Princess Knight

Aka Ribon no Kishi and Choppy and the Princess.

The story of Sapphire, the princess of Silverland, who must pretend to be a prince.

In Heaven, the souls of unborn children are being prepared for their births. Tink, an inexperienced apprentice angel, accidentally gives a child who will be born female both a pink "girl's" heart and a blue "boy's" heart. When this is found out, it's too late to fix the mistake, so Tink is banished to Earth in a weak mortal body to watch over the twin-hearted child.

Meanwhile, in Silverland, a vaguely medieval kingdom, the King learns to his dismay that the Queen has given birth to a girl, and due to complications cannot have another child. Women cannot inherit the throne, and the King knows that his closest male relative, Duke Duralumin, is a wicked man who would oppress the people. So the King pretends that Sapphire was born male, with only a handful of close advisors knowing the truth.

Thanks to her dual nature, Sapphire is equally adept at male and female activities (even if the latter must be taught in secret). The story picks up in Sapphire's early adolescence, as Duke Duralumin steps up his attempts to prove the Prince to be a girl, and Tink finally finds Sapphire in the mortal world. And it's a good thing Sapphire has a new ally, as the Duke is not the only force that threatens Silverland.

Ribon no Kishi was created by Osamu Tezuka in 1953, and is one of the earliest Shojo manga. There were four manga storylines, the third starting in 1963, and serving as the primary basis for the Anime version, which was originally broadcast on Fuji Television in 1967-68, making it one of the earliest Shojo anime works (though Mahou Tsukai Sally preceded it on the air by several months). The anime was broadcast in the United States as Princess Knight or Choppy and the Princess, the latter being at first the title of a short movie made by mashing together three of the episodes. The series also aired in Spanish on Univision, as La Princesa Caballero, and Canada got the series in a Quebecois French dub on CBC in 1974 under the title Prince Saphir. Distribution of the English version was spotty at best, and Nozomi Entertainment's 2013 DVD release included only the '60s English dub, though one can find subbed episodes online. The manga has received an English language two-volume collected release.

There's a sequel, Twin Knight, about Sapphire's twin children, Daisy and Violetta. And there's also a stage musical, which premiered in Japan in 2015 to commemorate the 60th anniversary of Nakayoshi, which ran the early '60s manga storyline from which the TV series was adapted. With a gender-non-conforming protagonist and multi-faceted examination of gender identity, the series could be considered well ahead of its time, and is today much beloved by LGBTQIA+ fans.

Not to be confused with Princess Knight Catue or Christine Ricci's Nella the Princess Knight.

Tropes used in Princess Knight include:

• Action Girl: Sapphire and Friebe.
• Anti-Anti-Christ: Hecate, Satan's daughter, who's secretly good, or at least no worse than mischievous.
• Back From the Dead: Sapphire's parents, in the finale of the anime, and Sapphire herself thanks to Venus's help.
• Bad Is Good and Good Is Bad: Hecate, while not truly evil, was raised by Madame Hell (or Mephisto, depending on the version) and has some very disturbing ideas of what constitutes harmless fun.
• Bifauxnen: Sapphire.
• Big Bad: Mr. X. Even Satan pales in comparison in terms of sheer evil. Though in the manga, Madame Hell is the Big Bad.
• Bishonen: See the entry for "Dude Looks Like a Lady", below.
• Broken Aesop: "You're acting like a sissy girl!"
• The Chew Toy: Sir Nylon. His constant misfortune gets more amusing considering he is a Complete Monster wannabe.
• Clingy Jealous Girl: Venus
• Deus Ex Machina: Played straight in the finale.
• Distressed Damsel: Although more often than not, it evolves into Badass Damsel.
• The Dog Bites Back: In the anime Sir Nylon, Duralumin's luckless henchman, finally snaps from the abuse and kills his boss, ruling Silverland for a very brief time as a drooling madman and puppet of Mr. X.
• Driven to Suicide: Duke Duralumin kills himself when he thinks his son is dying.
• Dub Name Change: The English dub changes Tink's name to Choppy. It also doesn't change Sapphire's name as much as it removes it - she's simply referred to by generic titles in the dub.
• Dude Looks Like a Lady: When Sapphire temporarily loses her female heart and turns into a guy, she looks exactly the same as she did as a girl.
• Easy Amnesia: Sapphire temporarily loses all her memories after she's brought back from the dead.
• Even the Girls Want Her: Sapphire's crossdressing earns her a few crushes from oblivious girls, most notably Friebe, who even makes it to the altar with Sapphire before she learns the truth.
• Everything's Better with Princesses
• Fantasy Kitchen Sink: A really weird example; apparently the Abrahamic God and the Greek gods exist in the same universe.
• Fluffy Cloud Heaven
• Forgot I Could Change the Rules: The king finally wants to change the law to allow Sapphire to succeed him, but is kidnapped to stop it.
• Friend to All Living Things: Sapphire has many cute animal friends.
• Gender Bender: Sapphire is female, but has both male and female "hearts". At one point she loses her female heart and turns into a man.
• Good Hurts Evil: Crucifixes and other holy items cause great pain to demons.
• Hair of Gold: Sapphire's female disguise.
• Heir Club for Men
• Heroic Sacrifice: Blood retrieves a potion to save Sapphire's life at the cost of his own life. Although it turns out he brought it back just a few moments too late.
• Jerkass Gods: Venus.
• Killed Off for Real: A lot of characters including the King (in the manga), Blood, Hecate, Eros, Madame Hell, and Duke Duralumin.
• Knight of Cerebus: Mr. X.
• Lady Land: Black Pearl Island.
• Laughing Mad: Friebe has a brief fit of hysterical laughter when she finds out that the boy she's about to marry is actually a girl.
• Long-Lost Relative: Captain Blood is the older brother of Prince Franz! Who'd have guessed?
• Loves My Alter Ego: Prince Franz loves Sapphire's female disguise but hates Prince Sapphire due to a misunderstanding.
• Mask Power: During a period when Sapphire was supposed to be imprisoned, she snuck out a secret passage and donned a mask to be the Phantom Knight, who fought crime and oppression.
• Never Say Die: Averted even in the English dub. In episode one, Sapphire specifically uses the word "killers" when calling out Nylon for sending an assassin squad after her.
• Nice Hat: Sapphire often wears a magnificently large hat.
• No Ontological Inertia: Madam Hell is reminded at one point her flesh-to-stone spell will be reversed if she dies. Sadly, this also applies to Hecate,as her mother literally made her using magic.
• Obfuscating Insanity: Marquis Oolong pretends to be a nutcase so that if any of his underlings plot to overthrow him, they'll be less covert about it and he'll be able to root them out.
• Peek-a-Bangs: Parpa and Friebe.
• Pink Girl, Blue Boy: The hearts in heaven are colored this way.
• Punch Clock Villain: Eros often disapproves of her mistress Venus's jealousy — motivated plots, and alternates between following orders because it's her job and secretly subverting Venus's plans while hoping that Venus won't find out.
• Raised as the Opposite Gender
• Really Seven Hundred Years Old: Tink looks like a little kid, but since he's an angel it's probably safe to assume he's much older.
• Rebellious Princess: Hecate is an odd case because she's technically the princess of Hell and she frequently rebels against her mother's plans and helps out the people that her mother is victimizing.
• Recursive Crossdressing: Sapphire sometimes wore a blonde wig and a gown to impersonate a girl with a nebulous relationship to the royalty of Silverland so that she could woo Prince Franz.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: Oolong.
• Satan: Also known as Mephisto. He desired, among other things, to steal Sapphire's unique twin-hearted soul. In his earthly form, he possessed powerful magic and Nigh Invulnerability, but was deathly afraid of angels, retreating whenever Tink blew his horn occasionally turning him into a Butt Monkey.
• Smug Snake: Sir Nylon. Mrs. Hell (who appears in the third release published by Nakayoshi and replaces Satan's role) also qualifies.
• Sweet Polly Oliver: Sapphire, interestingly with no name change necessary.
• Taken for Granite: Sapphire's mom, and later on lots of people in the vicinity of the royal castle of Silverland.
• Trope Codifier: This series codified the "princely crossdressing heroine" trope that was later featured in Rose of Versailles and Revolutionary Girl Utena.
• Voluntary Shapeshifter: Hecate can change into a variety of animals and creatures.
• Waif Fu: With the Hand Wave of Sapphire's "male heart", because it's not like a girl could be competent at martial arts.
• Wholesome Crossdresser