The Folktale
Stith Thompson
Guardian of treasure. *Fb “skat” III 235b, 236a; *Winter 41; *Norlind 69ff.; Finnish-Swedish: Wessman 73ff. Nos. 623 – 629. |
Part Two The Folktale from Ireland to India III – The Simple Tale 4. Legends and traditions E. Treasure Trove |
This Santa Claus legend is not so infantile as it appears. It is but a children's version of imaginings common to our humanity. In a life filled with struggle for food and shelter, with the fatigue of far travel, with the frustration that comes from thwarted ambition or disprized love, it is no wonder that in his dreams by night or his reveries by day such a creature as man should imagine conditions under which all these hardships would vanish. A magic tablecloth to supply him with food and drink, arms to defeat his enemies, carpets to carry him at will, talismans to induce love or to overcome sickness or death—the contemplation of all these has served as a drug to ease the pain of actual life. In some moods, however, these notions are sure to seem visionary and to compel a closer realization of life as it is actually lived, life in which one needs only an abundance of treasure or money to buy all that heart desires. Surely there are great hoards of treasure buried by the rich or the mighty in times of crisis and left forgotten. Why could not one, if he is clever enough, uncover such a hoard and live like a king? Tales of the search for treasure ( Those who have buried treasure have always seen to it that it should be hard to find, but there do exist ways of discovering it, though these methods are hard to learn about and usually even harder to carry out. Tradition seems to be clear that if one will merely go to the end of the rainbow the treasure is there ( The finding of treasure is not sufficient to assure its complete enjoyment. Very frequently there is an effective guardian over the hoard ( Even after the treasure has been successfully raised, it seldom brings the hoped-for joy. Like the Rheingold, it frequently carries with it a curse on all its possessors ( |
[411] See J. Frank Dobie, Coronado's Children (Dallas, Texas, 1930). |
Motifs B11.6.2, N500, N516, N532, N535, N543.1, N553, N554, N558, N570, N591 |
Part Two The Folktale from Ireland to India III – The Simple Tale 4. Legends and traditions F. Legends of Places and Persons |
In a somewhat systematic way, we have reviewed a number of those popular beliefs which have found a place in the traditional stories of Europe and western Asia. Nearly always the important thing about such traditions has been the underlying belief, and the exact form of the story illustrating this belief has frequently been a matter of indifference. If we think of the avowedly fictional folktale—the wonder story like The Dragon Slayer or Faithful John—as one extreme of folk tradition and actual beliefs in various supernatural manifestations as the other, we shall notice that in the accounts just reviewed of origin legends, strange animals, and marvelous manifestations, we have been moving in an area much closer to actual belief than to fiction. But sharp lines are hard to draw; and many traditions strongly attached to particular places or persons have tendencies to wander, so that it is frequently hard to determine the original location or person about whom the legend grew up. Such stories, because of their great mobility, are often very near to fiction, though usually some effort is made at localization and at other means of suggesting that we are listening to a true tale rather than to some flight of fancy. No generalization is safe about how much actual belief is accorded legends of this kind. All depends upon the attitude of teller and hearer. But whenever there has been conscious transfer of one of these traditions from place to place or from person to person it would seem that, at least for the story-teller, we have the conscious creation of fiction. Every country has some migratory legends of this kind, so that a listing of all of them would be unduly tedious. In addition to these tales of limited area, however, there are a considerable number known pretty well throughout the western world. Some of them have remained on the purely oral [p. 264] level, and some have taken their place in literature, although unmistakably popular in origin. This literary development of a very widely known mythological concept is clearly seen in the last chapter of the Arthur legend, where it is confidently asserted that the great king will one day return in the hour of his people's need ( Of the localized legends about animals, two have had extensive migrations. To Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, have long been attached the story of how they were suckled by the she-wolf ( Tales of magic have not usually resulted in well-formed traditions that persist in all details. We hear much about witches in general and about magic powers, and we have already noticed a few cases, like the moving of the rocks at Stonehenge, in which a magic act is attached to a well-known historical or legendary character. There are, to be sure, a series of literary legends concerning Virgil as a magician ( In another connection we have noticed the story of The Sleeping Army [413] which is only waiting to come back from the dead at the moment of supreme need. Hardly to be distinguished from this legend is that usually known as [p. 265] Kyffhäuser ( However prominent a part of folk thought the idea of tabu is, it has not formed the central motif of many definite legends. To be sure, the Biblical tradition of Lot's wife looking back and being turned into the pillar of salt ( Several marvelous legends, told of ancient Greek gods or heroes, have lived on and are met even today in unexpected quarters. Such, for instance, is the group of legends around King Midas: the person with the ass's ears ( The myth of Orpheus and his descent to the world of the dead to bring back his wife ( Readers of Herodotus find one of the chief interests in his accounts of marvels and of other incredible traditions. Whatever may be his value as sober history, he is an excellent source for the legends and traditions of the Mediterranean world in his day. Some of his stories have worked themselves into the regular folktale repertories of many parts of Europe, [415] sometimes constituting complete tales and sometimes only subsidiary motifs. It is in the latter use that his legend of The Ring of Polycrates ( Biblical legend, especially explanatory tales, are an important element in the folklore of Europe and a large part of Asia. [417] Such traditions are by no means confined to accounts of origins. A number of the well-known Bible stories, such as Ruth, Susanna and the Elders ( The Bible contains several incidents parallel to motifs well known in other connections in European and Asiatic folklore. The exact relation between these traditions and the Scriptures is not always clear, for we do not know certainly which is dependent upon the other. In the story of Moses, for example, we learn that he was abandoned in a basket of rushes ( Such are some of the legends of classical antiquity and of Biblical or Apocryphal literature which have lived on through the centuries. There are, of course a legion of anecdotes about historical characters which have been repeated in many literary collections but have in no sense become a part of popular legend. Such is true of the stories about Socrates and Xantippe, and about Diogenes. One tale about the painter Zeuxis (also told of Apelles) came to be ascribed to various artists of the Renaissance. Two artists compete in the painting of realistic pictures. The first paints a mare so realistic as to deceive a stallion, whereupon the second paints a curtain which deceives the first artist. Variations in details appear: sometimes a fly is painted on the nose of some figure in the painting and the other artist involuntarily tries to drive the fly away ( A widely known legend connecting the ancient and modern worlds is [p. 268] that of the Wandering Jew ( Popular stories concerning kings and their adventures were particularly common in the Middle Ages, and many of these have become truly traditional. Of the boyhood of a number of future kings the story is told of how the child first learns of his illegitimacy when he is taunted by his playmates ( Kings are so in the habit of assuming command that they sometimes lose all humility and need to be given a lesson. King Alfred in disguise is beaten by the peasant for letting the cakes burn ( Some royal legends have attached themselves to the popes. One of these, known also in folktales ( Of the hundreds of saints' legends current in the Middle Ages, [424] only a [p. 269] relatively few have become popular in Protestant countries. But even there one finds repeated stories of Saint Peter and the Lord wandering on earth. [425] A pious tale appearing in the Grimm collection (No. 205) and known over a good part of Europe tells of the holy man who dies as an unknown pilgrim in his own father's house ( Ecclesiastical legend has furnished stories not only of saints and holy men, but also of their opposites, sometimes merely exemplars of wicked lives and sometimes persons actively in league with the devil. A monstrous tale of punishment meted out to those who sit in judgment is that of the woman who has three hundred sixty-five children ( In the story of The Devil's Contract ( Gowther, or Robert the Devil, was not himself to blame for his demonic association, since the fault lay entirely with his mother. But sometimes it is said that a man has deliberately, at an age of discretion, sold himself into the devil's power for a sufficient consideration ( A favorite type of legend has always been that dealing with narrow escapes. Sometimes these concern the mere escape from captivity of persons and their pursuit, such as the legend, attributed to various heroes, of the spider who spins her web over the hole in which the fugitive is hiding and thus throws his pursuers off the track ( A third story concerning escape from captivity lacks the happy ending. This is the tale of the noble lady who pleads for the release of her husband (or sometimes her brother) and eventually agrees in return for the promise of release to sacrifice her honor to his captor. But she is shamefully betrayed, for the lord refuses to carry out his bargain ( The most interesting legends concerning warfare usually have to do with famous sieges. The events connected with military attack and defense are in general so alike that anecdotes of this kind are easily taken up and are likely to travel from place to place, however definitely they may at first have been localized. One of these legends favors the attackers. It is said that in a certain siege of Cirencester the surrounding army attached flaming articles to the feet of birds so that when they flew into the city they set it on fire ( Finally, any consideration of legends of besieged cities must include that tale of wifely devotion usually known as The Women of Weinsberg ( As we have been viewing legends of various cities and persons, it has been obvious how strong is the tendency for such material to make new attachments which may even drive out all memory of the original person or place. It has been perfectly clear to the tradition of the last century and a half that it was Marie Antoinette who, when told that the people had no bread to eat, said, "Let them eat cake" ( Popular legend in Europe and Asia covers an enormous area not only with regard to the material handled, but also to the form in which it is transmitted and the audiences for which it is designed. It is by no means all of one piece. Some of it is essentially mythology, some less pretentious origin legend, some local history, some an embodiment of supernatural belief; and some assumes such definitive narrative form that it differs little from the complex folktale. Probably from no point of view could a logical justification for bringing all of this material together be made. But it has been at least convenient to pass in rapid survey the principal classes of narrative which have not formed themselves into regular folktales, either complex or simple. Whatever may be the heterogeneous origin of the varied literary forms in which they appear or the present-day acceptance of these legends, they do all have in common their connection with the world of fact, at least as conceived in the mind of the teller of the story. As fantastic as some of this material is, it is related as an object of belief and its effect, in contrast with that of the ordinary folktale, is the effect of history, rather than of fiction. |
[412] It is hard to know whether this is a purely literary tradition or not. Certainly it has a long literary history, both in the European Middle Ages and in the older Oriental collections. But it has had a vigorous life in the oral folklore of India; cf. M. B. Emeneau, Journal of American Oriental Society, LXI (1941), 1-17 and LXII (1942), 339-341. [413] See [414] See A. H. Gayton, "The Orpheus Myth in North America," Journal of American Folk-Lore, XLVIII (1935), 263ff. See also p. 351, below. [415] See, for example, [416] See, for example, [417] See pp. 235ff., above. [418] Good collections of such Jewish material may be found in: M. J. bin Gorion, Der Born Judas: Legenden, Märchen und Erzählungen (6 v., Leipzig, 1918ff.); M. Gaster, The Exempla of the Rabbis (London and Leipzig, 1924); and L. Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews (tr. Paul Radin; 7 v., Philadelphia, 1910ff.). [419] Some of these have worked themselves into the folktale of The Clever Peasant Girl, [420] See also [421] Particularly [422] See p. 275, below. [423] For these legends of popes, see J. J. I. von Döllinger, Die Papst-Fabeln des Mittelalters (2nd ed., Stuttgart, 1890). Another interesting papal legend is that of Pope Joan, the woman in disguise who is supposed to have served as pope ( [424] The literature of saints' legends is very extensive. A good introduction to the general subject is found in G. H. Gerould, Saints' Legends. The most important compendium of such legends is the Legenda Aurea of Jacobus a Voragine, which has appeared in many editions. Definitive treatment is found in the enormous collection known as Acta Sanctorum which has been appearing for the last three centuries under the editorship of the Bollandist Society of Brussels. [425] See p. 150, above. [426] For the sale or promise of children to the devil or an ogre, see [427] For a similar ruse otherwise employed see |
Types: 554, 560, 671, 756B, 875, 920, 921, 930, 950 |
Motifs A580, B331.2, B523.1, B535, C312.1.2, C943, C961.1, D1316.5, D1427.1, D1711.1, D1711.2, D1960.1, E502, F81.1, F511.2.2, F545.1.3, F555.3.1, H561.5, F911.4, H41.3, H504.1, H540.2.1, H561.3, J151.1, J355.1, J1153.1, J1171.1, J1545.4.1, J2072.1, J2227, K534, K1353, K1961.2.1, K2111, K1815.1.1, K1872.1, K2351.1, L111.2.1, L411, L414, L435.2.1, M211, M370, M371, N211.1, N465, N570, N731.2, P15.1, Q25, Q415.2, Q502.1, S220ff., S223.0.1, T645, T646, V361 |