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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
‘One of Horace's fables remembered or invented. It is not found elsewhere’ (E. C. Wickham). Not elsewhere in classical literature, certainly. But a story illustrating precisely this absurd ignorance of the natural world is attested later, in circumstances which make it highly unlikely that it derives from Horace's brief reference, and I think we may safely assume that he did not invent the tale.
1 Thompson, Stith, Motif-Index of Folk Literature, iv (Copenhagen, 1957)Google Scholar, J. 1967; cf. Thompson, A. Aarne-Stith, The Types of the Folktale2 (Helsinki, 1961), no. 1273 A.Google Scholar
2 L'Hore di Ricreatione di M. Lodovico Guicciardini patritio Fiorentino (Antwerp, 1583)Google Scholar, i.48 (d).
3 ‘Vn' figliuolo d'vn contadino alleuato in casa letiosamente dalla madre, senza esperienza alcuna, fu mandate vn 'giorno dal padre alla citta con frutte a vendere; costui arriuato a vn' fiumicello, che si guadaua da ognuno a piacere, si fermo aspettando tutto il giorno, che quel' Rio finisse di correre. In fine non ne veggendo alcun' segno, torno a casa pieno disdegno, dolendosi forte della sua fortuna, e di quelle acque, che non fussero mai cessate, e corressero ancora.’
4 Here, as often, the Motif-Index offers an invaluable guide to literature which may throw light on a particular theme, but its prècis corresponds to only one of the items listed. A surprising number of peculiar Herodotean stories have been claimed as ‘widespread folktales’ by scholars who evidently thought it wasted labour to pursue the Motif-Index's far-flung citations.
5 Sicilianische Märchen, aus dem Volksmund gesammelt, i (Leipzig, 1870), 114–18, no. 17.Google Scholar