ABSTRACT
The verb fortælle (Older New Danish fortellie, Middle Low German vortellen) is used to indicate the telling of a story, although the object of the verb differs.1 Commonly, the object is the noun Historie (corresponding to the English “history,” from the Greek ἱστορία, Latin historia). While Historie may include the stories typically associated with “story-telling,” such as fairytales and adventures, it also has a broader meaning that ranges from the scholarly discipline of history, to folklore, to narratives both real and fictional, to anecdotes and rumors.2 The object Eventyr is more specific and therefore more pertinent to this project. Eventyr (Old Danish æwenthyr, Later Old Norse æfintýr, from which English derived “adventure”) refers to an adventure or incident as well as a tale of strange or wonderful events, which includes the categories of mythology and fairytale. By extension, the term may also be used to describe an untruthful story.3
