A comparative paralleling of the story of Zal and Roudabeh and the story of Rapunzel, Based on narratology theory

One of the well-founded romances of Ferdowsi's Shahnameh is the story of Zal and Rudabeh. A work that has beautifully mixed epic and love and narrated it in the language of poetry. Similar to this story in European folk literature, there is a story called Rapunzel, which has significant similarities with the story of Zal and Rudabeh. The purpose of this research is to compare the two stories and examine whether the story of Rapunzel is adapted from the story of Zal and Rudabeh or not.

Based on the theory of narratology, this research compares the story of Rapunzel and the story of Zal and Rudabeh. After the paleontology of the stories, it was found that the story of Rapunzel was printed in Italy a century before the introduction and arrival of the Shahnameh to Europe and existed in the folk literature of the people of the Danube coast; Therefore, the hypothesis that Rapunzel is adapted from the Shahnameh is rejected.

In the discourse analysis of these stories, common elements and symbols were found such as the originality of love, tower and height, mountain, hair and hair, and child, which points to the archetypes and common cultural views of the origins of both stories.

In both stories, love is introduced as the path to excellence and is a process that opens its way to union and finally, victory is with love. On the other hand, wisdom and love are introduced as the wings of flying and excellence, that wisdom without love and love without wisdom have no meaning. "Highness" which appears in the image of the tower in both stories, indicates the inner desire of man to move forward and what can provide the ground for this exaltation is the hair of Faroheshta Yar, and finally, having children refers to the continuation of romantic nature and immortality, which in The story of Zal and Simorgh leads to the birth of Rastam, and the story of Rapunzel leads to the birth of twins. In general, although these stories do not have the same narrative process, in terms of discourse and the message of the work, many common aspects can be counted in them, which shows that this similarity is not accidental.