The basement of the castle

The old man took the youth to the basement of the castle, and gave him three chests full of gold. The partition of such riches is just if we stick to the existent morality in the era of the Brothers Grimm: one part for the King, another for the poor, and the third for the youth (nowadays, I suppose that the state would keep half and the poor wouldn’t receive anything at all).

It is surprising the reiteration with which the number three appears in fairy tales and specifically in this one: the youth has to spend three nights at the castle, he can take three objects, he receives three chests of gold…

If we accept that nothing happens in the story by change, and everything that happens has a hiding meaning, then we can assume that the number three symbolizes the totality, well, there are three sides in a triangle, three are the people that form the Holy Trinity (Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit), and three form the scholastic theory of the human being (body, soul and spirit), for that, as the youth had overcome all three tests, his physical, mental and divine formation concludes, and he becomes in a different being worthy to marry the princess and to inherit the kingdom.