Jack And The Bull Theme

With the intent of revisiting the tales of my childhood, I selected “Jack and the Bull” as the first tale for review. This tale has numerous variations on the initial circumstances which can indicate the origin or the story. In some versions, Jack is hired help on a rich man’s farm. In other accounts he is working on his father’s farm. In all of the stories, his adversary is the wife or his stepmother who despises him. She gives him meager amounts of food until Jack is wasting away and realizes he will soon starve. While sitting in the pasture crying about his state in life, and his imminent starvation, a bull comes over and inquiries about his sorrow. In some variations, the bull had already been on the farm and in others it is a wandering
He comes to a small village where a man tells him that he has a grist mill but no time to work it. Before he offers Jack the job, he informs Jack that every other hired hand mysteriously perished on the first night of work. The grist mill owner shares his suspicions that the previous workers were poisoned. Jack asks to take a look at the mill, and agrees to take the job. In some renderings, Jack already has a little silver blade knife that was given to him by his father, or obtained from a traveling stranger after an act of kindness from Jack. In others, the stranger appears at the mill as the sun is setting and Jack obligingly starts the mill to grind the stranger’s corn even though it is past work hours. In all cases, Jack’s kindness to an elderly person result in the silver knife being in his possession. After the sun has set, Jack sits down to his dinner, which in some variations is a soup that he prepares himself and in others is a plate of dinner provided by the miller’s wife. But in all versions, a black cat appears and tries to put its paw into the food. Jack refuses to allow the cat to touch his food, and the cat always speaks “Sop Doll.” “Doll” is interpreted as a slang for a paw, or foot and the cat is asking to dip or ‘sop’ its paw in Jack’s food. Jack refuses, and the cat persists in asking to dip its paw
To discourage the suitors, he sets up a physical test with the price of failure being the suitor’s loss of life. In some accounts the father is a king or a wealthy man, while in other versions is local farmer. It is never clear why the father desires to keep his daughters unwed, but some renderings hint at nefarious intentions. A few versions sanitized the punishment for failure to pass the test with banishment or a flogging, but the majority specifies the death of the suitor. The frequent theme of the test involves a ring drawn on the ground in a large circle, ten feet most common, and the suitor must make a wild rabbit remain in the circle for a specified period of time. Jack decides to try his luck at winning the hand of one of the beautiful daughters. This story sometimes includes a dowry of gold, or jewels and sometimes only the daughter is the prize. In most stories, Jack encounters an old man on the road with whom he shares his lunch, or offers another gesture of kindness. The old man is the prototypical Traveling Stranger, Supernatural Elder, who dispenses either magical gifts or punishment to individuals based on their actions toward him. Some versions of this tale have the stranger giving Jack a wooden drill after sharing his lunch, and