A picture by French illustrator Gustave Doré

"Little Red Riding Hood" (or "Little Red Cap") is a French fairy tale for young children about a young girl and a wolf. The story comes from a folktale which means that it was a spoken story for a long time before it was a written story. It was first written down in the late 1600s, by Charles Perrault. The best-known version (the way the story is told) is Rotkäppchen by the Brothers Grimm and dates from the 19th century (1800s).