prince to Hildegarde. All blushing and aflutter, she clipped the threads that held the golden web of her maiden-love, through which ran all her happy girlish day-dreams, and let him take it from her. Glancing shyly up, she saw that it fitted him in all faultlessness, as the falcon\u2019s feathers fit the falcon.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen old Hildgardmar, stretching out his hands, said, \u2018Because even in childhood days thou ever kept in view the sterling yardstick as I bade thee, because no single strand of all the golden warp that Clotho gave thee was squandered on another, because thou waitedst till thy woman\u2019s fingers wrought the best that lay within thy woman\u2019s heart, all happiness shall now be thine! Receive it as thy perfect crown!\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cSo with her father\u2019s blessing light upon her, she rode away beside the prince; and ever after, all her life was crowned with happiness as it had been written for her in the stars.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I\u2019m going to come right out and say it: These princes are jerks, and Hertha and Huberta are well rid of them.<\/p>\n

I mean, the one prince sees that Hertha has woven a mantle fit for the page she loves, and given it to him, and he responds by giving her a look of disdain?<\/em>\u00a0Who does he think he is,<\/em> anyway? I get that the author of the story is trying to portray Hertha\u2019s page as unworthy of her, but honestly, he comes off loads better than the prince. I vote she stick with her faithful page rather than rejecting him because she just realized she might have ha a trust fund baby. And Huberta, for her part, has had enough relationship experience by now that she shouldn\u2019t have a problem finding a loving life partner, once she gets over the insult paid her by an\u00a0uppity\u00a0trust fund baby\u2014it\u2019s not like she\u2019s been kept locked in a closet and has no idea how to meet guys, after all.<\/p>\n

And then there\u2019s Hildegarde. Notice the words used to describe her reaction to the prince\u2014\u201cblushing\u201d and \u201caflutter\u201d and \u201cglancing\u00a0shyly up.\u201d These are not signs of a mature relationship. I mean, for goodness sake, she has only just met the<\/em> prince! She doesn\u2019t actually know him! In practice, what happened here was that her father, Hildgardmar, designed a yardstick of proper characteristics and chose her husband for her. This is what I was raised to expect. The roles played by Hildegarde and her father are exactly those outlined by leaders of the Christian Patriarchy movement and the \u201ccourtship\u201d ideal. And given that she has never been in a relationship with anyone before, and given the has just been presented by her father with an approved beau whom she is told will bring her all happiness, of course<\/em> she\u2019s all aflutter and blushing and shy! It\u2019s no wonder I read this section as so realistic when I was a teen\u2014it was what I\u2019d been taught to long for and expect.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m glad I went back through this story. It\u2019s helped me clarify my feelings about\u00a0The Three Weavers,<\/em>\u00a0which I first read more than ten years ago, and which had a significant impact on my relational development. I now understand that part of why I felt such an attachment to this story is that it perfectly fit with the other things I was taught, and especially with Joshua Harris\u2019 I Kissed Dating Goodbye<\/em>. The messages in this story were the stuff of my girlhood. I suppose I now wish I could travel into this story and tell Hertha, Huberta, and Hildegarde that there is more to their lives than who they marry, and that rather than sitting around at home waiting for life to come to them they should go out and seize it themselves. Maybe we would run away together, we four. Perhaps I should write a fanfic. After all, I already know who the villains would be (hint: it starts with \u201cp\u201d and ends with \u201crinces\u201d).<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I suppose I now wish I could travel into this story and tell Hertha, Huberta, and Hildegarde that there is more to their lives than who they marry, and that rather than sitting around at home waiting for life to come to them they should go out and seize it themselves. Maybe we would run away together, we four. Perhaps I should write a fanfic. After all, I already know who the villains would be (hint: it starts with “p” and ends with “rinces”).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":845,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[327],"class_list":["post-14041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-purity","tag-the-three-weavers"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Three Weavers, part V: The Princes Come Riding<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I suppose I now wish I could travel into this story and tell Hertha, Huberta, and Hildegarde that there is more to their lives than who they marry, and that rather than sitting around at home waiting for life to come to them they should go out and seize it themselves. Maybe we would run away together, we four. Perhaps I should write a fanfic. 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