dinavia Liebrecht adduces the Edda, '_der juengste Sohn Jarl's der
erste Koenig ist_.' Albericus Trium Fontium mentions Prester John, 'qui
cum fratrum suorum minimus esset, omnibus praepositus est.' In Hesiod we
meet _droit de juveignerie_, as he makes Zeus the _youngest_ of the
Cronidae, while Homer, making Zeus the eldest, is all for primogeniture
(Elton, _Origins of English History_, ch. viii. Liebrecht, _Zur
Volkskunde_).

The authorities quoted raise a presumption that _Juengsten-Recht_, an old
and widely diffused law, might have left a trace on myth and _Maerchen_.
If _Juengsten-Recht_ were yielding place to primogeniture, if the elders
were using their natural influence to secure advantages, then the
youngest child, still heir by waning custom, would doubtless suffer a
good deal of persecution. It may have been in this condition of affairs
that the myths of the brilliant triumph of the rightful but despised
heir, Cinderella, or Boots, were developed.

On the other hand, it is obvious that the necessities of fiction demand
examples of _failure_ in the adventures, to heighten the effect of the
final success. Now the failures might have begun with the youngest, and
the eldest might be the successful hero. But that would have reversed
the natural law by which the eldest goes first out into danger.
Moreover, the nursery audience of a _conte de nourrice_ is not
prejudiced in favour of the Big but of the Little Brother.

These simple facts of everyday life, rather than some ancient custom of
inheritance, may be the cause of the favouritism always shown to the
youngest son or daughter. (Compare Ralston, _Russian Folk Tales_, p. 81.
The idea of jealousy of the youngest brother, mixed up with a
miscellaneous assortment of _motifs_ of folk tales, occurs in
_Katha-sarit-sagara_, ch. xxxix.)

Against the notion that the successful youngest son or daughter of the
_contes_ is a descendant of the youngest child who is heir by _droit de
juveignerie_, it has been urged that the hero, if the heir, would 'not
start from the dust-bin and the coal-hole.' But if his heirship were
slipping from him, as has been suggested, the ashes of the hearth are
just what he _would_ start from. The 'coal-hole,' of course, is a modern
innovation. The hearth is the recognised legal position of the youngest
child in Gavel-kind. 'Et la mesuage seit autreci entre eux departi, mes
le ASTRE demorra al pune (ou al punee)[88].' In short, 'the Hearth-place