“Cinderella,” also known as “The Little Glass Slipper,” is one of the most recognizable folktales in all of the Western world. There aren’t many who don’t know this story of hardship, love, and shoe sizes. What we all don’t realize is that it’s not just limited to the Western world; Cinderella is one of the oldest stories in the world and shows up with slight variations in many countries.
If we’re talking about known records, the story of Cinderella goes as far back as at least AD 850 in the form of a Chinese folktale called “Yeh-Shen.” It also features a girl living with parents who hate her and a magical creature who helps her get with the king at a ceremony. She also leaves a slipper behind that helps the king find her and eventually marry her. Other than the European setting of Cinderella, that’s essentially the same story.
That’s only the Chinese version and the one that we have known records for; the earliest Cinderella iteration may actually go as far back as 7 BC. Almost every culture has its own version of it, too, proving that no matter how different we are, our stories still follow the same patterns.
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