Today on Monday Mysteries we take a look at a fountain in Cologne that has a tableau with representations of a lady with a lamp, along with many more than 7 dwarfs.

Chris and stumbled upon this large, ornate fountain late in afternoon on our first day in Cologne, as we roamed around the city without really much of a plan.  At first glance, we assumed the scenes were taken from the fairy tale Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs, since that was the only story about many dwarfs that we knew.  However, it didn’t really seem to match anything I knew from that fairy tale:  the woman is clearly about to go do some steps with a lantern, and there were way too many dwarfs. After all, Snow White just had 7 to deal with. We were intrigued, but there were no signs anywhere nearby to explain it.

I found the answer on the Internet, and as you’ve probably guessed, this has nothing to do with Snow White.  Rather, it has everything to do with The Tailor’s Wife and the Heinzelmännchen, (“elves” or “gnomes”).

Once upon a time in Cologne, there were Heinzelmännchen who helped the people in town.  During the night, while the people in Cologne slept, the Heinzelmännchen would do all work for the people. In the morning when the people got up, all their work had then already been done, so the people were free to play and be lazy all day long.

But there was a catch. There is always a catch. The Heinzelmännchen liked their privacy.  They didn’t want to be seen by any of the people in the town. So, as long as the people in Cologne slept while the Heinzelmännchen were working, the Heinzelmännchen could work in peace.  The Heinzelmännchen always disappeared before the people got up. But people were happy with that, since the Heinzelmännchen always did all the cleaning, etc. that  the people were supposed to do, even if no one had ever actually seen a Heinzelmännchen.

Now, one night the wife of the tailor decided that she wanted to see what the Heinzelmännchen looked like.  In order to do this, she scattered peas onto the floor of the tailor shop.

I guess the idea was to slow the Heinzelmännchen so she could catch them at their work, but I’m not really clear on why she needed to scatter peas onto the floor in order to see them.  However, that’s what she did.

That night, when the Heinzelmännchen came in to do their work, they slipped and fell. They were not amused — far from it! So they decided to leave Cologne for good, never to return

And from that day forth, the citizens of Cologne have had to do all their own work by themselves.  Kind of an unhappily ever after kind of legend.

Now, I can’t say I really understand the point of this story. Be happy if someone else is doing your work? Don’t be curious?  Always remember to be kind to Heinzelmännchen? Pick your own moral – I’m haven’t come up with a good one yet.

In any case, that’s the explanation for the mystery of the fountain with the lady with the lamp and the extraordinarily large number of little men/Heinzelmännchen.

Unfortunately, we never did go back again when the light was better, so I never took any closeups of the panels. But at least I snapped a few shots (included below) to try to give you a sense of the fountain, the statues, and the enormous scale of it all. Enjoy.