Indian Fairy Tales, Joseph Jacobs [universal ebook reader .txt] 📗

Indian Fairy Tales

By Joseph Jacobs.

Table of Contents Titlepage Imprint Dedication Preface Indian Fairy Tales The Lion and the Crane How the Raja’s Son Won the Princess Labam The Lambikin Punchkin The Broken Pot The Magic Fiddle The Cruel Crane Outwitted Loving Laili The Tiger, the Brahman, and the Jackal The Soothsayer’s Son Harisarman The Charmed Ring The Talkative Tortoise A Lac of Rupees for a Bit of Advice The Gold-Giving Serpent The Son of Seven Queens A Lesson for Kings Pride Goeth Before a Fall Raja Rasalu The Ass in the Lion’s Skin The Farmer and the Moneylender The Boy Who Had a Moon on His Forehead and a Star on His Chin The Prince and the Fakir Why the Fish Laughed The Demon with the Matted Hair The Ivory City and Its Fairy Princess How Sun, Moon, and Wind Went Out to Dinner How the Wicked Sons Were Duped The Pigeon and the Crow Notes and References I: The Lion and the Crane II: Princess Labam III: Lambikin IV: Punchkin V: The Broken Pot VI: The Magic Fiddle VII: The Cruel Crane Outwitted VIII: Loving Laili IX: The Tiger, the Brahman, and the Jackal X: The Soothsayer’s Son XI: Harisarman XII: The Charmed Ring XIII: The Talkative Tortoise XIV: Lac of Rupees XV: The Gold-Giving Serpent XVI: The Son of Seven Queens XVII: A Lesson for Kings XVIII: Pride Goeth Before a Fall XIX: Raja Rasalu XX: The Ass in the Lion’s Skin XXI: The Farmer and the Moneylender XXII: The Boy with Moon on Forehead XXIII: The Prince and the Fakir XXIV: Why the Fish Laughed XXV: The Demon with the Matted Hair XXVI: The Ivory Palace XXVII: Sun, Moon, and Wind XXVIII: How Wicked Sons Were Duped XXIX: The Pigeon and the Crow Endnotes Colophon Uncopyright Imprint

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To
my dear little Phil

Preface

From the extreme West of the Indo-European world, we go this year to the extreme East. From the soft rain and green turf of Gaeldom, we seek the garish sun and arid soil of the Hindu. In the Land of Ire, the belief in fairies, gnomes, ogres and monsters is all but dead; in the Land of Ind it still flourishes in all the vigour of animism.

Soils and national characters differ; but fairy tales are the same in plot and incidents, if not in treatment. The majority of the tales in this volume have been known in the West in some form or other, and the problem arises how to account for their simultaneous existence in farthest West and East. Some⁠—as Benfey in Germany, M. Cosquin in France, and Mr. Clouston in England⁠—have declared that India is the Home of the Fairy Tale, and that all European fairy tales have been brought from thence by Crusaders, by Mongol missionaries, by Gipsies, by Jews, by traders, by travellers. The question is still before the courts, and one can only deal with it as an advocate. So far as my instructions go, I should be prepared, within certain limits, to hold a brief for India. So far as the children of Europe have their fairy stories in common, these⁠—and they form more than a third of the whole⁠—are derived from India. In particular, the majority of the Drolls or comic tales and jingles can be traced, without much difficulty, back to the Indian peninsula.

Certainly there is abundant evidence of the early transmission by literary means of a considerable number of drolls and folktales from India about the time of the Crusaders. The collections known in Europe by the titles of The Fables of Bidpai, The Seven Wise Masters, Gesta Romanorum, and Barlaam and Josaphat, were extremely popular during the Middle Ages, and their contents passed on the one hand into the Exempla of the monkish preachers, and on the other into the Novelle of Italy, thence, after many days, to contribute their quota to the Elizabethan Drama. Perhaps nearly one-tenth of the main incidents of European folktales can be traced to this source.

There are even indications of an earlier literary contact between Europe and India, in the case of one branch of the folktale, the Fable or Beast Droll. In a somewhat elaborate discussion1 I have come to the conclusion that a goodly number of the fables that pass under the name of the Samian slave, Aesop, were derived from India, probably from the same source whence the same tales were utilised in the Jatakas, or Birth-stories of Buddha. These Jatakas contain a large quantity of genuine early Indian folktales, and form the earliest collection of folktales in the world, a sort of Indian Grimm, collected more than two thousand years before the good German brothers went on their quest among the folk with such delightful results. For this reason I have included