The Wicked Stepmother

I read a version of the cinderella story that comes from India. What immediately struck me was that the mother did not die, instead she is turned into a goat because she broke a promise to her husband of never eating out of his presence. This prompts the father to remarry. The wicked stepmother treats the children badly and doesn't feed them, so the goat mother uses magic to give the children food (the children have to tap her horns with a stick, and food will fall out). The wicked stepmother sends her daughter to spy on the children, and finds out that the goat has been helping them. She pretends to be sick, bribes the doctor to prescribe goats meat and forces the father to kill the goat. Before she dies, the goat mother tells the children to bury her bones in a secret place, and whenever they need food, they should visit the bones, and they would be given food. The story then takes a sudden and odd turn into the more traditional cinderella story, where one of the sisters is washing her face, and her nose ring comes off. It is then swallowed by a fish that is caught and sold to the king's cook. The cook bring the nose ring to the king, who sends out a proclamation requesting that the owner come before him. When he sees the young girl, he was "so fascinated by her pretty face and nice manner that he married her, and provided amply for the support of her family", and that's the end. I found this story closer to the grimms cinderella and the story of the black cow because the mother lives on after death to provide food for her children. The black cow also has the element of withholding food from the children. This story is meant to span across many years, as the children grow up.