Part Two

The Folktale from Ireland to India

II – The Complex Tale

4. Magic and marvels

F. Extraordinary Strength

In the story of The Bear's Son (Type 301) we have already encountered the supernaturally strong hero. The same introduction that leads to the train of events in that story is very frequently used as an opening of an entirely different tale. A very common designation for this story is Strong John (Type 650). It begins in the same way as The Bear's Son by accounting for the hero's origin. Frequently he is actually a son of a bear and a woman, though sometimes he may simply have the strength of a bear because his mother had been carried off and was still in captivity to the bear at the time of his birth. Other extraordinary origins are ascribed to him: he may be the son of a woman of the sea or of a kind of wood-nymph, or of a troll woman and a man who has merely dreamed a connection with her. Finally, he may be said to be struck from iron by a smith. Whatever may be his marvelous birth, he is usually precocious. His mother suckles him until he is well grown, and even before his weaning he practices his strength by uprooting trees. He is finally sent from home on account of his enormous appetite. For his journey he takes along a giant cane (sometimes said to hold fifty cattle). He undertakes to work for a smith, but he drives the anvil into the ground and he throws trees onto the roof of the smithy and breaks it.

Thus far the tale is identical with The Bear's Son. Instead of meeting the extraordinary companions and having adventures in the lower world, the hero in this story goes to work for a man with whom he enters into a strange contract. The stories differ among themselves as to the details. The three most popular are these. As payment for his year's labor he is to be allowed to give his master a single blow: the stroke sends the man to the sky; or he is to receive in payment all the grain he can carry off: he makes away with the whole crop. The third bargain is known as the anger bargain (Motif K172). Severe punishment shall be given to the first of the bargainers to become angry. The youth heaps all kinds of indignities on the master to provoke his anger and finally annoys him beyond endurance, so that in the end when his anger explodes the boy gives him a great blow or even some times cuts off his ears.. The interest in the story largely consists in these tricks which the hero plays on the master. When he is asked to thresh grain, he breaks the flail and makes a new one of the stable roof beams. Similarly, [p. 86] when he is to clear land or to dig ditches or to plow, he breaks the tools or kills or injures the work animals. [85] The master tries his best to kill the youth, but the latter always turns things to his own advantage. [86] The boy is sent to the devil's mill, but he drives the devils to his master's house. Likewise when he is sent for a wild horse or demons in hell, he brings them back with him. The master commands him to dig a well. While he is down below, the master throws a millstone on him, but the strong boy puts it around his neck as a collar and asks that chickens stop scratching sand on him.

Many other separate incidents in this story also appear elsewhere. Such, for example, are the long nursing of the strong hero (Motif F611.2.3), and the supernatural birth from an object (Motifs F611.1.11, T540 ). The setting out of the hero, especially his adventures at the smithy, are strongly reminiscent of the Siegfried myth. In other respects even the casual reader is reminded of the story of Hercules, not only because of the strength of the hero, but particularly because some of the tasks, such as bringing the devils from hell, are practically identical.

In spite of all these connections with ancient myth or with separate anecdotes or with the folktale of The Bear's Son, Strong John, as a modern oral tradition is a very definite entity, well constructed by the Scandinavians and Baltic peoples. Nearly four hundred versions have been reported in Finland and Estonia alone. It is also known in nearly every European country, but seems to extend very little into Asia. The French have brought it to Canada where it is still told, not only by their descendants, but by Indians both in Nova Scotia and in British Columbia. A Portuguese version has come by way of the Cape Verde Islands to Massachusetts.

Any distribution study of Strong John is made difficult because of its close relation with The Bear's Son. One is not always quite sure whether cataloguers have been careful to discriminate between the two types. It seems fair to say, however, that the special development of the strong man motif seen in this story has been essentially European. Some kinds of tales of powerful men are found nearly everywhere, and it is natural that some of the incidents should be similar.

[85] For details of these impudent or destructive acts, see the whole series of types numbered from 1000 to 1029. These sometimes appear independently or in small groups. Some of them are widespread, but others are confined to the Baltic and Scandinavian countries, where they have received vigorous development.

[86] Many incidents which appear in this section of the tales are found separately or in other connections. See Types 1115 to 1122.

301, 650, 1000-1029, 1115-1122

F611.1.11, F611.2.3, K172, T540

Part Two

The Folktale from Ireland to India

III – The Simple Tale

1. Jests and Anecdotes

H. Seduction and Adultery

To the unlettered story-teller and listener, as well as to the writer of literary tales, there has always been a greater interest in deceptions connected with sex conduct than any other. Such deceptions may be of several kinds. They may result in seduction, in the discomfiture of unwelcome lovers, in the beguiling of cuckolded husbands, or in the discovery and punishment of adulterers by the outraged husband or by some trickster who profits by the exposure. Tales like these are very old, and they were especially popular with the writers of fabliaux, novelle, and jestbooks. A great proportion of such literary tales are never heard from popular story-tellers. But some of [p. 203] them are very well known everywhere. And many such tales have certainly been made up in entire independence of literary influences.

As a part of longer tales we have already seen a number of cases of what is essentially seduction. A girl masks as a man and wins a princess's love; or the hero frames his questions to the princess who must always answer "No" in such a way as to gain his desires; or a princess is enticed on board a merchant's ship to inspect beautiful clothes; or the garments of bathing girls are seized and held. We have also seen a young man entering the princess's room in a golden ram or hidden in a chest, or even by means of artificial wings. And we have seen the frog prince buying the right to sleep before the girl's door, at the foot of her bed, and finally in the bed itself. [315]

One of the most widely-known tales of seduction is frequently recounted as a part of the Anger Bargain cycle (Types 1000-1029). After the trickster has heaped all manner of indignities upon the master, the latter sends him into the house to bring back two articles. He meets the two daughters and calls back to the master, "Both?" ''Yes, I said both," replies the master. The youth then has his will of both daughters (K1354.1; Type 1563). This anecdote is as old as the Thousand and One Nights, and was repeated in Renaissance jestbooks. It is a favorite in the Baltic states and has been reported in Roumania and among the French. Its appearance in three Indian tribes of North America and one of Bolivia and in Portuguese tradition in Massachusetts would suggest that not all European versions have been collected. Much less witty, but equally popular around the Baltic, is the tale of the young man who tricks a lady with a promise of a pair of beautiful shoes. The husband, however, appears before payment can be made (K1357; Type 1731). [316]

Writers of novelle and fabliaux were fond of tales of humiliated lovers. Virgil hanging in a basket below his mistress's window, or Aristotle crawling on all fours as a riding horse for his scornful lady, or the bawdy tricks recounted by Chaucer in his Miller's Tale—all these are a part of literature rather than of folklore. [317] On the contrary, the Oriental and Renaissance literary tale of The Entrapped Suitors (Lai l'épervier) (K1218.1; Type 1730) has attained a real popularity in the folklore of eastern Europe, and has been collected in Spain and Indonesia. The chaste wife with many suitors has them come, one at a time. As each arrives, the one before has just undressed and must hide. At the end, the husband and his guests come and chase the embarrassed suitors away.

Somewhat similar tales from fabliaux and jestbooks popular in eastern Europe but otherwise apparently unknown as folktales are two concerning [p. 204] discovered lovers. One of them tells how a man hidden in a roof sees a girl and her lover. He becomes so interested that he falls, and they flee and leave him in possession (K1271.1.4; Type 1776). The other anecdote is only a slight variant of this. The man who has seen the intrigue from the stable roof threatens to tell about it, and the woman gives him money to keep quiet (K1271.1.4.1; Type 1360B).

In the anecdote just mentioned the situation is related by the rascal in the form of a story, so that only gradually the woman realizes that her secret is known. This conversation with a double meaning reminds one of the very well-known tale of Old Hildebrand (K1556; Type 1360C). [318] In this case the husband leaves home and, suspecting his wife, has himself carried back, where he finds her entertaining the priest. They make rhymes about the husband's absence and the good times they expect to have. From his hiding place in the basket he answers in appropriate rhymes. In his exhaustive treatment of this tale, Walter Anderson [319] carries it back to Flemish literature of the late fifteenth century and shows its subsequent treatment in songs, puppet theaters, and Russian bylini. Contrary to most anecdotes which we have noticed, this one is almost completely unknown in Finland, Estonia, and Lithuania, although it is popular in all parts of Russia, even into Siberia, and in practically every part of Europe. In America it has been reported in several places: in the English tradition of North Carolina, the Negro of Louisiana and the Bahamas, and the Portuguese of Massachusetts. The combination of literary texts with its widespread oral acceptance made this one of the best of all short anecdotes for comparative study.

In the tale cycle of Big Claus and Little Claus (Type 1535) we saw how the trickster, acting as a sham magician, discovers a woman's adultery and manages to buy the chest which contains the hidden paramour (K1574). There are a number of variations to this motif, and in several combinations they go together to make an independent anecdote (Type 1725). The trickster, having discovered the intended adultery and the prepared feast, brings it about that the food goes to the husband instead of the paramour (K1571). Sometimes he merely makes her believe that the husband is coming to punish her, and thus forces her confession (K1572). In other versions the trickster, by a ruse, sends the master running after the departing paramour (K1573). Though the master knows nothing of the adultery, the lover is thoroughly frightened and the wife confesses to the husband. Of all these incidents, the latter is by far the most popular. It appears in the Thousand and One Nights, in various fabliaux and jestbooks, and in the writings of Hans Sachs. It is known orally in all parts of Europe, particularly in the north. Similar tales are reported from India. [p. 205]

[315] Types 514, 851, 516, 313 and 400, 854 and 900, 882, 575, and 440, respectively.

[316] With some variation, Chaucer has used this motif for his Shipman's Tale. See the study by Spargo, Shipman's Tale, pp. 50ff.

[317] For this group of motifs, see K1210-K1239.

[318] This resemblance is certainly not important, and Walter Anderson is quite right in taking me to task for assigning it the number 1360C as if it were only a subdivision of 1360. Old Hildebrand has to do with a returning husband and not with an outside trickster.

[319] Der Schwank vom alten Hildebrand.

313, 400, 440, 514, 516, 851, 854, 882, 900, 1000-1029, 1360, 1360B, 1360C, 1535, 1563, 1725, 1730, 1731, 1776

K1210-K1239, K1218.1, K1271.1.4, K1271.1.4.1, K1556, K1354.1, K1357, K1571, K1572, K1573, K1574