Three Stories From Folklore

My job is strange.

For World Book Week, I encouraged several of our staff[1] to read out stories rooted in their own heritage to my students. All my colleagues, however, are incredibly busy, so I agreed to source the stories. I am not the kind of librarian to do things by half, so what follows is me rewriting a fresh version several stories from world folklore for my colleagues to read to ensure that they are the correct length, and not stolen (entirely) from Wikipedia, or the Prague tourist board website.

Romany

Cristina married Florin when the sun was shining. They were so happy, and Cristina’s mother was glad to give her to a family who loved her as much as she did, but it had to be admitted that Florin was poor. Still, the couple thought, we can’t wait to have our own family, and share the love we know with our children. A year passed, and then another year, and Cristina was sitting on the steps at the back of her vardo watching the other children, her heart hurting from her unfulfilled wish. She stepped out of the encampment and walked into the forest, alone, seeking to quiet her mind. 

She was kicking a gnarly tree root when the hag found her. Cristina didn’t notice the old woman until she was right next to her, watching. Cristina didn’t know how long the woman had been there, but she answered the question in her eyes by speaking aloud as she kicked. “I’m doing everything right!” she says. “Why can’t I have a family like my friends and cousins?” 

“A baby, is it, that what you want?”  

Cristina met the eyes of this stranger, and all the sadness in her soul poured out into her words and her look. “More than anything in the world,” she said. 

The hag raised an eyebrow. “Enough to use magic?” 

Cristina stopped kicking. 

“Go home,” said the old woman, “and cut open a dudum, a big pumpkin. The biggest you can find! Pour milk into the shell, and drink it in one breath. You will then give birth to a son, and he will be happy and healthy… and rich! 

Cristina laughed a musical laugh. She didn’t care if her baby was a son or a daughter, if he was as rich as a king or as poor as herself, she just wanted a baby. She thanked the lady, no longer seeing her as withered and old but as kind and sympathetic. She smiled kindly as she left the woods and walked back to her vardo, hoping the old lady would be right. 

The old lady, being magic, was of course right, and everything she said came to pass – except that Cristina hadn’t been told she would die. She passed away shortly after the baby’s birth, leaving her beloved Florin to mourn her and raise the baby alone. 

When the boy became a man, at about twelve or thirteen years old, he left his father’s vardo and his whole encampment, determined to seek his fortune. He left everyone behind and waved them goodbye, their caravans rolling on in the dust as he walked on, into the city. This city was prosperous, and young Cristianus (for the boy had been named after his mother) was determined to make his fortune. The beautiful princess of this town wanted to see something brand new, which nobody in the world had done before, and the king was angry with people wasting their time. As such, the people who came to show off to the princess – princes from far-off lands, and rich merchants, and charming actors – found themselves condemned to death by the king after trying to impress the princess. Cristianus had travelled with his family for his whole life – who better to know what has been done before than somebody who has seen everything? 

Cristianus went straight to the throne room. He walked in, head held high when everyone else had theirs bowed, and looked the king straight in the eye. “Excuse me, sir,” he said, “please tell me what you have seen and enjoyed, that I may present something to your taste.” 

The king said nothing, but raised an eyebrow, and the guard to his right seized Cristianus by the shoulders. 

“You will await your turn in the dungeon, young man, like everybody else!” 

Before Cristianus could say anything, he had been carried out of the room. He didn’t struggle, just thought. 

The dungeon was dark, and wet, and still. Cristianus had never seen anything so static, but unlike most visitors to the dungeon he focussed on the world outside: the stars were the same he had slept under his whole life, the trees whispered in the breeze making him feel comfortable, and the river whistled by nearby reminding him of the endless movement of life. He was thankful. 

Suddenly there was a great flash of light in front of the bars of his cell. Cristianus blinked, but the form that appeared in the light did not vanish. It was Matuja, the beautiful faerie queen. He knew she protected the Romany people, and he praised her kindness. 

Matuja gestured to her heart and pulled a box from seemingly nothing with a motion as fluid as dance. A box and a rod, it was, and Cristianus, though confused, said nothing but ‘thank you’. The faerie Matuja told him, “You must pluck some of the long, white hairs from my head, my boy. Fashion this into a musical instrument, and show me, that I can dance.” 

Cristianus laughed, delighted. He knew the rhythms of the dances of his people and had spent many happy hours with his friends and family around the fire with music. Gypsy people play for happiness, to wipe away tears, to build excitement for a festival, to dance at a wedding or to allow a young couple to court. Matuja knew that Gypsy people had music and rhythm for all, and she danced all night to the music Cristianus played as he fashioned his new instrument. Her laughter and tears seemed to imbue the music with something magical beyond words. 

The next day, Cristianus played for the king and the princess, who were as delighted as the faerie queen. They had never seen such versatile music, and the princess, knowing it would bring her joy for many years to come, wanted to marry Cristianus. The king had no objections, and Cristianus came to the palace – though, like the great nomad Tamerlane, he never wanted to sleep in the grand palace, and the night he spent in jail beholding the stars was the only night he ever slept indoors. 

Kade avelas schetra andre lime, as they say – or, this is how the violin came into the world. 

Russian

When Anna’s mother was dying, the girl was so young the adults in her village didn’t think she was old enough to understand what was going on, but a child is never too young to understand fuss and sadness. When she saw how people were treating her mother and how her mother couldn’t get out of bed to be with her, Anna understood that something terrible was happening. Anna’s mother, too, understood that her daughter would have to navigate life without her, and she sent everyone away from her bedside to speak with her daughter alone.  

Anna was told how much her mother loved her, and always would, and how she’d be watching and protecting her from heaven. Then Anna was given an old doll, that had been her mother’s when she was young. “My love is in this doll,” he mother said, “and love is in food, too. When you are alone, feed the doll, and you will have the help of me and all your ancestors who are watching you from heaven.” 

As expected, Anna’s mother died, and Anna grew up close to her father and distant from the other children of the village. She kept the doll and slept next to it every night, imbuing it with love just as her mother had before her. 

Anna’s father was handsome and rich, so naturally other women in the village wouldn’t let him stay single for long. A few years later he married a widow with two children, both daughters, who he hoped would be companions for Anna when he travelled. He travelled often for work, and now Anna was left with her stepmother and sisters. 

Anna’s stepmother was mean, of course. She wanted her daughters to have everything better than Anna – better clothes, better status, better husbands when the time came – so she worked her stepdaughter hard when her father was gone. She took away the girl’s bedroom and made her sleep on the stove and rise early to make breakfast. Anna pinned up her pretty hair under a scarf from protection, washed more regularly than her sisters due to all the dirt she got on her, and she swept and scrubbed and cooked without complaint. Every day she met the other villagers when she went to their shops for her chores. They all liked her quiet, polite demeanour and gave her pretty scraps of ribbon to wear or shared their lunch with her to make the poor girl smile. Her stepmother grew sick of this. She took all of Anna’s nice things away and locked her in the room with only bread for supper. Anna didn’t cry, she just sat up hugging the doll her mother had given her and thinking quietly to herself. She didn’t want her bread crusts she had been given, so she remembered her mother’s words and, smiling to herself, fed the doll. Much to her surprise it grew and grew and grew until it was bigger than her. The doll told her not to worry about her solitude, she could be her own companion. The doll brushed her hair and listened to her troubles and Anna slept happy that night. 

The next day her stepmother grew angry at how refreshed and serene Anna seemed, and in a rage she sent her to work in the fields. With barely any food and no protection from the sun it would surely turn Anna raggedy and ugly next to her daughters. Anna, though, took her doll, and she shared her lunch with it. The doll encouraged her to sit under the shade of a tree and share the lunch of another worker, and it did all of the work for both of them. Anna made daisy crowns and the doll ploughed and planted, and when she got back to her cottage that night laughing and happy her stepmother fumed and plotted. 

The next day, Anna was invited into the sitting room with her stepmother and stepsisters. It was winter, it was dark, and they were sewing. “Anna,” her stepmother called, “you must help us stitch a beautiful garment for Father.” 

“Stepmother I can’t see. I think you and my sisters are pretending to sew, because nobody can sew without a fire or even moonlight.” 

“If you cannot see, child, go outside. We need to have this garment finished before Father comes home tomorrow.” 

“Yes, Anna,” said her sister, with a wicked grin, “You must go outside and sew by moonlight, if you think that is better.” 

The women forced Anna out of the cottage, they pushed her out of the door and laughed at her as she bashed on the door in her nightdress, begging to be let in from the cold Russian night. They continued to laugh as they lit the fire, then every candle in the house, and Anna heard them dancing. They were toasty and warm and she would surely die of the cold. She sighed, and began to walk into town, her socks wet as she trudged through the fresh night’s snow and her breath showed up in front of her face all the way to the village. 

It is well known, however, that you should not dance around candles, and whilst it is not known who caused the accident it was bound to come. Anna’s father arrived home the next day to a pile of ashes, and spurred his horse on to the village. Anna had spent the night at a friend’s house, where she had slept next to the fire as they warmed her feet and gave her a hearty meal. She had told a half-truth, that she had got locked out by accident, and all presumed that the women of her home had been trapped in. All that survived of the wooden home Anna and her father had called home was the tiled kitchen, and Anna’s prized possession, her mother’s doll who had been her companion, was safe on the stove – the one place that ought to have been warm was too cold to burn. 

Anna married, and her and her father moved into her new husband’s family home. Her father brought riches to his kind new family, and his daughter brought her doll and her sweet, kind self, and her quiet confidence that she was able to persevere through even the harshest Russian winter. 

Jewish

The year is 1590, and a large, shapeless, silent silhouette moves through the winding lanes of Prague’s Jewish ghetto in the dark night. It is neither man nor machine. 

Weeks earlier, the Jewish people had run to their Rabbi with a rumour: Rudolf II, Emperor of all the lands for hundreds of miles around, hated Jews, and was going to issue a decree to exile them from all his lands or face death. This had happened so many times before and the people were frightened. 

Rabbi Loew went to the riverbank to think. His people deserved a safe home, and he was going to make it happen. From the clay on the banks of the Vltava River he fashioned a man, and on his forehead he wrote emeṯ – truth. Through the rabbi’s rituals and Hebrew incantations the man rose to something resembling life, and he listened. He said nothing, but he listened. “My people are hungry!” said Rabbi Loew. “Catch some fish and take it to my wife.” He left the Golem there, and went to the temple to thank Yaweh for the miracle He had allowed him to make. 

When he came home from the temple, he saw six women fussing outside of his house. When he saw what they were fussing around, he broke into a run and went to speak to his wife. 

“Tell me, Judah, why a monster comes back every 20 minutes, drops a basket of fish on our doorstep, and will not stop no matter how we beg him? Tell me, are there any fish left in the Vltava?” Rabbi Loew was chastened, and ran to the riverbank to intercept his Golem.  

“Stop!” he shouted. The Golem stopped stock still in his tracks, still bent over the riverbank in a pose that would be painful for a man. Rabbi Loew realised that the Golem obeyed instructions exactly, and he needed to be careful what he told him. After thinking several minutes, Rabbi Loew spoke: 

“Walk slowly to my house, staying in the shadows. Apologise to my wife, then climb up into the attic and sit waiting for me.” The Golem bowed and did exactly as Rabbi Loew asked. 

When the Rabbi got back to his home the second time, exhausted, he went straight to his wife and apologised for not warning her. She was grateful to him for sourcing enough food to feed a whole hungry community, and told him of all the women in town who had come to claim fish for their families. That night the whole ghetto feasted. In the dead of night Rabbi Loew crept upstairs to his attic, thanked the Golem, and wiped the words off his forehead so that he was no longer sentient. He banned everyone from going up into the attic, and hid the Golem under prayer scarves. 

The rumour was not unfounded: the Emperor wanted a land free of Jewish people, even though they lived apart from other citizens and did their best to live peacefully. The people of Prague did not help: they were violent to the Jewish people, and made up evil rumours to help them look bad. “Jewish people drink the blood of children,” they said, “don’t let your kids near the Ghetto.” One man took it further – he told his children to sneak into the Ghetto, hide in the basement of a Jewish family, then told the Christian community of Prague that the Jews had stolen his children to kill. He said they needed to storm the Ghetto to find them. Rabbi Loew’s community was terrified – they knew the children thought it was an elaborate game of hide-and-seek, and if they did not find the children first their part of the city would be burned down in revenge for something they did not do. 

Rabbi Loew ran to his attic. He pulled the prayer scarves off the Golem, and wrote emet – truth – on his forehead in a shaky hand. “Please, find those children!” Rabbi Loew asked, “They will be traumatised if they are responsible for our deaths! You must look in every basement in the city, and if you find the Goyim children sweep them up gently in your arms and carry them home. You must leave them in their own, safe, beds then leave, and come back here to the attic and wait here patiently for me in the quiet. You must stay in the shadows the whole time, and not let the Christians see you.” 

The Jewish community did not stay idle: every family searched for the children in their shops and their attics and their basements, but the children were small and excited and had hidden well. The Christians, too, searched – cruelly, smashing up barrels of food stored for winter and throwing fuel for the fires out into the rain. The communities were close to hating each other, tensions were rising, and the two neighbouring communities of Prague were almost ready to harm one another, when the lying man’s wife came running. 

“They are in our home, fool! They are tucked up in their bed, and you have told them such silly stories that they are talking nonsense. Come and care for your children, fool, instead of starting fights!” 

The people looking for violence had no choice but to leave the Jewish quarter to peace and let the Jewish people pick up their wreckage – afraid, but safe. 

Rabbi Loew crept upstairs to his attic, and quietly thanked the Golem for saving the children and his people as he swept the words off his forehead.  

Only the Rabbi and his successors are allowed in that attic in Prague, and that’s because the Golem is still there. He has had many adventures since, helping his community, but the Rabbis of Prague keep him safe and away from prying eyes in the attic, as all magic belongs. 

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[1] Yes I am a day job haver, no I will not be elaborating

On This Topic:

• Mostly these are stolen from Wikipedia and Myths and Legends podcast, which I do recommend to all my students. Also the city of Prague’s tourist page wrote a full sentence I plagiarised and I’m… maybe sorry? Thank you for helping a busy librarian out, guys.
• We also had a Sino-Australian story and also, of course, Anansi from Ashanti folklore, but I did not have to write those.
• Decolonise! Look inside yourself and realise you have the power to be the change you want to see in the world!

To-Do:

• In an effort to decolonise my own studies I have acquired Zehou Li’s book on Kant from a Marxist-Confucian perspective and am reading that. I think it will be helpful for my work, but also it is very intense (as anything that has so much as touched Kant always is)
• Watch Angels In America – I’m teaching it, and have read it, but there’s no substitute for theatre (pronounced the-AY-tar) in its original form. Luckily I have access to NT Live.
• Write back to all the people who have written me letters and cards.

Today’s Culture:

• I have been too busy to journal!! So my project for the weekend is share my own thoughts & feelings with myself and make something pretty.
• Sitting in my office, working on my PhD and giving tutorials is absolutely a dream life and I want to remind myself how lucky I am to have these Thursdays and appreciate everything that brought me here.
• I’ve been wearing my hair down more often. I don’t know how y’all deal with the rattiness and tangles and it getting in your food. Does it bother you? Do all the compliments just inure you to it?