The story of Cinderella is so ancient and familiar to so many countries and cultures it is impossible to say it is set in any one place. In the UK the traditional pantomime version of Cinderella nearly always opens with a forest scene and the sets usually suggests a small village dominated by a rich family in a big house. This allows for the convenient presence royalty at the ball which Cinderella is magically enabled to attend and at which she loses her glass slipper. Costumes are suggestive of a pre-20th century period but this is also true of many other traditional pantomimes. It is possibly more important for Cinderella to be set in the past because the core elements of the story remain juts credible if one assumes the presence of the sort of rigid social hierarchies that used to keep the ruich man in his cstle and the poor girl at her grate. Perhaps the influence of the German fairytale and folklore gatherers, writers and publishers the Brothers Grimm explains why pantomime, film and illustrated printed versions of the Cinderella story often appear to be set in some sort of continental European community. However, such is the power of the basic storyline that many modern versions have been told. In truth the story of Cinderella can be set anywhere.