Bluebeard

Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)

a French story by Perrault. It was written in 1697, and was translated into English in the eighteenth century. Since that time, the tale has been told in many forms. The poetical version of J. G. Holland is the one most popular in America. Bluebeard is a type of the cruel husband. Fatima, his young wife, typifies curiosity. She is intrusted with the keys of her husband's castle, but there is one room she must not enter. Of course, her entire thought centers upon this room. At last she yields to temptation, and to her horror discovers in the fatal chamber the bodies of Bluebeard's former wives. In her agitation she drops the key. She picks it up but is unable to efface the stain of blood upon it, so her disobedience is discovered. She is about to meet the fate of her predecessors when friends arrive, rescue the prying wife, and slay the bloody husband. The story has a counterpart in one of the tales of the Arabian Nights. It is thought, however, that Perrault found the original of his Bluebeard in a certain Gilles de Laval, notable for cruelty to his family. Holland's poem treats the subject somewhat facetiously. It begins: Centuries since there flourished a man, A cruel old Tartar, as rich as a Khan, Whose castle was built on a splendid plan With gardens, and groves and plantations. But his shaggy beard was as blue as the sky, And he lived alone, for his neighbors were shy, And had heard hard stories, by the by, About his domestic relations.