After feeding two starving beggars, an old Russian soldier receives a magical flour sack and deck of playing cards which help him to remove some pesky devils from the Tsar’s palace.
The Devils Who Learned to Be Good
Devil
Noah and the Devil: A Legend of Noah’s Ark from Romania
In this Romanian folk version of the Noah story, getting the animals to march, two by two, onto the ark is the easy part–it was persuading his wife to come aboard that gave Noah a headache. And when he snapped, “Oh, you devil, come in!,” that gave the Devil himself just the invitation he needed. Once aboard, in the shape of a mouse, the Devil gnawed a hole in the ark, to sink it beneath the flood.
The Blacksmith and the Devils
In this Argentine version of a Hispanic folktale, a blacksmith makes a deal with the devil to extend his youth and good fortune.
The Bearskinner: A Tale of the Brothers Grimm
A dejected soldier makes a pact with the devil in this haunting, ultimately hopeful fairy tale. When a person gives up hope, is he still human? Such is the story of a soldier who has lost everything to war: his childhood home, his family and friends, his youth, and his innocence. Enter that sly opportunist, the devil, who wraps the soldier in the armor of a dead bear’s skin, fills its pockets with gold, and makes a dangerous and horrible wager.
Iblis
An Islamic version of the story of Adam and Eve and the fall from Paradise. In this Islamic version of Adam and Eve’s expulsion from Eden, the devil is called Iblis.