The origin of the Beast-Fable is still a vexed question among scholars,
some of whom ascribe it to the doctrine of metempsychosis, or the
transmigration of human souls into different animal forms; others,
again, are of the opinion that beasts and birds were first adopted as
characters of fictitious narratives, in order to safely convey reproof
or impart wholesome counsel to the minds of absolute princes, who would
signally resent "plain speaking."[127] Several nations of
antiquity--notably the Greeks, the Hindús, the Egyptians--have been
credited with the invention of the beast-fable, and there is no reason
to believe that it may not have been independently devised in different
countries. It is very certain, however, that Esop was not the inventor
of this kind of narrative in Greece, while those fables ascribed to him,
which have been familiar to us from our nursery days, are mostly
spurious, and have been traced to ancient Oriental sources. The
so-called Esopic apologue of the Lion and the House is found in an
Egyptian papyrus preserved at Leyden.[128] Many of them are quite modern
_rechauffés_ of Hindú apologues, such as the Milkmaid and her Pot of
Milk, which gave rise to our popular saying, "Don't count your chickens
until they be hatched." Nevertheless, genuine fables of Esop were
current in Athens at the best period of its literary history, though it
does not appear that they existed in writing during his lifetime.
Aristophanes represents a character in one of his plays as learning
Esop's fables from oral recitation. When first reduced to writing they
were in prose, and Socrates is said to have turned some of them into
verse, his example being followed by Babrius, amongst others, of whose
version but few fables remain entire. The most celebrated of his Latin
translators is Phædrus, who takes care to inform us that
If any thoughts in these Iambics shine,
The invention's Esop's, and the verse is mine.[129]
[127] The reader may with advantage consult the article
'Beast-Fable,' by Mr. Thos. Davidson, in _Chambers's
Encylopædia_, new edition.
[128] But this papyrus might be of as late a period as the
second century of our era.
[129] For the most complete history of the Esopic Fable, see
vol. i of Mr. Joseph Jacobs' edition of _The Fables of
Aesop, as first printed by Caxton in 1484, with those of
Avian, Alfonso, and Poggio_, recently published by Mr.
David Nutt; where a vast amount of erudite information
will be found on the subject in all its ramifications.
Mr. Jacobs, indeed, seems to have left little for future
gleaners: he has done his work in a thorough,
Benfey-like manner, and students of comparative
folk-lore are under great obligations to him for the
indefatigable industry he has devoted to the valuable
outcome of his wide-reaching learning.
Little is authentically known regarding the career of the renowned
fabulist, who is supposed to have been born about B.C. 620, and, as in
the case of Homer, various places are assigned as that of his
nativity--Samos, Sardis, Mesembria in Thrace, and Cotiæium in Phrygia.
He is said to have been brought as a slave to Athens when very young,
and after serving several masters was enfranchised by Iadmon, the
Samian. His death is thus related by Plutarch: Having gone to Delphos,
by the order of Croesus, with a large quantity of gold and silver, to
offer a costly sacrifice to Apollo and to distribute a considerable sum
among the inhabitants, a quarrel arose between him and the Delphians,
which induced him to return the money, and inform the king that the
people were unworthy of the liberal benefaction he had intended for
them. The Delphians, incensed, charged him with sacrilege, and, having
procured his condemnation, precipitated him from a rock and caused his
death.--The popular notion that Esop was a monster of ugliness and
deformity is derived from a "Life" of the fabulist, prefixed to a Greek
collection of fables purporting to be his, said to have been written by
Maximus Planudes, a monk of the 14th century, which, however apocryphal,
is both curious and entertaining, from whatever sources the anecdotes
may have been drawn.
According to Planudes,[130] Esop was born at Amorium, in the Greater
Phrygia, a slave, ugly exceedingly: he was sharp-chinned, snub-nosed,
bull-necked, blubber-lipped, and extremely swarthy (whence his name,
_Ais-ôpos_, or _Aith-ôpos_: burnt-face, blackamoor); pot-bellied,
crook-legged, and crook-backed; perhaps uglier even than the Thersites
of Homer; worst of all, tongue-tied, obscure and inarticulate in his
speech; in short, everything but his mind seemed to mark him out for a
slave. His first master sent him out to dig one day. A husbandman having
presented the master with some fine fresh figs, they were given to a
slave to be set before him after his bath. Esop had occasion to go into
the house; meanwhile the other slaves ate the figs, and when the master
missed them they accused Esop, who begged a moment's respite: he then
drank some warm water and caused himself to vomit, and as he had not
broken his fast his innocence was thus manifest. The same test
discovered the thieves, who by their punishment illustrated the proverb:
Whoso against another worketh guile
Thereby himself doth injure unaware.[131]
[130] _Fabulae Romanenses Graece conscriptae ex recensione et
cum adnotationibus_, Alfredi Eberhard (Leipzig, 1872),
vol. i, p. 226 ff.
[131] It would have been well had the sultan Bayazíd compelled
his soldier to adopt this plan when accused by an old
woman of having drunk up all her supply of goat's milk.
The soldier declared his innocence, upon which Bayazíd
ordered his stomach to be cut open, and finding the milk
not yet digested, quoth he to the woman: "Thou didst not
complain without reason." And, having caused her to be
recompensed for her loss, "Now go thy way," he added,
"for thou hast had justice for the wrong done thee."
Next day the master goes to town. Esop works in the field, and
entertains with his own food some travellers who had lost their way, and
sets them on the right road again. They are really priests of Artemis,
and having received their blessing he falls asleep, and dreams that
Tychê (i.e. Fortune) looses his tongue, and gives him eloquence. Waking,
he finds he can say _bous_, _onos_, _dikella_, (ox, ass, mattock). This
is the reward of piety, for "well-doing is full of good hopes." Zenas,
the overseer, is rebuked by Esop for beating a slave. This is the first
time he has been heard to speak distinctly. Zenas goes to his master and
accuses Esop of having blasphemed him and the gods, and is given Esop to
sell or give away as he pleases. He sells him to a trader for three
obols (4-1/2d.), Esop pleading that, if useless for aught else, he will
do for a bugbear to keep his children quiet. When they arrive home the
little ones begin to cry. "Was I not right?" quoth Esop, and the other
slaves think he has been bought to avert the Evil Eye.
The merchant sets out for Asia with all his house-hold. Esop is offered
the lightest load, as being a raw recruit. From among the bags, beds,
and baskets he chooses a basket full of bread--"a load for two men."
They laugh at his folly, but let him have his will, and he staggers
under the burden to the wonder of his master. But at the first halt for
_ariston_, or breakfast, the basket is half-emptied, and by the evening
wholly so, and then Esop marches triumphantly ahead, all commending his
wit. At Ephesus the merchant sells all his slaves, excepting a musician,
a scribe, and Esop. Thence he goes to Samos, where he puts new garments
on the two former (he had none left for Esop), and sets them out for
sale, Esop between them. Xanthus, the philospher, lived at Samos. He
goes to the slave market, and, seeing the three, praises the dealer's
cunning in making the two look handsomer than they were by contrast with
the ugly one. Asking the scribe and the musician what they know, their
answer is, "Everything," upon which Esop laughs. The price of the
musician (1000 obols, or six guineas) and of the scribe (three times
that sum) prevents the philosopher from buying them, and he turns to
Esop to see what he is made of. He gives him the customary salutation,
"Khaire!" (Rejoice). "I wasn't grieving," retorts Esop. "I greet thee,"
says Xanthus. "And I thee," replies Esop. "What are thou?" "Black." "I
don't mean that, but in what sort of place wast thou born?" "My mother
didn't tell me whether in the second floor or the cellar." "What can you
do?" "Nothing." "How?" "Why, these fellows here say they know how to do
everything, and they haven't left me a single thing." "By Jove," cries
Xanthus, "he has answered right well; for there is no man who knows
everything. That was why he laughed, it is clear." In the end, Xanthus
buys Esop for sixty obols (about 7s. 6d.) and takes him home, where his
wife (who is "very cleanly") receives him only on sufferance.
One day Xanthus, meeting friends at the bath, sends Esop home to boil
pease (idiomatically using the word in the singular), for his friends
are coming to eat with him. Esop boils _one_ pea and sets it before
Xanthus, who tastes it and bids him serve up. The water is then placed
on the table, and Esop justifies himself to his distracted master, who
then sends him for four pig's feet. While they boil, Xanthus slyly
abstracts one, and when Esop discovers this he takes it for a plot
against him of the other slaves. He runs into the yard, cuts a foot from
the pig feeding there, and tosses it into the pot. Presently the other
foot is put back, and Esop is confounded to see _five_ trotters on the
boil. He serves them up, however, and when Xanthus asks him what the
five mean he replies: "How many feet have two pigs?" Xanthus saying,
"Eight," quoth Esop: "Then here are five, and the porker feeding below
goes on three." On being reproached he urges: "But, master, there is no
harm in doing a sum in addition and subtraction, is there?" For very
shame Xanthus forbears whipping him.
One morning Xanthus gives a breakfast, for which Esop is sent to buy
"the best and most useful." He buys tongues, and the guests
(philosophers all) have nothing else. "What could be better for man than
tongue?" quoth Esop. Another time he is ordered to get "the worst and
most worthless"; again he brings tongues, and again is ready with a
similar defence.[132] A guest reviles him, and Esop retorts that he is
"malicious and a busybody." On hearing this Xanthus commands him to find
some one who is not a busybody. In the road Esop finds a simple soul and
brings him home to his master, who persuades his wife to bear with him
in anything he should pretend to do to her; if the guest is a busybody
(or one who meddles) Esop will get a beating. The plan fails; for the
good man continues eating and takes no notice of the wife-cuffing going
on, and when his host seems about to burn her, he only asks leave to
bring his own wife to be also placed on the pile.
[132] This story is also found in the _Liber de Donis_ of
Etienne de Bourbon (No. 246), a Dominican monk of the
14th century; in the _Summa Praedicantium_ of John
Bromyard, and several other medieval monkish collections
of _exempla_, or stories designed for the use of
preachers: in these the explanation is that nothing can
be better and nothing worse than _tongue_.
At a symposium Xanthus takes too much wine, and in bravado wagers his
house and all that it contains that he will drink up the waters of the
sea. Out of this scrape Esop rescues him by suggesting that he should
demand that all the rivers be stopped from flowing into the sea, for he
did not undertake to drink them too, and the other party is
satisfied.[133]
[133] This occurs in the several Asiatic versions of the Book
of Sindibád (Story of the Sandalwood Merchant); in the
_Gesta Romanorum_; in the old English metrical _Tale of
Beryn_; in one of the Italian _Novelle_ of Sacchetti;
and in the exploits of Tyl Eulenspiegel, the German
Rogue.
A party of scientific guests are coming to dinner one day, and Esop is
set just within the door to keep out "all but the wise." When there is a
knock at the door Esop shouts: "What does the dog shake?" and all save
one go away in high dudgeon, thinking he means them; but this last
answers: "His tail," and is admitted.
At a public festival an eagle carries off the municipal ring, and Esop
obtains his freedom by order of the state for his interpretation of this
omen--that some king purposes to annex Samos. This, it turns out, is
Croesus, who sends to claim tribute. Hereupon Esop relates his first
fable, that of the Wolf, the Dog, and the Sheep, and, going on an
embassy to Croesus, that of the Grasshopper who was caught by the
Locust-gatherer. He brings home "peace with honour." After this Esop
travels over the world, showing his wisdom and wit. At Babylon he is
made much of by the king. He then visits Egypt and confounds the sages
in his monarch's behalf. Once more he returns to Greece, and at Delphi
is accused of stealing a sacred golden bowl and condemned to be hurled
from a rock. He pleads the fables of the Matron of Ephesus,[134] the
Frog and the Mouse, the Beetle and the Eagle, the Old Farmer and his
Ass-waggon, and others, but all is of no avail, and the villains break
his neck.
[134] Taken from Petronius Arbiter. The story is widely
spread. It is found in the _Seven Wise Masters_,
and--_mutatis mutandis_--is well known to the Chinese.
Planudes takes some liberties with his original,
substituting for the soldier guarding the suspended
corpse of a criminal, who "comforts" the sorrowing
widow, a herdsman with his beasts, which he loses in
prosecuting his amour.
* * * * *
Such are some of the apocryphal sayings and doings of Esop the
fabulist--the manner of his death being the only circumstance for which
there is any authority. The idea of his bodily deformity is utterly
without foundation, and may have been adopted as a foil to his
extraordinary shrewdness and wit, as exhibited in the anecdotes related
of him by Planudes. That there was nothing uncouth in the person of Esop
is evident from the fact that the Athenians erected a fine statue of
him, by the famed sculptor Lysippus.--The Latin collection of the fables
ascribed to Esop was first printed at Rome in 1473 and soon afterwards
translated into most of the languages of Europe. About the year 1480 the
Greek text was printed at Milan. From a French version Caxton printed
them in English at Westminster in 1484, with woodcuts: "Here begynneth
the Book of the subtyl History and Fables of Esope. Translated out of
Frenssche into Englissche, by William Caxton," etc. In this version
Planudes' description of Esop's personal appearance is reproduced:[135]
He was "deformed and evil shapen, for he had a great head, large visage,
long jaws, sharp eyes, a short neck, curb backed, great belly, great
legs, and large feet; and yet that which was worse, he was dumb and
could not speak; but, notwithstanding all this, he had a great wit and
was greatly ingenious, subtle in cavillection and joyous in words"--an
inconsistency which is done away in a later edition by the statement
that afterwards he found his tongue.--It is curious to find the Scottish
poet Robert Henryson (15th century), in one of the prologues to his
metrical versions of some of the Fables, draw a very different portrait
of Esop.[136] He tells us that one day in the midst of June, "that joly
sweit seasoun," he went alone to a wood, where he was charmed with the
"noyis of birdis richt delitious," and "sweit was the smell of flowris
quhyte and reid," and, sheltering himself under a green hawthorn from
the heat of the sun, he fell asleep:
And, in my dreme, methocht come throw the schaw[137]
The fairest man that ever befoir I saw.
His gowne wes of ane claith als quhyte as milk,
His chymeris[138] wes of chambelote purpour broun;
His hude[139] of scarlet, bordourit[140] weill with silk,
On hekellit-wyis,[141] untill his girdill doun;
His bonat round, and of the auld fassoun,[142]
His beird was quhyte, his ene was greit and gray,
With lokker[143] hair, quilk ouer his schulderis lay.
Ane roll of paper in his hand he bair,
Ane swannis pen stikkand[144] under his eir,
Ane inkhorne, with ane prettie gilt pennair,[145]
Ane bag of silk, all at his belt can beir:
Thus was he gudelie graithit[146] in his geir.
Of stature large, and with ane feirfull[147] face;
Evin quhair I lay, he came ane sturdie pace.
[135] Mr. Jacobs was obliged to omit the Life of Esop in his
reprint of Caxton's text of the Fables, as it would have
unduly increased the bulk of his second volume. But
those interested in the genealogy of popular tales and
fables will be glad to have Mr. Jacobs' all but
exhaustive account of the so-called Esopic fables,
together with his excellent synopsis of parallels, in
preference to the monkish collection of spurious
anecdotes of the fabulist, of which the most noteworthy
are given in the present paper.
[136] Robert Henryson was a schoolmaster in Dunfermline in the
latter part of the 15th century. His _Moral Fables_,
edited by Dr. David Irving, were printed for the
Maitland Club in 1832, and his complete works (Poems and
Fables) were edited by Dr. David Laing, and published in
1865. His _Testament of Cresseid_, usually considered as
his best performance, is a continuation of Chaucer's
_Troilus and Cresseide_, which was derived from the
Latin of an unknown author named Lollius. Henryson was
the author of the first pastoral poem composed in the
English (or Scottish) language--that of _Robin and
Makyn_. "To his power of poetical conception," Dr. Laing
justly remarks, "he unites no inconsiderable skill in
versification: his lines, if divested of their uncouth
orthography, might be mistaken for those of a more
modern poet."
[137] _Schaw_, a wood, a covert.
[138] _Chymeris_, a short, light gown.
[139] _Hude_, hood.
[140] _Bordourit_, embroidered.
[141] _Hekellit-wise_, like the feathers in the neck of a cock.
[142] _Fassoun_, fashion.
[143] _Lokker_, (?) gray.
[144] _Stikkand_, sticking.
[145] _Pennair_, pen-case.
[146] _Graithit_, apparelled, arrayed.
[147] _Feirfull_, awe-inspiring, dignified.
The Arabian sage Lokinan is represented by tradition to have been a
black slave, and of hideous appearance, from which, and from the
identity of the apologues in the Arabian collection that bears his name
as the author with the so-called Esopic fables, some writers have
supposed that Esop and Lokman are simply different names of one and the
same individual. But the fables ascribed to Lokman have been for the
most part (if not indeed entirely) derived from the Greek; and there is
no authority whatever that Lokman composed any apologues. Various
traditions exist regarding Lokman's origin and history. It is said that
he was an Ethiopian, and was sold as a slave to the Israelites during
the reign of David. According to one version, he was a carpenter;
another describes him as having been originally a tailor; while a third
account states that he was a shepherd. If the Arabs may be credited, he
was nearly related to the patriarch Job. Among the anecdotes which are
recounted of his amiable disposition is the following: His master once
gave him a bitter lemon to eat. Lokman ate it all, upon which his
master, greatly astonished, asked him: "How was it possible for you to
eat so unpalatable a fruit?" Lokman replied: "I have received so many
favours from you, that it is no wonder I should once in my life eat a
bitter melon from your hand." Struck with this generous answer, the
master, it is said, immediately gave him his freedom.--A man of eminence
among the Jews, observing a great crowd around Lokman, eagerly listening
to his discourse, asked him whether he was not the black slave who
lately tended the sheep of such a person, to which Lokman replying in
the affirmative, "How was it possible," continued his questioner, "for
thee to attain so exalted a degree of wisdom and piety?" Lokman
answered: "By always speaking the truth; keeping my word; and never
intermeddling in affairs that did not concern me."--Being asked from
whom he had learned urbanity, he replied: "From men of rude manners, for
whatever I saw in them that was disagreeable I avoided doing myself."
And when asked from whom he had acquired his philosophy, he said: "From
the blind, who never advance a step until they have tried the ground."
Lokman is also credited with this apothegm: "Be a learned man, a
disciple of the learned, or an auditor of the learned; at least, be a
lover of knowledge and desirous of improvement."--In Persian and Turkish
tales Lokman sometimes figures as a highly skilled physician, and "wise
as Lokman" is proverbial throughout the Muhammedan world.
_ADDITIONAL NOTE._
DRINKING THE SEA DRY, p. 306.
The same jest is also found in _Aino Folk-Tales_, translated by Prof.
Basil Hall Chamberlain, and published in the _Folk-Lore Journal_, 1888,
as follows:
There was the Chief of the Mouth of the River and the Chief of the Upper
Current of the River. The former was very vain-glorious, and therefore
wished to put the latter to shame or to kill him by engaging him in an
attempt to perform something impossible. So he sent for him and said:
"The sea is a useful thing, in so far as it is the original home of the
fish which come up the river. But it is very destructive in stormy
weather, when it beats wildly upon the beach. Do you now drink it dry,
so that there may be rivers and dry land only. If you cannot do so, then
forfeit all your possessions." The other said, greatly to the
vain-glorious man's surprise: "I accept the challenge." So, on their
going down to the beach, the Chief of the Upper Current of the River
took a cup and scooped up a little of the sea-water with it, drank a few
drops, and said: "In the sea-water itself there is no harm. It is some
of the rivers flowing into it that are poisonous. Do you, therefore,
first close the mouths of all the rivers both in Aino-land and in Japan,
and prevent them from flowing into the sea, and then I will undertake to
drink the sea dry." Hereupon the Chief of the Mouth of the River felt
ashamed, acknowledged his error, and gave all his treasures to his
rival.
* * * * *
Such an idea as this of first "stopping the rivers" might well have been
conceived independently by different peoples, but surely not by such a
race so low in the scale of humanity as the Ainos, who must have got the
story from the Japanese, who in their turn probably derived it from some
Indian-Buddhist source--perhaps a version of the Book of Sindibád. Of
course, the several European versions and variants have been copied out
of one book into another, and independent invention is out of the
question.