Sleeping Beauty and the Spindle

Sleeping Beauty and the Spindle: does the tale warn of the dangers of women seeking independence?

Spinster. The plosive makes it an easy word to spit, and that’s how people usually say it. Today, spinster is a disparaging word for a single woman, carrying connotations of failure and a boring or meaningless life. At best, it means a single woman, usually over the usual marrying or childbearing age. More commonly, it means a pathetic woman with an empty life, simply waiting to die and be eaten by her cats (childless cat lady is surely the modern spinster). The usage of the word betrays a nervousness or hatred towards single women, particularly women who are single by choice. The word and its negative connotations still abound in popular culture. In Bridgerton, Penelope simultaneously desires freedom to pursue her own interests but is terrified of becoming a spinster. I once tried to keep a tally of how many times the characters of Gilmore Girls said the word spinster, but I lost count.

The word has a long and varied history. Originally, spinster was a literal word: it referred to people who spun. Natural fibres, except for silk, must be spun into yarn before they can be knitted, woven, or stitched, and spinning has been carried out since at least the Neolithic period. Spinning was often an occupation of poor, single women. It is a skill, and takes a lot of practice to get right. Until the introduction of industrial spinning, hand spinning could earn a woman a wage that in many instances could grant her some independence. It's sometimes said that spinning was one of the few ways women could earn an independent living, but throughout history, women have worked, paid, underpaid, and unpaid, in every occupation you could think of. Certainly, though, spinning is associated with women, and for a period of history offered a path, if not necessarily to financial comfort, then to some level of independence. Over time, it became synonymous with single, independent women.

A spinning wheel in Beatrix Potter's house (thought to have been decorative, perhaps showing her appreciation of the symbolism of the spinning wheel and the beauty of the skill in its use)

You’ll have your own recollection of the story of Sleeping Beauty, from a book or film or an amalgamation of reimaginings. The one I’ve got on my desk was published by the Brothers Grimm. It’s called Briar-Rose. It’s only four pages long, but I’ll paraphrase it for you.

Long ago there lived a king and queen that desperately wanted a child. One day, a frog told the queen she’d have a daughter. When their daughter, Briar-Rose, was born, the king was overjoyed and ordered a great feast. He wanted to invite all the wise women of the land in the hope they’d bestow gifts on the child. There were thirteen wise women in his kingdom, but he only had twelve golden plates for them to eat from, so he left one of them off the guest list. After the feast, eleven of the wise women bestowed gifts on the princess: virtue, beauty, wealth, and so on. Suddenly, the uninvited wise woman entered in a rage at being left out. She cursed the child: in her fifteenth year the princess shall prick herself on a spindle and fall dead. The guests were shocked. The twelfth wise woman hadn’t yet bestowed her gift on the princess, so she used it to lessen the curse: but it shall not be death the princess falls into, only a deep sleep lasting a hundred years.

The king ordered every spindle in his kingdom to be burnt. One day, in her fifteenth year, the princess was in the palace alone and climbed to the top of a narrow spiral staircase to a small door. In the tower was an old woman with a spindle, busily spinning her flax. The princess took an interest in the old woman’s work and wanted to learn how to spin too. She picked up the spindle and in doing so pricked her finger. As soon as she pricked her finger, she fell into a deep sleep, and so did everyone else in the castle. Even the horses in the stables, dogs in the courtyard, pigeons on the roof, and flies on the wall fell asleep.

Around the palace a thorn thicket grew taller every year and, in the end, surrounded the entire palace and grew on top of it so nobody could see the building anymore. From time to time, princes would try to force their way through the thicket, but none prevailed. Eventually, a prince arrived on what happened to be one hundred years after the palace fell asleep. When he tried to get through the thorns, they had turned into beautiful flowers and let him through easily.

The prince found the princess sleeping and kissed her. As the prince’s lips touched hers, Briar-Rose awoke and smiled at him. Everyone else woke up, too, to celebrate the marriage of the prince and princess. They all lived happily ever after.

Sleeping Beauty, by Henry Meynell Rheam (1899)

This is just one version of sleeping beauty, and it is neither the earliest nor the latest. Other variations have differences; in one particularly awful version, an anonymous French collection from ~1340 called Perceforest, Sleeping Beauty is raped by the prince in her sleep. Themes of male violence, lack of consent, and the ‘male rescuer’ in the various iterations of Sleeping Beauty have been analysed at length. In almost all the published retellings of Sleeping Beauty, the princess pricks her fingers on a spindle.

In this post, I’m interested in the role of the spindle in the symbolism and moralising of the story. Spindles have been used for millennia¹. Scholars think the spinning wheel was invented in what is now China or India, over a thousand years ago, reaching Europe in the late middle ages.² For at least a few hundred years, they have been synonymous with a woman’s ability to be financially independent. So what does it mean when we tell a story where a young girl is cursed to fall into a deep sleep if she touches a spindle?

When viewed through the lens of the historical status of spinsters, Sleeping Beauty seems like a story warning of the dangers of girls approaching occupations associated with financial and social independence. There is a message here: if you seek independence, something terrible will befall you.

If, after pricking her finger on the spindle, Sleeping Beauty represents a woman who has become a spinster, we see her not living an interesting, independent life, but falling into a stupor, and dragging those around her down with her – her life stands still, and is devoid of meaning until a man comes into it. The prince 'saves' her from this dreary existence that the spindle brought and rights her path: back to heterosexual marriage. The time after the princess touches the spindle is a waiting stage; there is no happily ever after until she marries the prince. For me, the message is clear: exploring options that may bring independence and an alternative lifestyle is dangerous, and any period a woman spends pursuing those options is simply a time during which she is waiting (and hoping) for something better to come along.

While Sleeping Beauty is asleep, a thorny thicket grows around the palace, perhaps a metaphor for the thorny barriers people imagine spinsters (read: single, independent women) build around themselves and their life to keep others out. The thorns grow so high that eventually the palace isn't visible at all, perhaps symbolising how spinsters are perceived to disappear from society or become invisible (or perhaps wanting this to be the case, as independent women participating actively in society was, and is, seen as a dangerous thing).

Briar Rose by Anne Anderson (1874-1930)

Speaking of symbolism about spinsters, the spinster who provides the spindle that pricks the princess is usually an older woman and is often portrayed as a crone or a witch (both cultural figures intended to represent the evil threat of independent, intelligent women). Independent older women are portrayed as a danger to young women – someone who can lead them astray, away from or delaying in the ‘right’ path of finding a prince, marrying, and living happily ever after.

In the Grimms' tale, Briar-Rose takes an interest in the spinster's work, wanting to learn how to spin too - but this is forgotten when she awakes to the kiss of the man – she’s now on the ‘right’ path. A princess arguably has little need for a source of independent income; this matters little in a fairytale, which is more about the moral messaging than the characters themselves, but perhaps this broadens the symbolism further: not only is it dangerous to seek financial independence, but also creative independence, solidarity with other women, interests outside of marriage and children, forms of community that don't involve men, art, deep maternal culture, or any path that deviates from social norms.

The heroine in distress narrative that sees a princess in need of rescuing by a prince is an issue of its own,³ but in the Grimms' version of Sleeping Beauty, Briar-Rose is due to wake up anyway on the day the prince visits. For me, the Grimms' tale leaves open a tantalising alternative: had the prince not arrived on the hundredth day, would the princess have awoken and walked out of the hedge of beautiful flowers and into an interesting and independent life?

Sleeping Beauty by Edward Frederick Brewtnall (1846–1902)

Women with their spinning wheels have long been agents for change and enchantment - Esther Rutter, This Golden Fleece.

References

¹ see, e.g., Standley, E. R. (2016) ‘Spinning Yarns: The Archaeological Evidence for Hand Spinning and its Social Implications, c AD 1200-1500, Medieval Archaeology, 60(2), pp. 266–299. doi: 10.1080/00766097.2016.1221264, or This Golden Fleece, by Esther Rutter, where Rutter explains that drop spindles have been used to spin yarn since neolithic times (p.136).

² This Golden Fleece by Esther Rutter.

³ see, e.g., Humiski, M., 2021. The Magical World of Patriarchy: Exploring Gender Representations and Faux Feminism in “The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood,” Sleeping Beauty, and Maleficent (Doctoral dissertation, UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver).

The three paintings included in this post are in the public domain, and I found them via Wikimedia Commons.

Wikipedia, though often insufficient for use as a primary source, is a fantastic place to start research and holds a wealth of information. It is run primarily by volunteers, and is an important contribution to the information commons.

I have no doubt that the interpretations I've explored in this post have been explored before, perhaps by lots of people - but I haven't been able to find any articles about the symbolism of the princess pricking her finger on a spindle in Sleeping Beauty. If you know of any, I'd love to hear about them.

How did I get into this, you ask? I spend a lot of time thinking about wool and its cultural history...you can read about my search for a woolly jumper here.