HISTORICAL

A commemorative plaque indicates the residence of Ratón Pérez, in the ground floor of number 8, Arenal street

The 5th of January of 2003 the City council of Madrid paid tribute to Ratón Pérez with a commemorative plaque installed at number 8, Arenal street, just in the place where a fairytale located his house with the legend: “Here he lived, in a cake box in the Prast confectionery, Ratón Pérez, according to the story that father Coloma wrote for young King Alfonso XIII”.

Father Coloma received, at the end of XIX century, the order to create a story for the young King, Alfonso XIII, as a gift of his mother and regent, María Cristina, to commemorate the beginning of the change of his first teething.

The narration is based on an old rural tradition, according to which the mothers offered to the mice that grew between the grain of the farms, the milk teeth of their children, combining the desire of good harvests with the one to see them grow strong and healthy.

World wide traditions like this exist, though with variants. In the United Kingdom, Australia and the Philippines the one in charge to receive the milk teething of the children and to flatter to them with a coin under their pillow is Tooth Fairy; in France, its said that a rodent, Petite Souris, takes the children milk teeth that fall; in the north of Europe, the tooth is left in a glass of water and in the countries of the European East, they are the grandmothers who take care of this task.

In Spain and most of the Hispano-American countries, the rodent has full name and this one was the personage that father Luis Coloma useed for his story.

The story narrates the adventures of Ratón Pérez and king Buby, the nickname that Queen Mother used with her son. Through the conduits of the water pipes, Ratón Pérez visits Madrid children’s houses, in a route in which king Buby shows to the rodent how his little subjects lived and, among them, some very poor ones, as Gilito, a boy who lived with his mother in a small attic. The moral that locks up the story is related to values like the generosity, bravery and the duties of a sovereign with his subjects.

The manuscript is conserved from 1894 in the library of the Real Palace. The first public edition was made in 1902 and, in 1911, an informed edition was created. From 1940, it hasn’t been made any new edition of the story; but in 2003, a series of television of cartoons was carried out, cradle in the personage of Luis Coloma, under the title Perez Mouse Factory, that achieveed certain success of audience.

The author of the story, Luis Coloma, was a Jesuit Father writer of children's tales and historical and local traditions novels. He has been rediscovered in mid-20th century, by the cinematographic adaptations of some of his works like Pequeñeces (smallness), by Juan de Orduña, and Jeromín (Luis Lucia Mingarro).

King Buby, Alfonso XIII, was born king -he was posthumous son, that is to say, he was born after his father died-. His education was very conditioned by flatterers and people of the court, who prevented him to know the people that he began to govern at the age of sixteen. At such an early age, Alfonso XIII swore the Constitution and raised the throne, without having shown before the position of Prince of Asturias, with his corresponding responsibilities, or to have had the possibility of knowing, little by little, the duties that were expected from him.