History Literature / TheTwelveDancingPrincesses

After many princes have tried and failed to solve the mystery, and old soldier traveling through a wood meets an old woman who advises him to take on the challenge. She gives him an invisibility cloak and tells him not to eat or drink anything given to him by one of the princesses who will come to him in the evening, and to pretend to sleep after the princess leaves. After reaching the castle, he follows the advice, [[DiscreetDrinkDisposal secretly disposes the wine]] offered to him by a princess, and pretends to fall asleep.

** The ''Faerie Tale Theatre'' version knocks it down to six princesses instead of twelve.

* DiscreetDrinkDisposal: A standard part of the story, which often has the soldier pour the drugged drink the princess offers him into a hidden sponge. In Creator/{{Robin McKinley}}'s adaptation of the story in ''The Door in the Hedge'', he pours the drugged wine into the thick, luxurious cloaks he's been given to wear, whereas in ''Anime/GrimmsFairytaleClassics'' he quietly dumps the drink in the soil of the nearest plant.

* YoungestChildWins: Averted, a rare example for the oldest sister to be chosen as the hero's bride -- in some versions. Sometimes he chooses the youngest princess, whom he followed closely throughout the adventure; sometimes he declares he doesn't want any wife so untrustworthy.

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: The hero in the original tales is described as "old" (hence why he picks the oldest princess to be his wife), but in the ''Anime/GrimmsFairytaleClassics'' he turns out to be a rather handsome soldier (who even wears a a nice hat) not likely to be past his mid 20's. [[SheCleansUpNicely He looks even better when dolled up in regal clothes at the end]].

* KarmaHoudiniWarranty: In some versions of the story, the men that the princesses dance with at the ball are under a spell. When the princesses are exposed, they suddenly remember who they are. Additionally the original has the king say that anyone who fails to find out what his daughters are up to will be executed - and the princesses still try to drug the soldier, knowing he'll be killed.

* EldritchLocation: The magical place where the princesses dance is generally agreed to be in the LandOfFaerie, and an interesting note is that while many versions hold the princesses, the princes, or [[UpToEleven the entire royal family]] to be under a curse, nobody seems to state who put the curse on them or WHY they would have done it, so there are some heavy GeniusLoci implications if you poke at the backstory long enough.

* GratuitousPrincess: While it's not unusual for a fairy tale to have princesses, the story features not two but twelve princesses, all of whom sleep in the same room and are basically interchangeable. The large number seems to add to the mystery of why they able to disappear each night and dance the night away - it's less plausible that such a large number could sneak away undetected.

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: The hero in the original tales is described as "old" (hence why he picks the oldest princess to be his wife), but in the ''Anime/GrimmsFairytaleClassics'' he turns out to be a rather handsome soldier (who even wears a a NiceHat) not likely to be past his mid 20's. [[SheCleansUpNicely He looks even better when dolled up in regal clothes at the end]].

** The king puts dozens of innocent men to death for [[DisproportionateRetribution failing to discover where his daughters go each night]] and is arguably the villain of the story, but ends the tale [[KarmaHoudini getting what he wanted]] and suffering no negative consequences. Even adaptations that chastise the princesses for letting the men die rarely extend that to the king who was actually killing them, and unlike them, there's no implication that he was [[HypnotizeThePrincess under a spell]].

* HypnotizeThePrincess: In some versions, the princesses are under a curse and that's why they [[OOCIsSeriousBusiness find no problems lying to their father and letting the princes get executed for failing;]] when the soldier finally breaks the curse and they regain their memories, [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone they're horrified at their actions.]] In other versions, [[DistressedDude the failed princes are the ones under a curse]] and they're not actually dead, but spirited off to the Otherworld where the princesses dance with them. In yet more versions, ''everyone'' is under that curse, and it's never really stated who went to all this trouble.

[[http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/TwelDanc.shtml "The Twelve Dancing Princesses"]] (or "The Worn-Out Dancing Shoes" or "The Shoes that were Danced to Pieces", original: "Die zertanzten Schuhe") is a German {{fairy tale}} originally published by Creator/TheBrothersGrimm in ''Children's and Household Tales'' as tale number 133. Charles Deulin collected another, French version in his ''Contes du Roi Cambinus'' (1874), which Creator/AndrewLang [[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/twelvedancing/stories/lang.html included]] in ''The Red Fairy Book'' and Creator/AlexanderAfanasyev collected a Russian variant, "The Secret Ball", in ''Narodnye Russkie Skazki''. Creator/JosephJacobs collected a GenderFlip, "Literature/KateCrackernuts".

After many princes have tried and failed to solve the mystery, and old soldier traveling through a wood meets an old woman who advises him to take on the challenge. She gives him an invisibility cloak and tells him not to eat or drink anything given to him by one of the princesses who will come to him in the evening, and to pretend to sleep after the princess leaves. After reaching the castle, he follows the advice, [[SecretDrinkDisposal secretly disposes the wine]] offered to him by a princess, and pretends to fall asleep.

The plot follows twelve princesses who slept in twelve beds in the same room; every night their doors were securely locked, but in the morning their shoes were found to be worn through as if they had been dancing all night. The king promised his kingdom and a daughter to any man who could discover the princesses' secret within three days and three nights, but those who failed within the set time limit would be put to death.

An old soldier came to try his hand at the task, following many who had failed. Whilst traveling through a wood he came upon an old woman, who gave him an invisibility cloak and told him not to eat or drink anything given to him by one of the princesses who would come to him in the evening, and to pretend to be fast asleep after the princess left. He followed the advice, only pretending to drink the wine given to him by a princess after reaching the castle, and pretending to fall asleep.

The princesses, sure that the soldier was asleep, dressed themselves in fine clothes and escaped from their room by a trap door in the floor. The soldier, seeing this, donned his invisibility cloak and followed them down. The passageway led them to three groves of trees: one of silver, the second of gold, and the third of diamonds. The soldier broke off a twig from each as evidence. They walked on until they came upon a great lake, and twelve boats with twelve princes in them ferried them to the other side, the soldier hiding in the boat of the youngest princess. On the other side of the lake was a castle, into which all the princesses went and danced the night away until their shoes were worn and they needed to leave.

This continued a second and third night and on the third night the soldier carried away a golden cup as a token of where he had been. When it came time for him to declare the princesses' secret, he went before the king with the three branches and the golden cup, and told the king all he had seen. The princesses saw there was no use to deny the truth, and confessed. The soldier took the eldest princess as his bride and was made the king's heir.

* ProtagonistCenteredMorality: Few versions of the story give much attention to the motives or feelings of the princesses. In some versions, they are stated to be under a spell, but more often they're implied to be willing participants in the nights of dancing, and how they feel about the soldier revealing the truth and getting to choose one of them to marry is rarely addressed. Then there's the case in the original that if anyone attempts to figure out the truth and ''fails'', they are executed. So the princesses don't seem to mind innocent people being put to death, as long as they can continue their dancing. In some variants, they are wittingly dancing with literal devils; some (but not all) of these variants have the hero refusing to marry any of them.

[[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/twelvedancing/index.html "The Twelve Dancing Princesses"]] (or "The Worn-Out Dancing Shoes" or "The Shoes that were Danced to Pieces", original: "Die zertanzten Schuhe") is a German {{fairy tale}} originally published by Creator/TheBrothersGrimm in ''Children's and Household Tales'' as tale number 133. Charles Deulin collected another, French version in his ''Contes du Roi Cambinus'' (1874), which Creator/AndrewLang [[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/twelvedancing/stories/lang.html included]] in ''The Red Fairy Book'' and Creator/AlexanderAfanasyev collected a Russian variant, "The Secret Ball", in ''Narodnye Russkie Skazki''. Creator/JosephJacobs collected a GenderFlip, "Literature/KateCrackernuts".

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Nothing is really said about the hero's looks, but in the ''Anime/GrimmsFairytaleClassics'' he turns out to be a rather handsome soldier (who even wears a a NiceHat) not likely to be past his mid 20's. [[SheCleansUpNicely He looks even better when dolled up in regal clothes at the end]].

* HypnotizeThePrincess: In some versions, the princesses are under a curse and that's why they [[OOCIsSeriousBusiness find no problems lying to their father and letting the princes get executed for failing;]] when the soldier finally breaks the curse and they regain their memories, [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone they're horrified at their actions.]] In other versions, [[DistressedDude the failed princes are the ones under a curse]] and they're not actually dead, but spirited off to the Otherworld where the princesses dance with them. In yet more versions, ''everyone'' is under that curse, and it's never really stated who went to all this trouble.
* GratuitousPrincess: While it's not unusual for a fairy tale to have princesses, the story features not two but twelve princesses, all of whom sleep in the same room and are basically interchangeable. The large number seems to add to the mystery of why they able to disappear each night and dance the night away - it's less plausible that such a large number could sneak away undetected.

* EverythingsBetterWithPrincesses

* HypnotizeThePrincess: In some versions, the princesses are under a curse and that's why they [[OOCIsSeriousBusiness find no problems lying to their father and letting the princes get executed for failing;]] when the soldier finally breaks the curse and they regain their memories, [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone they're horrified at their actions.]] In other versions, [[DistressedDude the failed princes are the ones under a curse]] and they're not actually dead, but spirited off to the Otherworld where the princesses dance with them. In yet more versions, ''everyone'' is under that curse, and it's never really stated who went to all this trouble, or ''why.''

* EldritchLocation: The magical place where the princesses dance is generally agreed to be in TheOtherworld, and an interesting note is that while many versions hold the princesses, the princes, or [[UpToEleven the entire royal family]] to be under a curse, nobody seems to state who put the curse on them or WHY they would have done it, so there are some heavy GeniusLoci implications if you [[FridgeHorror poke at the backstory long enough.]]

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Nothing is really said about the hero's looks, but in the ''Anime/GrimmsFairytaleClassics'' he turns out to be a rather handsome soldier not likely to be past his mid 20's. [[SheCleansUpNicely He looks even better when dolled up in regal clothes at the end]].

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Nothing is really said about the hero's looks, but in the ''Anime/GrimmsFairytaleClassics'' he turns out to be a rather handsome soldier not likely to be past his mid 20's [[SheCleansUpNicely and looks even better at the end]].