Mythology and Folklore

There was once a mother Blue Crane who looked after five of her children. One day, while feeding her child in the wetland areas of the Western Cape, a brown hyena approached her. He demanded that the Blue Crane give up one of her children or else he would swim across and take her entire family. The Blue Crane was immensely worried. Here she was, a small and weak mother bird, merely trying to take care of her family. As she sat in her nest pondering of what to do, she came up with an idea. She yelled to the hyena to give her another day to choose which of the five children she would give up. The hyena, knowing that he was guaranteed a meal tomorrow, quickly agreed and head off. Now the Blue Crane was in a conundrum. What could she do to save her children? As she thought, she remembered the favor she had done to the queen of the lands, the Lioness. Just recently Blue Crane had informed Lioness of her son's willingness to explore the lands late at night, a behavior that easily worri...

Like Part A of the South African Tales, Part B is very animal focused. This is not surprising due to the prominence of animals in African stories typically, and it is story type that I have always found interesting to read. While this is a short story, there is a lot to unpack as well as I could add in a potential story retelling. The three animals, Jackal, Dove, and Heron, all play an integral role in the plot of the story. What I found interesting is the common pattern of using three animals or humans in a story and the title. This was seen when I read the Indian tales about the Brahman, Jackal, and Tiger, as well as my previous South African story of the Lion, Jackal and the Man. Perhaps there is some significance to using three titular characters for the stories across cultures. Reading this story, the main lesson taken away is how the heron's neck becomes bent. Most short stores tend to be significant in that have a meaning or explanation of some real world phenomenon. What I...

The South African Folk tales are a collection of short stories that have a heavy focus on animals from Africa, Many of the stories are about elephants, lions, jackals, or even ostriches. In particular I read the story, The Lion, The Jackal, and The Man . The story title reminded me of the story The Brahman, The Tiger, and The Jackal, from the Indian short stories which is why I immediately chose to read this short story. Like the Indian story, this story has a dominant animal, the Indian one being the tiger and the South African story being a lion. Additionally, both stories eventually lead to the fall or defeat of the lion and tiger. Also notable is how the jackal is common to both stories. My research of jackals led me to find that they are commonly located in India and Africa, so it really is not a surprise that they are in both stories. Moreover, I found out that the jackal is a close relative of the coyote and are often depicted as a clever, witty animal in numerous myths and folk...