Editing Fairy tale (section)

===Aarne-Thompson===
This system groups fairy and folk tales according to their overall plot. Common, identifying features are picked out to decide which tales are grouped together. Much therefore depends on what features are regarded as decisive.

For instance, tales like ''[[Cinderella]]''{{nsmdns}}in which a persecuted heroine, with the help of the [[fairy godmother]] or similar [[donor (fairy tale)|magical helper]], attends an event (or three) in which she wins the love of a prince and is identified as his true bride{{nsmdns}}are classified as type 510, the persecuted heroine. Some such tales are ''[[The Wonderful Birch]]''; ''[[Aschenputtel]]''; ''[[Katie Woodencloak]]''; ''[[The Story of Tam and Cam]]''; ''[[Ye Xian]]''; ''[[Cap O' Rushes]]''; ''[[Catskin]]''; ''[[Fair, Brown and Trembling]]''; ''[[Finette Cendron]]''; ''[[Allerleirauh]]''.

Further analysis of the tales shows that in ''Cinderella'', ''The Wonderful Birch'', ''The Story of Tam and Cam'', ''Ye Xian'', and ''Aschenputtel'', the heroine is persecuted by her stepmother and refused permission to go to the ball or other event, and in ''Fair, Brown and Trembling'' and ''Finette Cendron'' by her sisters and other female figures, and these are grouped as 510A; while in ''Cap O' Rushes'', ''Catskin'', and ''Allerleirauh'', the heroine is driven from home by her father's persecutions, and must take work in a kitchen elsewhere, and these are grouped as 510B. But in ''Katie Woodencloak'', she is driven from home by her stepmother's persecutions and must take service in a kitchen elsewhere, and in ''Tattercoats'', she is refused permission to go to the ball by her grandfather. Given these features common with both types of 510, ''Katie Woodencloak'' is classified as 510A because the villain is the stepmother, and ''Tattercoats'' as 510B because the grandfather fills the father's role.

This system has its weaknesses in the difficulty of having no way to classify subportions of a tale as motifs. ''[[Rapunzel]]'' is type 310 (The Maiden in the Tower), but it opens with a child being demanded in return for stolen food, as does ''[[Puddocky]]''; but ''Puddocky'' is not a Maiden in the Tower tale, while ''[[The Canary Prince]]'', which opens with a jealous stepmother, is.

It also lends itself to emphasis on the common elements, to the extent that the folklorist describes ''[[The Black Bull of Norroway]]'' as the same story as ''[[Beauty and the Beast]]''. This can be useful as a shorthand but can also erase the coloring and details of a story.{{Sfn|Tolkien|1966|p=18}}