Article: Fairy tales have ancient origin

The Telegraph recently published an article Fairy tales have ancient origin about Dr Jamie Tehrani, a cultural anthropologist at Durham University, who has studied 35 versions of Little Red Riding Hood from around the world and presented a paper this past Tuesday at the British Science Festival in Guildford, Surrey. Tehrani identified 70 variables in plot and characters between different versions of Little Red Riding Hood and found that the varients shared a common ancestor dating back more than 2,600 years. (This was paraphrased from the article.)

The article is solid and makes one wish for access to Tehrani's paper. Jack Zipes is quoted, so I recommend clicking through and reading the full piece.

Since Tehrani's work is not yet published, there are other books that present both sides of the argument for the origins of fairy tales. Here's a helpful list of some of the best:


Fairy Tale in the Ancient World by Graham Anderson


Fairy Tales from Before Fairy Tales: The Medieval Latin Past of Wonderful Lies by Dr. Jan M. Ziolkowski


From the Beast to the Blonde: On Fairy Tales and Their Tellers by Marina Warner


The Classic Fairy Tales by Iona and Peter Opie


The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: From Straparola and Basile to the Brothers Grimm by Jack Zipes


The Classic Fairy Tales by Maria Tatar


Fairy Tales: A New History by Ruth B. Bottigheimer

I also have a still incomplete, but helpful article on SurLaLune: The Quest for the Earliest Fairy Tales as well as a Fairy Tale timeline.

(In the Great Minds Club, Kate at Diamonds and Toads also linked to this article earlier this week and Gypsy at Once Upon a Blog did today.)