The Frog Prince

We all know the story about how a frog turns into a prince, don’t we? No? Ok, here's the story for those who forgot: A princess accidentally loses her golden ball in a pond. A friendly frog offers to retrieve it for her, but in return, he asks to become her companion. The princess agrees without intending to keep her promise. However, when the frog reminds her at the palace, she reluctantly fulfills her word. To her surprise, the frog transforms into a handsome prince, revealing that he had been cursed. His curse could only be broken by someone showing him kindness and keeping their promise. Grateful to the princess for her compassion, they fall in love, and the prince is freed from the curse. The story highlights the importance of keeping one's word and demonstrating kindness to others.

Well, as it transpires, this is much more than just a fairytale; there is some loose truth in this story. To understand its basics, you need to travel all the way back to the 12th century. Back then, it was entirely possible for not just countries to have royalty but for regions. You could have kings and queens of the north, south, east, and west of a country, specific counties, and even some towns had royalty.

It was 1190, and Phillip II of France's wife, Isabella of Hainaut, passed away during childbirth. Concerned about preserving his succession line and future ancestry, he ordered the "prospective royal brides" catalogue from his nearest branch of Ikea, where he read about Ingeborg, the daughter of King Valdemar I of Denmark. He was unaware that it was actually a trap and that Ikea and Valdemar had an ongoing feud because the king felt that Ikea technically belonged to Denmark. Ikea, on the other hand, claimed sovereignty over Sweden, stating they were founded in 1088 by a then ten-year-old Inge, who later became known as Inge the Elder due to his horrendously aged face. Ikea figured the end of this ownership row would only conclude if they tried to wipe out the royal family by marrying off heirs into other countries. So, in the most recent copy of the catalogue, Ikea wrote misleading descriptions with fake portraits of goats in dresses to represent other members of royal brides-to-be. Without the ability to take photographs for several hundred years, it was commonplace to disguise people's true looks. Phillip simply assumed, having perused many other goat-looking women in his town, that the catalogue had a purge on misrepresentation, and that Ingeborg was by far the most beautiful.

Over in Denmark, however, Valdemar, disgusted by his daughter's unkempt looks, which included high levels of facial hair, was happy to receive Phillip's offer and gave him an additional dowry of 10,000 marks of silver, saying, "Take her off my hands, please," he begged. On the day that Phillip finally met Ingeborg, he was repulsed by her hairy complexion and scaly skin. After a quick ceremony, he had Ingeborg moved to the convent of Saint-Maur-des-Fosses because he could not bear to look at her. He also tried to sue Ikea for misrepresentation of his wife, as he said she was at least 3.5 times less attractive than her portrait. What he never counted on was that Ingeborg was a witch.

While at the convent, Phillip asked the church to nullify the wedding because he could not bear to consummate it and swiftly moved on to marry Margaret, the daughter of Count William I of Geneva. Everything was going to go smoothly, but the spanner hit when Ikea's 30-day return policy became exposed. Having taken 20 days to get her to France, there was no possible way for Ingeborg to get back to Denmark in time. Thus, Phillip abandoned plans to marry Margaret (after she was kidnapped) and took Ingeborg back.

But bliss never followed, and Ingeborg was held in a tower, allowing Phillipe to move onto Agnes. Ingeborg, understandably miffed at being continuously picked up and dropped, cast a spell on Agnes, meaning she would only give birth to frog-like children and that if they failed to marry by 13, they would turn into frogs. Phillip tried to disown the two frog-like children, assuming it was something to do with Agnes, at one point accusing her of witchcraft. One day, the two children disappeared, only to turn into proper frogs.

Over the passage of time, it is known that the two frogs mated with others and that more bloodline was born as a result, creating a royal lineage and an unclaimed wealth never received to this day.

So while the story goes that a frog turned into a prince, it was actually a princess and prince who went from being normal children with frog-like looks, who, in fact, turned into frogs. But this is not where you might expect this story to end.

Ingeborg, as a final gesture of revenge, stole a raven flying past her tower, carrying a message to the world stating that if you were to eat the legs of a royal frog, you would inherit their wealth without the need to marry, thus creating a delicacy respected to this very day. While some people are considered to have inherited some of this wealth (which comes from the dowry), there is still much left, and the purest heirs are supposedly still out there.