In the preface, the publisher Johannes Stauda explains that the text for the play was transcribed around 1900 by his old aunt Josefine, a teacher at secondary school just like him: through her intervention, he says, one must find some recollection of a tragedy written by Franz Grillparzer, Die Ahnfrau [The Grandmother] (1817). Stauda also asserts that the present version of Der Sieg der Liebe [The Triumph of Love] was played at Werschau in Bohemia (Všeruby), with heads of puppets carved in potatoes. But the play as it was published, illustrated with wood engravings in a German expressionist style, is, to say the least, a rewriting. On this matter, Stauda provides a reminder that the glove-puppet repertoire generally circulated first and foremost orally and that the written or printed sources are rare (he quotes, notably, Johannes E. Rabe’s study in Hamburg).

The King learns, thanks to an anonymous letter, that Kasimir, his daughter Pumfia’s fiancé, is none other than the terrible bandit Jaromir. When Jaromir appears and confirms to Pumfia that the news is true, the King challenges him to a duel. But Jaromir, victorious, cuts off the King’s head. Pumfia wants to retire to a convent. Jaromir offers to console her and they run away together: love conquers all.