Tuesday, May 24, 2016

C030. Baer (p. 54). How Mr. Rabbit Succeeded in Raising a Dust

This is Chase030.

Types ATU1060 squeezing the supposed stone
Motifs K0062 squeezing the supposed stone
H0331 suitor contest
Notes

Baer notes: "may possible be related to an Akamba story, collected by Reverend Mbiti. In "The man who had a beautiful daughter" a father sets a suitor test: bring your axe, and climb the stone so that you can peel strings of stone. The young man sets a countertest: take your axe and cut four posts of smoke so that I can tie them together and climb on top of the stone. When the old man replies that he can't do it, the young man tells him he knows smoke cannot be made into posts nor stone into strings." ... "the use of ashes, while serving practically to obscure what he is actually doing, also echoes the Akamba countertask."

Not all versions have girl of choice. Baer notes: "another version from George more closely resembles the initial condition in the Akamba tale: Old Man Fox sets the suitor test, pounding dust from a rock, because his daughter was critical of all the suitors. Rabbit won with dust in his slippers, "just one of his courting tricks" (in Backhus).

Baer also cites Mofokeng's "assertion that in any contest in which bore hare and tortoise are involved, tortoise as the original hero is victorious, is the fact that in this contest Terrapin excuses himself from participating. Her observation of tortoise's victory over hare in African tales is borne out in the Uncle Remuse tales in which both participate" (Chase018 and Chase026).



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