How about a ghost story today, in the lead up to Halloween? This one comes Poland and was retold by Otto Knoop in Ostmärkische Sagen, Märchen und Erzählungen, 1909. It was translated by D. L. Ashliman and I found it on his website, Folklore and Mythology Electronic Texts.
In the village of Hammer many years ago there lived a young married couple. The wife loved to eat liver and could not live if she didn't eat a liver every day. One day she sent her husband once again to town to fetch a liver. However, the husband met a group of young merrymakers and went with them to a tavern, where he drank away all his money.
Sad, and without the liver, he made his way homeward. On his way he had to go through a forest. Here he met a hunter, who asked him why he was so sad. The man told him everything, . The hunter told him that in...
I usually try to share spooky stories in October, with Halloween being at the end of the month, but I'm a little slow this year. I just started decorating the inside of the house on Tuesday and we probably won't get around to the outside until next week. I did find a suitable spooky story for today though. "The Shroud" comes from Russia and was retold by W. R. S. Ralston in Russian Folk-Tales, 1873. I read it at D. L. Ashliman's Folklore and Mythology Electronic Texts, one of my favorite sites.
In a certain village there was a girl who was lazy and slothful, hated working, but would gossip and chatter away like anything! She decided to invite the other girls to a spinning party. Every one knows, it is the lazybones who gives the spinning-feast, and the sweet-toothed are those who go to it.
Well, on the appointed night she got her spinners together. They span for her, and she fed them...
"Sila Tsarevich and Ivashka with the White Smock" comes from Russia, as you can probably tell from the title. The version I read was from Robert Steele in The Russian Garland of Fairy Tales: Being Russian Folk Legends Translated from a Collection of Chapbooks Made in Moscow in 1916. It's a type of helper story, in this case categorized as "The Grateful Dead."
There was once a tsar, named Chotei, who had three sons -- the first, Aspar Tsarevich; the second, Adam Tsarevich; and the third and youngest son, Sila Tsarevich. All three got their father's permission to travel and see the world. the three set sail, each on his own ship. When they were out on the open sea, the eldest brother's ship sailed first, the second brother's next, and Sila Tsarevich sailed last.
On the third day of the voyage they saw a coffin with iron bands floating on the waves. The two oldest brothers sailed past without paying any attention...
It's time to get the last of the veggies out of our garden and wrap up for the year, which made me think of looking for a harvest of farming tale. This one comes from England and was told by Thomas Sternberg in The Dialect and Folk-lore of Northamptonshire (London: John Russell Smith, 1851).
One of these spirits, a Bogie, once asserted a claim to a field hitherto possessed by a farmer, and, after much disputing, they came to an arrangement by agreeing to divide its produce between them. At planting time, the farmer asks the Bogie what part of the crop he will have, "tops or bottoms."
"Bottoms," said the spirit. Upon hearing this, the crafty farmer sows the field with wheat, so that when harvest arrived the grain falls to his share, while the poor Bogie is obliged to content himself with the stubble.
The next year the Bogie, finding he had made such an unfortunate selection in the bottoms, chose the "tops," whereupon the...
I was listening to A Great Reckoning the other day and it mentioned that the phrase "a murder of crows" came from folklore. I knew the phrase but never knew where it came from, so I though it would be a perfect story to share today. There's just one minor problem - I can't find the story. I thought I'd go ahead and tell you what I did find though.
There are several different explanations for the origin of the term, a "murder of crows," mostly based on old folk tales and superstitions. For instance, there is a folktale that crows will gather and decide the capital fate of another crow. One such tale, "A Parliament of Crows" is mentioned in a couple of places, but I can't find the actual story. Although these are mostly considered folklore, apparently some actual instances have been witness. In Sweden the trials are called “kråkriksdag,” roughly translated as “crow’s parliament” with stories of crows acquitted and...
I've been a little busy this week, at work and home. Granted it's my own fault, but that's why I went with a short fable today, one of Aesop's. I also saw crows picking at my neighbor's garbage this morning on my way out, so a crow story it is.
A troublesome crow seated herself on the back of a sheep. The sheep, much against his will, carried her backward and forward for a long time and at last said: "If you had treated a dog in this way, you would have had your deserts from his sharp teeth." To this the crow replied; "I despise the weak and yield to the strong. I know whom I may bully and whom I must flatter, and thus I hope to prolong my life to a good old age."
I was surprised by how many images show crows on sheep. Is it a thing and I just wasn't aware of it?
Thursday's Tales is a...