Fable Facts

Photo of Greek stamp depicting the Aesop's fable of the The Ass in The Lion's Skin and The Fox courtesy 123rf.com

Today's topic was requested by Isobel Keogh of Perth Scotland, @scots_perth on Twitter.

Fables are short stories that teach a lesson using animals or mythical creatures as the characters in the stories.  Aesop's Fables are arguably the best known fables in the western world, and have been translated into nearly every language.  Fables are found in nearly every culture inside and outside the western world, including Africa, Asia, Sumaria, India, and other countries.

What I didn't know about Aesop, the Ancient Greek writer of the eponymous fables, is that he was born into slavery and later granted freedom, most likely was of African decent, was said to have a speech impediment that was miraculously healed by a deity, was written about by Plato and Aristotle, and many people deny that he was an actual person.

There are many wonderful websites about fables.  Click here for an Aesop's Fables website that includes over 650 fables that are indexed and cross-referenced.  Click here for a website geared toward children that also includes fairy tales and nursery rhymes.

Thanks to Isobel Keogh of Perth Scotland, @scots_perth on Twitter, for today's topic!  What did you learn today?

Mothering Day and Mother's Day

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Mothering Day has been celebrated in England since the early 18th century.  Mother's Day has been celebrated in the United States since the early 20th century.  In England and Scotland special cakes called furmety, carlings, and simnel cake have been made on Mothering Day.  Carnation is the flower most commonly associated with Mother's Day in the U.S.  For more information click here.  What did you learn today?

National Poetry Month!

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I love poetry, and I read a lot and memorize some.  I especially love 18th and 19th century poetry, although there are some 20th century poets I'm passionate about including Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost, and Edna St. Vincent Millay.  One of my favorite books I own is World Poetry:  An Anthology of Verse from Antiquity to Our Time.  So, I was especially happy to learn that April is National Poetry Month in the U.S., and has been so since 1996.  For more information click here.

Two of my favorite poems follow:

Solitude
by Alexander Pope, 1688-1744 (English)

Happy the man, whose wish and care
A few paternal acres bound,
Content to breathe his native air
     In his own ground.

Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread,
Whose flocks supply him with attire;
Whose trees in summer yield him shade,
     In winter, fire.

Blest, who can unconcernedly find
Hours, days, and years slide soft away
In health of body, peace of mind;
     Quiet by day.

Sounds sleep by night; study and ease
Together mixed, sweet recreation,
And innocence, which most does please
     With meditation.

Thus let me live, unseen, unknown;
Thus unlamented let me die,
Steal from the world, and not a stone
     Tell where I lie.

Native Land
From The Lay of the Last Minstrel
by Sir Walter Scott, 1771-1832 (Scottish)

Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land?
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turned
From wandering on a foreign strand?
If such there breathe, go, mark him well;
For him no minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim--
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.

What did you learn today?

Robinson Crusoe in Real Life

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Three hundred and three years ago yesterday, on February 2, 1709, the sailor who was the inspiration for the book, Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe, was rescued from the island of Aguas Buenas off the coast of Chile.  Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk had been stranded for four years alone on that tropical island.  For more information, including how Selkirk might have survived on the island, click here.  I didn't know Robinson Crusoe was based on fact!

History of the Kaleidoscope

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The kaleidoscope was invented in 1816 by Sir David Brewster (1781-1868) of Scotland.  Brewster was a child prodigy, built a telescope at age 10, and entered the University of Edinburgh at age 12 where his primary studies were optics and the physics of light.  For more information click here.

I enjoy and have a few kaleidoscopes.  What do you collect?

Fully Intact Viking Boat Burial Site Discovered in Scotland

"The UK mainland's first fully intact Viking boat burial site has been uncovered in the west Highlands, archaeologists have said.  The site, at Ardnamurchan, is thought to be more than 1,000 years old.   Artefacts buried alongside the Viking in his boat suggest he was a high-ranking warrior.  Archaeologist Dr Hannah Cobb said the 'artefacts and preservation make this one of the most important Norse graves ever excavated in Britain'."  Read more and see pictures at BBC News Highlands and Islands.