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Overview
The princes find a huge, dark, savage-looking troll, eleven younger troll women and a twelfth maiden with human appearance in a rocky cave. The maiden explains that she is an abducted princess kept as a servant, not another daughter. She warns the guests that the hostess plans to kill them while they sleep beside her daughters. The brothers exchange positions and caps with the sleeping troll women; the mother consequently kills her own children before discovering the deception.
Unable to defend herself against the brothers, she curses them into oxen with narrowly specified daily human meals and release conditions. She also condemns the princess to pour water endlessly between two wells until someone surprises and topples her. The princes kill the troll, but the curses continue. Thorsteinn later breaks both conditions. The account therefore makes the spell independent of the caster’s continuing life; it does not locate her soul in a hidden object or identify her with the life-egg sisters of a different tale.
Origins & earliest records
Icelandic Legends, second series (1866), The Story of Thorsteinn, the Carl’s Son, pp. 473–481.
Records & interpretation
Complete tale from the royal brothers’ hunt through release and Thorsteinn’s succession; this is separate from the later story of Thorsteinn the king’s son.
Selected bibliography
Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.
- 01
Icelandic Legends, second series: Thorsteinn, the Carl’s Son, pp. 473–481
Complete collected narrative; curse p. 476, ox-shapes pp. 477–480 and ending p. 481.
Family, evolution & connections
The troll mother and eleven daughters in Thorsteinn’s tale
Only the eleven daughters expressly assigned to this troll mother.
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- Eleven unnamed troll daughters
The children follow the narrative’s repeated daughter references. No father is named. The human princess is a kidnapped servant, not a twelfth daughter. Sleeping arrangements with the princes do not establish marriages.
Eleven unnamed troll daughters in Thorsteinn the Carl’s Son
The troll mother’s eleven younger troll women are her daughters. The twelfth young woman explicitly identifies herself as a kidnapped princess from another kingdom, so she is excluded from the troll family.
References
Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.
- Primary textIcelandic Legends, surviving 1866 alternate copyResearch access: 2026-10-05
Image credits
A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.