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Tuesday, May 13, 2008
homesubmit tales

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
Harisaman
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 Money-Lender
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 Money-Lender
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

XIX. Raja Rasalu

Source.-Steel-Temple, Wideawake Stories, pp. 247-80, omitting "How Raja Rasalu was Born," "How Raja Rasalu's Friends Forsook Him," "How Raja Rasalu Killed the Giants," and "How Raja Rasalu became a Jogi."

A further version in Temple, Legends of Panjab, vol. i. Chaupur, I should explain, is a game played by two players with eight men, each on a board in the shape of a cross, four men to each cross covered with squares.

The moves of the men are decided by the throws of a long form of dice. The object of the game is to see which of the players can first move all his men into the black centre square of the cross (Temple, l. c., p. 344, and Legends of Panjab, i. 243-5) It is sometimes said to be the origin of chess.

Parallels.-Rev. C. Swynnerton, "Four Legends about Raja Rasalu," in Folk-Lore Journal, p. 158 seq., also in separate book much enlarged, The Adventures of Raja Rasalu, Calcutta, 1884. Curiously enough, the real interest of the story comes after the end of our part of it, for Kokilan, when she grows up, is married to Raja Rasalu, and behaves as sometimes youthful wives behave to elderly husbands. He gives her her lover's heart to eat, a la Decameron, and she dashes herself over the rocks. For the parallels of this part of the legend see my edition of Painter's Palace of Pleasure, tom. i. Tale 39, or, better, the Programm of H. Patzig, Zur Geschichte der Herzmare (Berlin, 1891). Gambling for life occurs in Celtic and other folk-tales; cf. my List of Incidents, s. v. "Gambling for Magic Objects."

Remarks.-Raja Rasalu is possibly a historic personage, according to Capt. Temple, Calcutta Review, 1884, p. 397, flourishing in the eighth or ninth century. There is a place called Sirikap ka-kila in the neighbourhood of Sialkot, the traditional seat of Rasalu on the Indus, not far from Atlock.

Herr Patzig is strongly for the Eastern origin of the romance, and finds its earliest appearance in the West in the Anglo-Norman troubadour, Thomas' Lai Guirun, where it becomes part of the Tristan cycle. There is, so far as I know, no proof of the earliest part of the Rasalu legend (our part) coming to Europe, except the existence of the gambling incidents of the same kind in Celtic and other folk-tales.