Once upon a sentence , bedtime tale were recited , instead of read , and the unwritten tales were told and passed down from contemporaries to generation . In Europe , many were put to paper in the sixteenth , 17th , and eighteenth one C . Butaccording to fresh research , some of the most far-famed fairy tales — includingBeauty and the Beast , The Spirit in the Bottle , Snow White , andRapunzel — are much older , dating back K of years .
The Guardianreportsthat researchers usedphylogenetic analysisto find common threads between 275 Indo - European sprite tales . This proficiency is more normally used in biology to analyze molecular data point and regain relationships between things that partake a common ancestry . By applying it to the study of the stories , anthropologist Jamie Tehrani and folklorist Sara Graça da Silva were able to get a better understanding of their origins .
While old research suggestedBeauty and the BeastandRumplestiltskinwere inspired by Greek and Roman mythology , the researchers found that the stories ' origin go further back . In a paper published inRoyal Society Open Science , da Silva and Tehrani write , " Both tales can be firmly trace back to the growth of the major westerly Indo - European subfamilies as discrete lineages between 2500 and 6000 years ago and may have even been present in the last common ancestor of Western Indo - European languages . " One story from the researchers ' depth psychology , titledThe Smith and the Devil , may be as much as 6000 years old , dating to the era when metallurgy start to come out .
These tales " have been told since before even English , French and Italian be , " Tehrani toldThe Guardian . " The motive present in fairytales are timeless and jolly universal . "
The enduring narration have added more to club than amusement , according to da Silva : " Ultimately , despite being often disregarded as fictitious , and even as a less form of narrative , kinsfolk tales are excellent case studies for cross - cultural comparisons and work on human conduct , admit cooperation , decision devising , [ and so on ] . ”
[ h / t : The Guardian ]
