Serbian Folk-lore

Serbian Folk-lore

IT is only within the last few years that the importance of folk-lore, the popular legends, tales, drolls, and extravagances which have been handed down from generation to generation among the labourers, peasants and youth of a nation, has been frankly recognised. It is now, however, generally acknowledged that this kind of literature, which more than all other deserves the name of popular, possesses a value beyond any momentary amusement which the tales themselves may afford, and it has assumed an honourable post side by side with other and graver materials, and has obtained a recognised use in deciding the conclusions of the historian and ethnologist. It is fortunate that the utility of these tales and old wives fables should have been thus recognised, otherwise the dull utilitarianism of modern educators would soon have trampled out these fragments of the elder time, and have left to our children no alternative than that of being crammed [Pg 2] with geography and natural history.[1] The collection of Serbian popular tales, now translated into English and here published, is an additional contribution to our knowledge of such literaturethe most venerable secular literature, it may be, which has come down to our times. At the wish of the lady who has selected and translated these tales, I have undertaken to edit them. In doing so I have, however, preserved, as far as possible, the literality of her version, and have limited myself to the addition of a few notes to the text. The tales included in this volume have been selected from two collections of Serbian folk-lore; the greater part from the well-known Srpske narodne pripovijetke, of Vuk Stefanovich Karadjich, published at Vienna, in 1853, and others from the Bosniacke narodne pripovijetke, collected by the Society of Young Bosnia, the first part of which collection was printed at Sissek, in Croatia, in 1870. The collection of Vuk Stefanovich Karadjich was translated into German by his daughter Wilhelmina, and printed at Berlin, in 1854.[2] To this volume, which is dedicated to the Princess Julia, widow of the late Prince Michael Obrenovich III., Jacob Grimm, who suggested to Karadjich the utility of making the original collection, has contributed a short but interesting preface. The collection of Vuk Karadjich was gathered by him from the lips of professional story-tellers, and of [Pg 3] old peasant women in Serbia and the Herzgovina. One of these stories, translated in the present volume, and here called The Wonderful Kiosk, or The Kiosk in the Sky, was however written out and contributed to this collection by Prince Michael, the late and lamented ruler of Serbia, who had heard it, in childhood, from the lips of his nurse. The Bosniac collection was made by young theological students from that countrymembers of the college at Dyakovo, in Croatia. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 45321
Author: Denton, W. (William)
Release Date: Apr 5, 2014
Format: eBook
Language: English

Contributors

Translator: Mijatovich, Elodie Lawton, 1825-1908