Z is for a Zoo (WTF Hungary - Weird Things in Hungarian Folktales)

Welcome to this year's A to Z Challenge titled WTF Hungary - Weird Things in Hungarian Folktales! You can find all other participating blogs on the A to Z Challenge main blog.

If they ask you if you know a folktale that features a zoo, now you can say yes.

The tale is titled the Frog Brother-in-Law, and it starts out very much like a Frog Prince story. A princess encounters the frog who tells her he is a prince. She insists on marrying him, but her father the king orders them to go live in a pig sty. The frog of course soon turns out to be an enchanted being, capable of all kinds of magic.

One day, the two brothers-in-law (the husbands of the two elder princesses) go out hunting, as a contest against their frog brother-in-law. When they are gone, the frog turns into a diamond prince, and conjures up a zoo full of all kinds of animals. Since the two princes can't hunt anything all day, they decide to stop by at the zoo on the way home, and buy some prey. The diamond prince sells them some rabbits, in exchange for permission to brand the princes with his signet ring. Eventually, it turns out that the frog is a diamond prince, and the two brothers-in-law are useless hunters. Happy end.

Let's be honest: We all know the kind of person that would shop for hunting trophies at a zoo...

Bonus: This folktale was collected from the same woman who brought us The Diamond Prince in the Rubber Suit at the beginning of the month.

THANK YOU all for following all the Hungarian folktale weirdness this month! Your comments were delightful :) For those of you participating, congratulations on reaching the end of A to Z! See you on May 7th for Reflections!