English Translations
Mary Howitt was the first to translate "Thumbelina" into English and published it as "Tommelise" in Wonderful Stories for Children in 1846. However, she did not approve of the opening scene with the witch, and, instead, had the childless woman provide bread and milk to a hungry beggar woman who then rewarded her hostess with a barleycorn.
Charles Boner also translated the tale in 1846 as "Little Ellie" while Madame de Chatelain dubbed the child 'Little Totty' in her 1852 translation. The editor of The Child's Own Book (1853) called the child throughout, 'Little Maja'. H.W. Dulcken was probably the translator responsible for the name, 'Thumbelina'. His widely published volumes of Andersen's tales appeared in 1864 and 1866. Mrs. H.B. Paulli translated the name as 'Little Tiny' in the late-nineteenth century.
In the twentieth century, Erik Christian Haugaard translated the name as 'Inchelina' in 1974, and Jeffrey and Diane Crone Frank translated the name as 'Thumbelisa' in 2005. Modern English translations of "Thumbelina" are found in the six-volume complete edition of Andersen's tales from the 1940s by Jean Hersholt, and Erik Christian Haugaard’s translation of the complete tales in 1974.
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