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[mebwalker]

John Edwin Noble, 1876-1941 (Photo credit: Bridgeman Images)

(Photo credit: Bridgeman Images)

This post is a continuation of recent posts featuring bells.  It also belongs to a series on Fables and other works featuring animals.

Sources and Classification

the Perry Index 163

Aesop

Aesop (620 and 560 BCE) was a Greek story teller who told Fables. It could be that he also wrote the fables he told, but these appear to have been transmitted orally from generation to generation. They therefore belong to an oral tradition as is the case with fairy tales. It has been claimed Aesop was a “Levantin,” i.e. from the Middle East,[1]that he was a freed slave, that he was forced to jump to his death or pushed down a cliff, but the truth is that we do not know whether or not there ever lived an Aesop.

Biographies

The Life of Aesop

Maximus Planudes

Jean de La Fontaine

Yet, we have not only fables by Aesop, but biographies. The main one is by Maximus Planudes (c. 1260 – c. 1305), a Greek monk and scholar who lived in Constantinople, the former Byzantium and current Istanbul (Turkey). Planudes was a compiler of the Greek Anthology, yet also famed for his command of Latin and polished translations of Aesop’s Fables. Planudes published the first annotated collection of Aesop’s fables.

La Fontaine also wrote a short biography of Aesop entitled La Vie d’Ésope, le Phrygien. It prefaces his first volume (recueil) of fables, 6 books, published in 1668.

India and the Middle East

La Fontaine’s second volume shows the influence of fables originating in the Sanskrit Panchatantra by Vishnu Sharma and versions of Abdullah Ibn Al-Muqaffa’s Persian Kalīlah wa Dimnah, fables based on the Panchatantra. There are two renditions of Kalīlah wa Dimnah. All three are linked to one another and to the Panchatantra because the story-teller within the book is Pilpay, Bidpai, or Bidpaï.

Ibn Al-Muqaffa’s Kalīlah wa Dimnah. Ibn Al-Muqaffa (died c. 756-759) was a Muslim Persian scholar;

Kalīleh o Demneh (12th century CE; author not specified) Persian;

Kashefi’s Anvār-e Soheylī, or ‘The Lights of Canopus‘ (15th century) Persian.

Had Jean de La Fontaine (8 July 1621 – 13 April 1695) read Gilbert Gaulmin‘s 1644 Livre des lumières before publishing his first volume of fables, we could suggest direct oriental influence. I am writing “direct” because India and the Middle East are the birthplace of a substantial number of fables and, in particular, Aesopic fables. Gilbert Gaulmin’s Livre des lumières is probably rooted in Kashefi’s ‘The Lights of Canopus.’ Lumières means “lights.”

However, La Fontaine had not read Gaulmin’s Livre des lumières when he wrote his first volume of fables (12 books). “Le Conseil tenu par les rats” (“The Mice in Council”) is included in La Fontaine first of three volumes of fables, called recueils in French, published in 1668, 1678, and shortly before 1695, the year of La Fontaine’s death.

This does not mean that a monk, sitting in his scriptorium, did not create a “Mice in Council,” but the text is missing. There have always been fabulists and not all were retelling a fable. One can still write Aesop’s fables.

Moreover, it has been said that Aesop was a “Levantin,” (see Internet Archive FR)which may also be the case with Babrius (see Babrius [Babrias], Wikipedia). Besides, Aesop is not the first Greek story-teller. Luqman (c. 1100 BCE) wrote a “Goose with the Golden Eggs,” entitled “Une Femme et une Poule.”

Gustave Doré

J. J. Grandville

Auguste Vimar

Gustave Doré J. J. Grandville Auguste Vimar (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

An Oral and a Learned Tradition

Phaedrus 1st century CE (Latin)

Babrius 2nd century CE (Greek)

Flavius Avianus 5th century CE (Latin)

In the absence of a text, Aesop’s Fables have been considered an example of the oral tradition, texts that are transmitted orally from generation to generation. It seems Aesop’s Fables did not enter a “learned” tradition until Latin author Phaedrus, who lived in the 1st century CE, published a book of fables attributed to Aesop (Gutenberg [EB #25512]). So did Greek author Babrius (Gabrias), in the second century CE.

A third early translator of Aesop is Flavius Avianus (400 CE), the author translator of 42 Aesopic fables. However, “The Mice in Council” is not included in Avianus’ translations. Avianus is possibly Macrobius Ambrosius Theodosius, the author of Saturnalia. (See Macrobius, Wikipedia.)

L’Ysopet-Avionnet

After considerable reflection, I looked for a copy of the Ysopet-Avionnet. I found “The Mice in Council” in the Ysopet-Avionnet, a collection of fables that was used as a school text from the Middle Ages until the early part of the 20th century. I had read the Ysopet-Avionnet as a child. It may have been one of my grand-mother’s books. The Ysopet-Avionnet is an Internet Archive publication, p. 191, near the end). In the Ysopet-Avionnet, “The Mice in Council” is entitled “Des Souris qui firent concile contre le chat” (“De muribus concilium facientibus contra catum”). 

However, to my dismay, neither 5th-century Avianus nor 12th-century Anglo-Norman  fabulist Walter of England, Gualterus Anglicus, wrote a “Mice in Council.” Yet, the fables published in the Ysopet-Avionnet are by Walter of England for the most part. Walter of England, who wrote in Anglo-Norman is also known as the “anonymous Neveleti.” The Nevelet we know is the author of a 1610 Mythologia Aesopica of Isaac Nicholas Nevelet, La Fontaine’s main source.[2] 

Laurentius Abstemius’ could be the first translator, had he not published his Hecatomythium in 1495, nearly three centuries after the publication of the Ysopet-Avionnet. (See shanaweb.net, a French site.)

An English Tradition

William Caxton (translator, printer, diplomat) (1484)

Sir Roger L‘Estrange‘s Fables of Aesop and Other Eminent Mythologists (1692) (Abstemius’ Hecatomythium, 1495)

Samuel Croxall (c.1690 – 1752), the author of The Fables of Aesop; with Instructive Applications. Aesop’s Fables 100 Cuts

Laurentius Abstemius‘ Hecatomythium (1495) is the source of Sir Roger L’Estrange‘s Fables of Aesop and Other Eminent Mythologists (1692). A collection of fables by Aesop had been printed and possibly translated by famed English translator and printer William Caxton, in 1484, too early to include Abstemius’ “Mice in Council.” Caxton printed The fables of Aesop, as first printed by William Caxton, in 1484, with those of Avian, Alfonso and Poggio, now again edited and induced. A third English fabulist was Samuel Croxall (c. 1690 – 1752), the author of The Fables of Aesop; with Instructive Applications. Aesop’s Fables 100 Cuts. Croxall was an Anglican churchman. Moralizing would be his chief objective. 

Ysopets and Romulus

the 12th century

Aesop>Ysopet

Romulus>a Romulus

Marie de France

The 12th century is a turning-point and a culmination. In fact, it has been called a Renaissance. In France, collections of fables by Aesop were now called Ysopets or Isopets and became textbooks used in schools. An Ysopet could also be called a Romulus. As well, Reynard the Fox was born in 1148-1149 as Reinardus in the Ysengrimus, a beast epic.

There may have been a fabulist named Romulus, who wrote Latin prose fables now considered a legendary figure. However a Romulus could be a collection of prose fables written in Latin and rooted in Phaedrus. (See Romulus, Wikipedia.) We have several and among these:

The Romulus Ordinarius (Romulus Vulgaris), 83 tales known in a 9th-century text;

The Romulus Roberti;

The Romulus of Vienna;

The Romulus of Nilant, 45 fables, published in 1709 by Johan Frederik Nilant (Jean-Frédéric Nilant).

These were versified by Walter of England (see Gualterus Anglicus), Alexander Neckam (Novus Aesopus), Adémar de Chabannes (c. 989 – 1034; 67 fables), and other translators or fabulists.

French author Marie de France used a Romulus as a source for her collection of 102 fables written in Anglo-Norman. (My copy has 103 fables.) Marie de France is a major author who will be discussed in a later post.

The texts

La Fontaine’s “Le Conseil tenu par les rats” (full text) La Fontaine’s “The Council held by the rats” (full text)

The Mice in Council, Milo Winter

The Mice in Council, Milo Winter

Milo Winter (Photo credit: The Gutenberg Project [EBook #19994])

Belling the Cat

The Mice once called a meeting to decide on a plan to free themselves of their enemy, the Cat. At least they wished to find some way of knowing when she was coming, so they might have time to run away. Indeed, something had to be done, for they lived in such constant fear of her claws that they hardly dared stir from their dens by night or day.

Many plans were discussed, but none of them was thought good enough. At last a very young Mouse got up and said:

“I have a plan that seems very simple, but I know it will be successful. All we have to do is to hang a bell about the Cat’s neck. When we hear the bell ringing we will know immediately that our enemy is coming.”

All the Mice were much surprised that they had not thought of such a plan before. But in the midst of the rejoicing over their good fortune, an old Mouse arose and said:

“I will say that the plan of the young Mouse is very good. But let me ask one question: Who will bell the Cat?”

It is one thing to say that something should be done, but quite a different matter to do it.

Comments

Prudence or foresight is the moral of nearly all Aesopic fables. One has to think. Prudence makes it unrealistic for a mouse to try to hang a bell down a cat’s neck. In La Fontaine’s fable, the solution to the rats’ main peril, being devoured by the cat, a risk, would cause a rat to be devoured, certain death and, therefore, the greater peril. No rat can bell a cat.

In An Argosy of Fables,[3] the translator, Thomas James, has the mice applaud when it occurs to them that they need simply bell the cat. A mouse then gets up and asks the relevant question. Who will bell the cat?

In La Fontaine, we have what he calls a comedy: “[u]ne ample Comédie à cent actes divers.” (“Le bûcheron et Mercure” [V.1].) The cat  is named after Rabelais’ Rodilardus (the Latin form of Rodilard [round and fat]). There is, moreover, a reference to the court. Courtiers waste time. They are mindless.

In English, the “who will Bell the Cat” is idiomatic. It has entered the English language and is now proverbial. Fables are the illustration of a proverb, but in our fable the illustration is returned to a proverb. The illustration or exemplum has considerable strength.

Conclusion

The “Mice in Council” may be difficult to trace and is sometimes confused with the “Cat and Mouse.” However, it was included in the widely-read Ysopet-Avionnet, as well as in Laurentius Abstemius Hecatomythium (1495). So it appears to date back to the 12th century and the 15th century. It is Jean de La Fontaine’s Le Conseil tenu par les rats, Walter Crane left an image and it is part of the Aesop for Children and exquisitely illustrated by Milo Winter [EBook #19994]. It is also featured  in the An Argosy of Fables, 1921, a Wikisource publication where it is traced back to Abstemius. Laura Gibbs has classified it as Aesopic, part of the Aesop for Children, 1919. (See MythFolklore.net.)

It seems to me that Wikipedia’s view of the provenance of “Belling the Cat” is sensible.

“In the classificatory system established for the fables by B. E. Perry, it is numbered 613, which is reserved for Mediaeval attributions outside the Aesopic canon.”

The Mice in Council by Norah Frye

  An Argosy of Fables (Wikisource)

I am listing related articles on a page. I apologize for the delay.

Warm greetings to all of you. ♥ 

Sources and Resources

The Aesop for Children, Project Gutenberg [EBook #19994] EN Laura Gibbs, Latina Bestiaria EN The Fables of Pilpay, Internet Archive EN Les Fables de Pilpay, philosophe indien; ou la Conduite des rois (Google Books) FR The Fables of Phaedrus, Project Gutenberg [EBook #25512] EN Robinson Ellis, The Fables of Phaedrus , Internet Archive EN Ysopet-Avionnet, Internet Archive, p. 191 Latin FR Aesop’s Fables by William Caxton, Internet Archive EN Fables de Loqman le Sage, J. Derembourg, 1850 Internet Archive FR

____________________ [1]  Stated in Les Fables de Pilpay, philosophe indien ou la Conduite des rois FR

[2] La Fontaine’s main source was Swiss fabulist Neveleti’s who used Avianus. Névelet did not write “Belling the Cat” http://www.shanaweb.net/esope/nevelet/les-fables-esope-selon-nevelet.html http://www.shanaweb.net/des-rats-tenant-conseil/ http://www.shanaweb.net/origine-des-fables-de-jean-de-la-fontaine/

[3] Cooper and Bransom, An Argosy of Fables, a Representative Selection from the Fable Literature of every Age and Land (New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company Publishers, 1921).

Aaron Copland plays “The Cat & the Mouse”

Latin Literature, Spy in Vanity Fair

© Micheline Walker 29 July 2015 WordPress

Le Conseil tenu par les rats (Photo credit: Bridgeman Images)

[mebwalker]

  British Library, Sloane MS 278, Folio 53r

“A fox [above] pretends to be dead to deceive two birds into coming close enough to catch.” (fol. 53r) (Photo credit: The Medieval Bestiary) (Aarne-Thompson Classification Index, 56A)[1]

“The lion’s cubs [below] are born dead; after three days the father comes and roars over them, and brings them to life.” (fol. 96v) (Photo credit: The Medieval Bestiary)

Bodleian Library, MS. Douce 308, Folio 96v

In his Preface to Æsop’s Fables, its translator, George Fyler Townsend,[2]  states that  “[t]he introduction [in fables] of the animals or fictitious characters should be marked with an unexceptionable care and attention to their natural attributes, and to the qualities attributed to them by universal popular consent. The Fox should be always cunning, the Hare timid, the Lion bold, the Wolf cruel, the Bull strong, the Horse proud, and the Ass patient.”(Bold characters are mine.)

Bodleian Library, MS. Douce 366, Folio 71v

“A fox [above] runs off with a cock, while a woman carrying a distaff gestures angrily.” (fol. 71v) (Photo credit: The Medieval Bestiary)

The Lore on Animals

The Fox as the Devil, etc.

Townsend’s statement reflects an anthropomorphic vision of animals (humans in disguise), as in George Orwell‘s 1945 Animal Farm). In fables and in beast epics, such as Le Roman de Renart, animals are anthropomorphic. But Townsend’s comment also reflects a will to stereotype animals and transform them into allegorical creatures. In Medieval Bestiaries, they are symbols. The same can be said of the characters  featured in the Roman de la Rose. Medieval writers were fond of allegories, hence the questionable, but poetical qualities bestowed on medieval beasts. These animals are symbols. The Lion is God and the Lamb, Jesus Christ. Only a virgin can catch the legendary or mythical Unicorn. (See Unicorn, Wikipedia – the free encyclopedia). The Beaver[3] eats its own testicles to avoid being caught by hunters. As for the fox, it is not only devious, but the devil himself:

“The fox represents the devil, who pretends to be dead to those who retain their worldly ways, and only reveals himself when he has them in his jaws. To those with perfect faith, the devil is truly dead.” (See David Badke or The Medieval Bestiary [bestiary.ca].)

British Library, Harley MS 4751, Folio 9r

“Hunted [above] for its testicles, it castrates itself to escape from the hunter.” (fol. 9r) (Photo credit: The Medieval Bestiary)

Exceptions to the lore, but…

There are exceptions to the lore. The Dog is a very loyal animal. It can sniff out nearly anything or anyone. It remains, however, that the Dog does not let go of the prey it holds for the prey it might catch. In other words, the fanciful and the fantastic suffuse Medieval Bestiaries, such as the Aberdeen Bestiary or the Ashmole Bestiary (or Bestiaries). The same is true of several extraordinary medieval beasts and animal tales, not to mention qualities attributed to stones, vegetation, and most aspects of nature. The merveilleux FR, characterizes more than a thousand years, of “natural histories.” It is often called le merveilleux chrétien, a Christian magical realism (the fantastic).

Writers of Medieval Bestiaries used natural histories such as Claudius Alienus‘ (170 CE – 235 CE) On the Nature of Animals (17 books) as their “academic” reference. Yet, these works wore rooted in earlier texts, such as Herodotus‘ Histories and Pliny the Elder‘s (c. 23 CE –  24 or 25 August 79 CE) Historia Naturalis.[4]  However, as we have seen, the preferred source of writers of Medieval Bestiaries was the anonymous Physiologus, which cannot be considered “scientific.” (Manuscript shelf)

The Naming of Reinardus/Renart

This depiction of animals seems all the more anthropomorphic when the animal is given a name. In the Ysengrimus, the Fox is called Reinardus, the name it keeps. It is called Renart in the Roman de Renart, and Renard, the current spelling, in La Fontaine. The Fox is all too human. Professor Jan M. Ziolkowski[5] writes that animals featured in the Roman de Renart are

so highly individualized that they have names, like human beings.

This comment reminds me of T. S. Eliot‘s “The Naming of Cats,” Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats (1939). “The Naming of Cats” was a source for Andrew Lloyd Webber‘s   immensely successful musical entitled Cats (1981). (See Cats, Wikipedia – the free encyclopedia.)

Reinardus and Renart

The naming of the Roman de Renart‘s animal cast begins with the Ysengrimus (1148-1149), the birthplace of Reinardus (Latin), who becomes Renart beginning in 1274-1275, when the first “branches” of the Roman de Renart, written in “Roman,” the vernacular, were published. In short, animals in the Medieval Bestiary are seldom presented with animal attributes, except in illuminations (enluminures FR) and illustrations. In other words, beasts inhabiting the Medieval Bestiary are stereotypes, or archetypes. Deviousness is the Fox’s main attribute, but it is a literary attribute, by “universal popular consent.”

Intertextualité

Medieval Beast literature is and excellent example of intertextuality EN, a term coined by Julia Kristeva in 1966. Intertextuality is a theory according to which texts are rooted in an earlier text or earlier texts. One could also use the word palimpsest.

The Fox

a trickster (archetype and symbol)

an animal that covets grapes

“The Fox and the Cat” or « Le Chat et le Renard » (La Fontaine IX.14), Perry Index 605 & ATU 105

“The Fox and Grapes” or « Le Renard et les Raisins » (La Fontaine III.11), Perry Index 15

how the bear lost its tail ATU motif 2

  Let’s look at the Fox, the most famous animal in European literature. In the Reynard the Fox cycle, a European beast epic, the fox is the trickster extraordinaire. He is also a trickster in most Æsopic fables, but there are exceptions.

Exceptions

In “The Fox and Cat” (Perry Index 605; ATU 105) and “The Fox and Grapes,” La Fontaine’s fox is not a trickster. When a pack of dogs run towards the Fox and the Cat, the Cat climbs up a tree, but our poor Fox has nowhere to go. In this fable, the image of the fox is not consistent with that of the trickster extraordinaire.

As for the “Fox and Grapes,” despite his formidable engin, ingenuity, the Fox cannot reach the grapes and would feel humiliated if it did not decide that the grapes were sour. Here, the Fox regains what it has lost. Ironically, it rehabilitates itself. (See “The Fox and Grapes,” Wikipedia – the free encyclopedia.) Moreover, one “fabulous” Fox loses its tail: « Le Renard ayant la queue coupée » (“The Fox with his Tail Cut Off”) (La Fontaine V.5). How the Bear lost its tail is ATU motif 2.

—ooo—

Generally speaking, the European Fox is the trickster, an archetypal figure, but playing tricks is not a “natural attribute” of Foxes (See Townsend). Matters change when the Fox finds its way into Joel Chandler Harris‘ Uncle Remus, where the rabbit outfoxes Br’er Fox. Any animal could be given a function, such as the function of “trickster.”“

Yet, I have just used the verb “to outfox,” a verb that is probably derived from the tricks the Fox plays in most of its appearances in Æsopic fables, the 12th–century Ysengrimus, and in the Reynard the Fox narratives that followed the Ysengrimus, where the fox is named Reinardus. To “outfox” is now embedded in the English language, as is the term “sour grapes.” The Fox has survived. We have Goethe’s Reineke Fuchs (1793) and other Reynards. In fact, an anti-semitic Reynard was created. (See Reynard the Fox, Wikipedia – the free encyclopedia; scroll down).

Bodleian Library, MS. Ashmole 1511, Folio 21r

British Library, Royal MS 12 C. xix, Folio 6r

“Bear cubs are born as shapeless lumps of flesh, so their mother has to lick them into their proper shape.” (fol. 21r) (Photo credit: The Medieval Bestiary)

“The lion is the king of beasts.” (fol. 6r) (Photo credit: The Medieval Bestiary)

Bodleian Library, MS. Bodley 764, Folio 22v

“Bear cubs are born as formless lumps of flesh; here [above] the mother is licking the cub into shape.” (fol. 22v) (Photo credit: The Medieval Bestiary)

British Library, Harley MS 4751, Folio 15r

“A mother bear [above] licks her cub into shape.” (Photo credit: The Medieval Bestiary)

Bibliothèque Nationale de France, fr. 1951, Folio 18r

“‘le lyon [above] qui fait revivre ses lyonciaus’ – The lion revives its dead cubs. In the Bestiaire d’amour the man says that in the same way the woman can revive him from his love-death.” (fol. 18r) (Photo credit: BnF)

The Fox: “Licking into Shape”

natural histories

licking into shape (Pliny the Elder)

  Pliny the Elder

In fables and the Reynard the Fox cycle, Renart’s main fictitious characteristic is his devious nature, an attribute bestowed upon him by humans and which he possesses every where, in fables, beast epics, medieval bestiaries, and in “natural histories,” by “universal popular consent.”

Licking into Shape

Pliny the Elder, however, does not mention deviousness with respect to the fox. What Pliny reveals is the birth of incomplete offspring that have to be licked into shape. I have yet to find an image of the Fox licking its offspring into shape, but Bears and Lions also lick their incomplete progeny into shape. (See Fox, in the Medieval Bestiary.) Although this characteristic, i.e. licking into shape, was noted by Pliny the Elder’s Naturalis Historia, or Natural History (published c. 77– 79 CE), it may have entered animal lore long before Pliny was born.

Beasts override Genre[6]

However, if we peruse the lore of the fox, not only does it lick its little ones into shape, but it lurks near grapes. According to Bartholomeus Anglicus (13th century), “[f]oxes lurk and hide themselves under vine leaves, and gnaw covetously and fret the grapes of the vineyard,” which the fox does in “The Fox and Grapes,” an Æsopic fable. This is an instance of “beasts overriding genre,” and, in our particular case, of beast overriding a fable and the Medieval Bestiary. In the Perry Index,“The Fox and Grapes” is Perry Index number 15. (See Fox, Medieval Bestiary)

I have not found an image of the Fox licking unfinished foxes into shape, but I have found images of the lion licking its cubs into shape and breathing life into foxes born dead.

Le Roman de Renart, Renart et Tiécelin le corbeau, br.II, Bibliothèque nationale de France

The Fox Playing Dead to Obtain Food

Renart et les anguilles (br. III)

Æsop’s “The Dog and the Fox Who Played Dead” (ATU 56A)

British Library Arundel MS 292

Laurentius Abstemius 146 

  Animal “lore” also presents a second image of the Fox. In “The Crow and Fox” (« Le Renard et le Corbeau, » (La Fontaine I.3) the fox flatters the crow into singing, chantage: blackmail, which causes the crow to open its beak and drop its dinner. But the literary fox also plays dead to catch food, which is yet another manifestation of the fox’s deceptive literary “nature.” The theft of fish is motif number 1 in the Aarne-Thompson-Üther classification system.

Previously, Isidore of Seville (7th century CE) had written about foxes that they were “deceptive animals.” As for Bartholomeus Anglicus (13th century), he had described the fox as “a false beast and deceiving” that “makes believe it is dead in order to catch food.” (ATU 105)

The fox also plays dead in Laura Gibbs’ Bestiaria Latina:

Æsop’s “The Dog and the Fox Who Played Dead,” (ATU 5A) and in

Abstemius, p. 146, the pseudonym of Lorenzo Bevilaqua.

On Abstemius

Abstemius is the author of the Hecatomythium (A Hundred Fables). Abstemius’ real name was Lorenzo Bevilaqua.  He was a professor of literature at Urbino in the 15th century. He published the Hecatomythium, (A Hundred Fables) in 1495, followed by 97 fables, the content of his 1499 Hecatomythium Secundum, published in Venice in 1499. Hecatomythium is a Greek word, but Abstemius wrote in Latin. (See Laurentius Abstemius, Wikipedia – the free Encyclopedia.)

The Fox is also featured in the

Middle English British Library Arundel MS 292, a 13th-century English bestiary.

Conclusion

Several Natural Histories were written in Greco-Roman Antiquity, going back to Herodotus‘ Histories. Herodotus described the crocodile, the hippopotamus and phoenix. Many Natural Histories were also published in the early Middle Ages.

However, animals dwelling in 1) fables in 2) beast epics, such as the Reynard the Fox cycle; 3) in Medieval Bestiaries; 4) and in natural histories are not zoological creatures, but the denizens of literature. They possess qualities attributed to them “by universal popular consent,” which, in the Middle Ages, may have been the consent of Christian “naturalists,” some of whom were monks and scribes.

The fox, the devil himself was a beloved rascal. Besides, we owe fox “lore” at least two English expressions: to “lick into shape” and “sour grapes.”

I apologize for my tardiness (Cronic Fatigue Syndrome) and send all of you my kindest regards.

RELATED ARTICLES

Dogs, a long time ago… (12 September 2014)

The Dog that dropped the Substance for the Shadow (10 September 2014)

Aesop & La Fontaine Online…  (8 September 2014) list

Aesop’s “The Boy Bathing” (5 September 2014)

La Fontaine’s the “Fox and Grapes” (20 September 2013)

Another Motif: The Tail-Fisher (29 April 2013)

Another Motif: Playing Dead (20 April 2013)

Reynard the Fox, the Itinerant (24 October 2011)

Sources and Resources

Aarne-Thompson-Üther classification system (motif index)

Perry Index: index of Æsop’s Fables

Le Roman de Renart (Renart et les anguilles [Renart and the eels]) (br. III; ATU 1)

Mythologia Æsopica (mythfolklore.net)

Bestiaria Latina (Laura Gibbs)

The Bern Physiologus Codex Bongarsianus 318

The Medieval Bestiary (http://bestiary.ca) (David Badke)

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[1] The Aarne-Thomson classification system (motif index) was modified by Hans Jorge Üther, hence the initials ATU.

[2] George Fyler Townsend, Æsop’s Fables, Project Gutenberg [EBook #21]. Third paragraph.

[3] Æsop’s fables have been indexed by Ben Edwin Perry (1892–1968). “The Beaver” is Perry Index 118.

[4]  Pliny the Elder died in the eruption of Vesuvius.

[5] Jan M. Ziolkowski, Talking Animals: Medieval Latin Beast Poetry, 750 – 1150 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993), p. 3.

[6] Ziolkowski, op. cit.,  p. 1

  Museum Meermanno, MMW, 10 B 25, Folio 13v

© Micheline Walker

September 25, 2014

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http://wp.me/p1htO9-bxT   “A fox  pretends to be dead to deceive two birds into coming close enough to catch.” (fol.