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Overview

A grateful speaking skull teaches Dobrotek how to summon the Grey Seer-Horse without looking behind him. Wind, lightning and thunder accompany its arrival. It flies as quickly as storm-wind, with flame from its nostrils, sparks from its eyes and smoke from its mouth. Passage through its left ear and out the right gives the prince golden armour and tremendous strength; reversing the passage later restores his ordinary condition.

The horse explains the dwarf’s identity and directs the prince to the All-Cutting Sword. It shelters him from the Giant-Head’s gaze, carries him between distant mountains and seas, and eventually leaves him beside his original, ordinary horse. When a rival subsequently murders Dobrotek in his sleep and steals the sleeping princess, the wounded prince calls it again. It flies to the mountain of Everlasting Life and sprinkles him with waters from three springs: Loosening, Healing and Life. The dead prince revives. The horse also explains that the severed dwarf’s beard can awaken Ladna, then vanishes. Its revival is attributed to these collected waters, not merely to its flaming breath.

Golden maneSpeaks and fliesEar-passage changes riderProtects against deadly gazeThree waters revive prince
01

Origins & earliest records

Polish Fairy Tales, translated from A. J. Gliński by Maude Ashurst Biggs (1920), The Whirlwind, pp. 37–52.

02

Records & interpretation

The selected English tale supplies the transformation, actions and ending. Biggs’s preface explicitly acknowledges considerable shortening of her source.

Selected bibliography

Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.

  1. 01

    Polish Fairy Tales: The Whirlwind, pp. 37–52

    A. J. Gliński; Maude Ashurst Biggs, translator; Cecile Walton, illustrator · 1920

    Complete selected English narrative and translator’s preface. No individually named oral contributor provided; original Polish text not collated.

Family & connections

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References

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  1. Primary historical shortened literary translationGliński/Biggs 1920: The WhirlwindResearch access: 2026-10-05

Image credits

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