African Folktales at Internet Archive: Hausa Folklore, Customs, Proverbs

Following up on Skinner's Hausa translations from yesterday, today I want to feature Hausa Folklore, Customs, Proverbs, etc. by Malam Shaihu, and translated by R. S. Rattray; both Volume 1 and Volume 2 are just a click away at the Internet Archive.

As Rattray explains in his note at the start of Volume 1, the scribes, or malamai, played a crucial role in Hausa culture, so to prepare this book he worked with a malam named Shaihu who wrote out these Hausa stories (sometimes translating into Hausa from Arabic manuscripts), while Rattray then provided the English translation along with a transliteration into the Roman alphabet. Malam Shaihu himself spoke no English. The book itself contains the Hausa text in beautiful Arabic script:

Then Rattray added the Roman transliteration with the English translation below:

In Volume 1, you will find a short history of the Hausa nation, followed by 21 stories that feature human beings as the main characters. Then, in Volume 2, you will find 9 animal stories, plus some accounts of cultural traditions and practices, and finally a section of proverbs, with the Arabic script, transliteration, and translation, just as for the stories:

I've written about Rattray at this blog before, as he is the author of Ashanti Proverbs and Akan-Ashanti Folktales, among other works. You can find out more about his life and career at Wikipedia: Robert Sutherland Rattray. There is even an amusement park named after him, located in Kumasi in Ghana: Rattray Park. Here's a little video about the park:

You cannot just hop over to Rattray Park, but you can find his books just a click away at the Internet Archive:

Hausa Folklore, Customs, Proverbs, etc.
by Malam Shaihu and R. S. Rattray