Why do most stories begin with 'Once Upon a Time...'?

Answer 1

The idiom "Once upon a time..." has been a part of the English language for a very long time. It is hard to trace it back to its origin or to say exactly why it has become so widely used.

It is believed that the first examples go back as far as Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in 1385, but by this time it had already become a conventionally used phrase, so it would have been widely used before this date, and it would have originated long before.

It's the conventional opining for oral narratives, and is widely used for oral retelling of folklore, fables and other such stories. By the 1600's it was adopted as the traditional opening of such stories and was used in written narrative forms produced for children up to the age of about 8.

The phrase "Once upon a time..." is particularly prevalent in fairly tales for younger children, where it is commonly the opening line, with the conclusion "...And the all lived happily ever after." (or as it was originally: "Happily until their deaths.")

"Once upon a time..." is generally used as the English translation of similar phrases in other languages. For example, Hans Christian Andersen's Fairy Tales often start with "der var engang" which literally means "There was, once...," and the Brothers Grimm would open with "Es war einmal" which literally translated means "it was once." When these famous fairy tales were translated to English, the start was changed to the English phrase "Once upon a time..."

Nearly every language has a phrase similar to "Once upon a time..." that dates back as far as the folklore tales themselves! All of them also have their own traditional endings too. Some examples of these are:

Hindi: "किसी ज़माने में" - Literally means "In one era..."

Latin: "Olim..." - Literally means "At that time..."

Russian: "Давным-давно" - Literally means "Long, long time ago..."

Persian: "روزی روزگاری" - Literally means "One day, One time..."

Bengali: "Onek din aagekar kotha" - Literally means "It's story of long time ago..."

French: "Il était une fois" - Literally means "There was one time..."

Answer 2

"Once Upon a Time" is a traditional fairy tale opening that helps set the tone and signal to the audience that they are about to enter a magical or fantastical world. It also serves as a way to introduce that the events being told took place in the distant past.