Zmeu - a Fantastic Creature of Romanian Folklore

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The Zmeu is a marvelous creature of Romanian tales and Romanian mythology. Now and again appeared differently in relation to other lavish creatures, for instance the balaur or the vârcolac, the zmeu is by the by distinctive, because it as a principle has clear human qualities: it is humanoid and has legs, arms, the competence to make and utilize obsolescents, for instance weapons, or the longing to marry pre-adult youthful women. In a couple of stories, Zmeu appears in the sky and spits fire. In distinctive stories, it has a heavenly profitable stone on its head that sparkles as the sun. It adores top notch lesser adolescent women, whom it seizes, normally with the deciding objective of wedding them. It is basically certainly squashed by a brave ruler or knight-errant. Its customary structure is that of a legendary serpent or balaur.

The "zmeu" figures prominently in many Romanian folk tales as the manifestation of the destructive forces of greed and selfishness. Often, the zmeu steals something of great value, which only Făt-Frumos (the Romanian "Prince Charming"; literally: "handsome youth") can retrieve through his great, selfless bravery. For example, in the ballad of the knight Greuceanu, the zmeu steals the sun and the moon from the sky, thereby enshrouding all humanity in darkness. In the story of Prâslea the Brave and the Golden Apples, the zmeu robs the king of the precious "golden apples"; a parallel can be drawn to the German fairy tale The Golden Bird, the Russian Tsarevitch Ivan, the Fire Bird and the Gray Wolf, and the Bulgarian The Nine Peahens and the Golden Apples — although in all these other cases, the thief was a bird (nevertheless, in some versions of the Romanian story, the zmeu does transform into a bird to steal the golden apples). Usually, the zmeu resides in the "other world" (celǎlalt tǎrâm) and sometimes Făt-Frumos has to descend into his dark kingdom, implying that the zmeu lives underground.

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The zmeu has a more than enough extraordinary, ruinous powers accessible to him. He can fly, shapeshift, and has colossal extraordinary quality. At final, the limits of the zmeu are of no benefit, as Făt-Frumos smashes him through military smoothness and valiant. 

Some English understandings suggest the "zmeu" as the hulk or goliath from western European mythologies. As the mammoth, the zmeu likes to snatch a woman to be his wife in his extraordinary area. After Făt-Frumos executes the zmeu, he takes the woman as his mate to-be. So likewise, for instance the mammoth in the common British stories of Jack and the Beanstalk, the zmeu returns home to his post from his attacks into human landscapes sensing that a human (Făt-Frumos) is lying in entanglement some place close-by. A Zmeu is similarly every so often pictured as a flare who goes in the room of a lesser youthful woman or widow and once inside, transforms into a man and lure her.