Little Red Ridinghood
Preserved but no longer current.
This nursery tale is, with slight alterations, common to Sweden, Germany, and France, It comes to us from the French Le Petit Chaperon Rouge, in Charles Perrault's Conies des Temps, and was probably derived from Italy. The finale, which tells of the arrival of a huntsman who slits open the wolf and restores little Red Ridinghood and her grandmother to life, is a German addition.
Era: ca. 1898 (Victorian)
Sources & notes
Reproduced from Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898 edition, public domain; archive.org, retrieved 2026-07-31; OCR text, minor errors possible). Reflects the scholarship and attitudes of its era.
Common questions
What does “Little Red Ridinghood” mean?
This nursery tale is, with slight alterations, common to Sweden, Germany, and France, It comes to us from the French Le Petit Chaperon Rouge, in Charles Perrault's Conies des Temps, and was probably derived from Italy. The finale, which tells of the arrival of a huntsman who slits open the wolf and restores little Red Ridinghood and her grandmother to life, is a German addition.
Is “Little Red Ridinghood” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.