A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.

Overview

The self-playing guitar’s music heals sickness, lifts sorrow, undoes sorcery and raises murdered people to strike their killers. When the reigning king sets it playing, his dead elder brother appears in a shroud. He identifies himself as the rightful ruler and accuses the younger brother of having him murdered. He then breathes upon the usurper, who falls dead, and vanishes.

The ferryman is acclaimed king after the court recovers from its fear. The returned brother does not resume government or remain as a living monarch; his appearance completes an accusation and punishment. Although the narrator describes the general guitar effect as raising the murdered, this particular scene also calls its figure a phantom. The profile preserves that wording rather than imposing a single biological explanation of resurrection. The source supplies neither the original method of assassination nor an earlier haunting.

Shrouded royal apparitionExplicit murdered elder brotherBreath kills murdererVanishing after punishment
01

Origins & earliest records

Polish Fairy Tales, translated from A. J. Gliński by Maude Ashurst Biggs (1920), The Good Ferryman and the Water Nymphs, pp. 53–68.

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 Good Ferryman and the Water Nymphs, pp. 53–68

    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, evolution & connections

The murdered king and younger usurper — Biggs

Complete pp. 53–68 narrative; opening p. 57 and revelation pp. 66–67.

Explicit elder brother succession and revenant’s brother address. Parents and descendants unspecified. The ferryman’s two elder brothers belong to a separate family. The revenant vanishes after the younger brother dies; no continuing restored reign is implied.

Gliński / Biggs, Polish Fairy Tales (1920), The Good Ferryman and the Water Nymphs, pp. 53–68

References

Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.

  1. Primary historical shortened literary translationGliński/Biggs 1920: The Good Ferryman and the Water NymphsResearch access: 2026-10-05

Image credits

A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.

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