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Wednesday, May 15, 2013

how the dog made the jackal howl: an angolan folktale

From  a collection of folktales of Angola, in literal translation:  here's why the jackal howls. His relative the Dog left him for tasty people food!
* * *
DOG AND JACKAL.
Jackal used to be in the bush with his kinsman, Dog. Jackal then sends Dog, saying: "Go to the houses, to fetch some fire. When thou comest with it, we will burn the prairie of grass; so as to catch locusts and eat." Dog agreed.
He started; arrived in the village. He enters a house; finds a woman, who is feeding her child (with) mush. Dog sat down; fire, he will not take it. The woman has fed her child; she scrapes the pot. She takes mush; she gives it to Dog. Dog eats; thinks, saying: "Why, I am all the time just dying with hunger in the bush; in the village there is good eating." The Dog settled (there).
Jackal, behind where he stayed, looked for the other, who was sent for fire; he does not appear.
The Jackal, whenever he is howling, people say, "The Jackal is howling, tway!" But no; he is speaking, saying: "I am surprised, I, Jackal of Ngonga; Dog, whom I sent for fire, when he found mush, he was seduced; he stayed for good."
* * *
Heli Chatelain, Folktales of Angola (Published for the American Folk-Lore Society by Houghton Mifflin, 1894), p. 213.

1 comment:

parlance said...

I wonder how closely related dogs and jackals are. Interesting folk tale.