African Folktales at Internet Archive: Lamba Folklore

Finishing up this week of scholarly collections of African folktales, I want to focus on Clement Doke's Lamba Folklore, published in 1927 by the American Folklore Society, and just a click away at the Internet Archive.

This monumental book over 150 traditional Lamba tales, plus riddles and songs. The book includes the Lamba text along with the English translations, which is why the book is very long; almost 600 pages!  You can find out more about the Lamba language at Wikipedia. Lamba is a Bantu language of central Africa, and the Lamba people live in the northern part of Zambia (Rhodesia at the time Doke published this book) and in the southern part of the Congo (which was the Belgian Congo). 

Doke was one of the first scholars to conduct comparative linguistic studies of the Bantu languages, and it is our good fortune that collecting these stories was part of his method. You can find out more about Doke at Wikipedia.

Doke divides the stories he collected into four general categories: animal stories, in which the hare is the main character, although tortoise can rival him in cunning; tales of village life, often centering on the character of the chief; fairy tales about adventurous heroes and heroines; and tales of supernatural characters like ogres. Having the Lamba text side by side with the English allows you to deduce the Lamba names for these different story characters. For example, looking at the titles in the table of contents, you can see that the hare's name is Kalulu.

You can also use the search features at Internet Archive to focus on a specific character or detail that is of interest to you, such as all the mentions of tortoise, paging through the book from one mention of tortoise to the next.

I've also made a list of links by title: The Story of the Steward / The Story of the Youngster Who Slept on the Stirring-stick / The Story of a Man / The Story of the Son-in-law and His Father-in-law / The Story of Mr. Eagle and Mr. Dove / The Story of Mr. Water-lizard and Mr. Vulture / The Story of the Sons of Squeezer and Mr. Water-lizard / The Story of the Humans and the Tadpoles / The Story of Mr. Wisdom-i-have-it and Mr. Wisdom-is-being-told / The Story of the Great Chief That Used to Trouble the People / The Story of Mr. Lion- Child and Mr. Cow-child / The Story of Mr. Genet and the Chiefs / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and the Tightly-bound / The Story of the Youngster of the Navel-string / The Story of the Man and the Honey-guide / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and What Ate Wulambe / The Story of a Poor Man / The Story of the Simpleton and the Cunning Man / The Story of the Youngsters / The Story of Hammer-head / The Story of a Man Who Went to Marry / The Story of the Honey and His Mother-in-law / The Story of Going Through a Hole in the Tree With a Ball / The Choric Story of the Breaker of the River-grass / The Story of the Mother-in-law and the Son-in-law / The Story of Mr. Hornbill and Mr. Tortoise / The Story of Mr. Tortoise and Mr. Owl / The Story of the Animals and the Fruit / The Story of Mr. Duiker and Mr. Tortoise / The Choric Story of the Ogre / The Story of Mr. Lion and Mr. Little- Hare Who Came to Become His Confidential Servant / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and the Guinea-fowl / The Story of the Goblins / The Story of the Goblin and the Human Being / The Story of Mr. Lion and Mr. Little-hare / What Is Witnessed Is the First Thing / What Doesn't Know Munkoyo / The Story of the Man and His Wife / The Story of a Devil / The Story of the Two Men That Travelled Together / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and Mr. Elephant / The Story of the People and the Hyena / The Story of Mr. Duiker and Mr. Tortoise / The Story of the Man and His Wife / The Story of the Man Without Wisdom / The Story of the Chief's Wife and the Child With the Mouse / The Story of the Mwansakala and Fumbe and Panga Mice and All the Galagos and the Fulwe and Matuta Mice / The Story of the Man Who Came to Marry / The Story of the Blind Man (Who Said) That There Would Be a Pit / The Story of Mr. Water-lizard and Mr. Tree-snake / The Story of the Man Who Was Stricken With Hunger / The Story of the Youngsters / The Story of Mr. Wart-hog and Mr. Lion / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and Mr. River-hog / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and Mr. River-hog / Concerning the River-hog That Was a Doctor / The Choric Story of the Lion. / The Story of Mr. Big-black-ant and Mr. Little-black-ant / The Choric Story of the Rhinoceros / The Story of Mr. Little-hare / The Story of the Man Who Was Enslaved / The Story of Mr. Lurie and Mr. Bat / The Story of the Man in the Famine Time / The Story of Mr. Little Hare / The Story of Mr. River-bird and Mr. Cock / The Story of Mr. Cock and Mr. Wild-cat and the Goblins / The Story of the Wakota Bird / The Story of Shichinongomunvima and Chilubwelubwe / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and All the Animals / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and Mr. Big-mad- Hare / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and Mr. Lion and Mr. Tortoise / The Story of How the Children Escaped From the Ogres / The Story of the Man and the Ogre / The Story of the Man, the Lizard, and the Termites / The Story of Mongoose and His Mate With Whom He Was Friends / The Story of Mukana-iwewo / The Story of the Man Who Sought Out Three Servants / The Story of the Chief and His Councillors / The Story of the Man Who Did Not Do Well / The Story of Mr. River-hog and His Fellow River-hog / The Story of the Man Who Had Two Daughters, a Sane One and an Idiot / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and His Little-hare Companion . . / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and Mr. Hyena / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and Mr. Lion and Mr. Hyena / The Story of Mr. Stoat and Mr. Hyena / The Story of Mrs. Fish-eagle and Mrs. Hyena / The Story of the Man Who Went to the Nsenga Country / The Story of Mr. Groin and Mr. Groin-swelling / The Story of the Single-call / The Story of the Man With the Beard and His Son / The Story of the Fowl and the Dog / The Story of Mr. Bush-buck and Mr. Rock-rabbit / The Story of Kantanga and the Ogre / The Story of Mr. Hyena and the Man / The Story of Nkolonkofyo / The Story of the Son-in-law and His Mother-in-law / The Story of Mr. River-hog / The Story of Mr. Thrush and His Mate / The Story of the Man and the Lion / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and His Game-pit / The Story of the Father and His Child / The Story of the Man With the One Eye and His Child / The Story of the Snake and Mr. Frog / The Story of Mr. Spotted-snake and Mr. Frog / The Story of the Father-in-law and His Son-in-law / The Story of Mr. Little- Shrew-mouse and Mr. Great-shrew / The Story of the Man and His Father-in-law / The Story of a Certain Man and His Father-in-law / What a Little Thing Did / The Pygmies / The Story of the Man Who Beat the Drum / The Story of the Man Who Had Bone-meat / The Story of the Man and the Dog / The Story of Mr. Fish-eagle and Mr. Vulture / The Story of Mr. Shrew and Mr. Shiwakota / The Story of Mr. River-hog and the Sausage Tree / The Story of the Man and His Dogs / The Story of God and Mr. Chameleon His Favorite / The Story of the Blind Man and His Five Sons / The Story of the Two People Together / The Story of the Chief and His People; the Coming of Death Into the World / The Story of "a Lie Returns" / The Story of Mr. Night-jar and the Creator / The Story of the Man Who Was Maimed / The Choric Story of the Mound / The Story of the Person Who Gave Birth to Children / The Story of the Person Who Was in the Deserted Village With Her Two Beautiful Daughters / The Story of Mr. Monkey and Mr. Little-hare / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and the Monkeys / The Story of Mr. Hyena and the People / The Story of the Men and the Lion / The Story of the Youngster Who Went to Amass Wealth / The Story of Mr. Wild-dog and Mr. Duiker / The Story of the Man and the Devil / The Story of the People Who Dug a Game-pit / The Story of Mr. Little-genet / The Story of Sandasanda and Iwona / The Story of Mr. Hyena, the Nephew of Mr. Lion / The Story of the Fathers and the Child / The Story of Mr. Frog and Mr. Meckling / The Story of the Great-water-snake and the People / The Story of Mr. Fierceness-of-hunger / The Story of the Monkeys / The Choric Story of Mwewa and Her Brother / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and the Monkey-nuts / The Story of the Hoopoe / The Story of Mr. Ground-hornbill and Mr. Lion / The Story of Splasher / The Story of Trickster / The Story of the Gnome / The Choric Story of Mfuluwende and Kelunge / The Choric Story of Kaluyende / The Story of the Man Who Had Some Dogs / The Story of Mr. Little-hare and the People / The Choric Story of Luwe / The Choric Story of Lunda and Nkonde / The Story of the Blue-monkey and the Fish / Concerning God the Creator / Katala the Pole-joiner.

So, hundreds of pages of Lamba stories await you here, just a click away, thanks to Internet Archive.

Lamba Folklore

by Clement Doke

African Folktales at Internet Archive: Treasury of Basuto Lore

For today's book, I want to feature a collection of South African stories: The Treasury of Basuto Lore by Edouard Jacottet. This book was published in 1908 which means that it is available at any time, not just for digital checkout.

This book is a work of monumental scholarship for its time, with the Sotho text (more about the Sotho language) presented side by side with the English translation.

There are also detailed notes for each story that explain specific linguistic details and which also point to variations on the story published previously in other South African collections like Callaway (more about Callaway's Zulu stories here). 

So, using the resources of the Internet Archive, you can look at these early written records of story performances, and compare them to more recent books that present the legends of South Africa, seeing how the stories both persist but also change over time and from one storyteller to another.

And what about Edouard Jacottet? His life and death are the subject of a recent book, published in 2005, about the mysterious circumstances under which he died in Lesotho in 1920: Murder at Morija: Faith, Mystery, and Tragedy on an African Mission by Tim Couzens. The book is not available at the Internet Archive but there are abundant used copies available at Abe and other online booksellers.

Jacottet's book has also been a source for the authors of children's story books, like Anne Rockwell's When the Drum Sang: An African Folktale, which tells the story of Tselane, a young woman, Tselane, kidnapped by a monster. 

Rockwell also did the illustrations: 

So, Jacottet's book is another example of a work of real scholarly value (the Sotho text plus all those footnotes!), while also providing a story source for children's book authors to work with as well: public domain texts are valuable both for scholars and students around the world, and for aspiring writers too. It is full of marvelous stories about heroes and heroines, magic, animals, all kinds of tales, just a click away at the Internet Archive.

African Folktales at Internet Archive: Tales, Customs, Names, and Dirges of the Tigre Tribe

For today's book, I want to across the continent to eastern Africa, featuring a monumental collection of folktales published in 1915: Tales, Customs, Names, and Dirges of the Tigre Tribes by Enno Littmann. Because this book is in the public domain, it is available at any time, not just for digital checkout.

This is Volume 2 of "The Princeton Expedition to Abyssinia" (which took place in 1905), and it contains 125 folktales translated into English. Many of the stories are animal tales and, beware, Littmann has rendered the Tigray word hashil or "jackal" with the word "fox" as the jackal is playing a role similar to the role played by the clever fox in European folktales. So, if you see a fox, that's really a jackal!

Volume 1, which is also available at Internet Archive, contains the Tigre text of the stories.  

Volume 2 includes some photographs as well, such as these pictures showing how young women wore their hair:

and this photograph of bread-making:

As you can see from the book title, this dates back to when Abyssinia was used for the name of the countries now known as Ethiopia and Eritrea; the English name Abyssinia comes from the Arabic al-Habash. The Tigray region, which is where these stories come from, is in northern Ethiopia, inhabited by the Tirgrayan people who speak the Tigrinya language. You've probably been reading about the Tigray conflict in the news.

So, if you would like to learn something about the Tigrayan people and their traditions, this monumental book of stories is ready for you to read and explore!

Tales, Customs, Names, and Dirges

of the Tigre Tribes

by Enno Littmann

African Folktales at Internet Archive: Tales Tiv Tell

After the Akan-Ashanti folktales of yesterday, I wanted to share another collection of stories from western Africa: Tales Tiv Tell, collected by Harold and Ruth Bergsman, just a click away at Internet Archive.

The Tiv people live in Nigeria and in Cameroon; you can find out more about them at Wikipedia.

The Bergsmans worked with students in Benue State in Nigeria during the 1960s collecting stories in the Tiv language, and the book was created with a Nigerian audience in mind, especially students in Nigerian schools; that's why you'll see reading comprehension questions after each story. There are over 40 stories in the book, plus illustrations by A. Ajayi. As you can see, the book contains both animal stories (including trickster hare!) and also stories about people:

So, enjoy this book written for Nigerian students; we can all learn from and enjoy these stories, just a click away at Internet Archive.

Tales Tiv Tell

collected by 

Harold and Ruth Bergsman

African Folktales at Internet Archive: Akan-Ashanti Folk-Tales

Yesterday I featured two important works of contemporary scholarship from the World Oral Literature Project, and today I want to feature an older, very important collection: Akan-Ashanti Folk-Tales by R. S. Rattray, which contains 75 stories:

This book was published in 1930, so it will be entering the public domain soon, and for now, it's just a click away at the Internet Archive. Some of Rattray's earlier work is in the public domain, such as his collection of Ashanti Proverbs, which I've written about earlier at this blog. You can find out more about Rattray at Wikipedia.

In the introduction to this collection of tales, Rattray is highly critical of earlier tale collections for their amateurish approach: "The most that can be said for such methods is that the results are perhaps better than nothing at all." With this book, Rattray aspires to a close, literal translation of the stories that he heard from old storytellers in remote villages. 

The book has illustrations by members of the Ashanti, Fanti, and Ewe tribes with whom Rattray lived and worked but, sad to say, Rattray did not record the names of the artists. Some of the illustrations are really marvelous, like this one of Half-a-Ball-of-Kenki:

This illustration shows a woman on her way to her village:

Rattray's book has been important source for later book authors: Verna Aardema's books The Sky-God Stories, Anansi Finds a Fool, and Half-a-Ball-of-Kenki  rely on Rattray's book as a source, as does Ashley Bryan's The Adventures of Aku.

The Sky-God Stories

by Verna Aardema

Anansi Finds a Fool

by Verna Aardema

Half-a-Ball-of-Kenki

by Verna Aardema

The Adventures of Aku

by Ashley Bryan

So, you can enjoy Rattray's abundant collection of stories, or look at the books which those stories inspired; they are all available at the Internet Archive.

Akan-Ashanti Folk-Tales

by R. S. Rattray

African Folktales at Internet Archive: The Ibonia Epic from Madagascar

Last week I focused on mostly children's books with beautiful illustrations, and this week I want to shift the focus to important scholarly publications that you can find at the Internet Archive, starting with How to Read a Folktale: The Ibonia Epic from Madagascar by Lee Haring.

The Ibonia epic comes from the island of Madagascar, and this book presents Haring's English translation of the epic along with detailed commentary. 

The story was first recorded in writing in the 1870s, and was told for unknown centuries before being written down. Ibonia is a hero on a rescue mission. using both strength and wisdom to rescue his betrothed. It's a mixture of folktale elements that might remind you of a fairy tale but on an epic scale. You can get a sense of the scope of the hero's adventure from this list of section titles in the book's table of contents: There Is No Child ~ Her Quest for Conception ~ The Locust Becomes a Baby ~ The Baby Chooses a Wife and Refuses Names ~ His Quest for a Birthplace ~ Yet Unnamed ~ Refusing Names from Princes ~ The Name for a Perfected Man ~ Power ~ Stone Man Shakes ~ He Refuses More Names ~ Games ~ He Arms Himself ~ He Is Tested ~ He Combats Beast and Man ~ He Refuses Other Wives ~ The Disguised Flayer ~ An Old Man Becomes Stone Man’s Rival ~ Victory: "Dead, I Do Not Leave You on Earth; Living, I Give You to No Man” ~ Return of the Royal Couple ~ Ibonia Prescribes Laws and Bids Farewell.

This is a book from the World Oral Literature project at Open Books Press which means it is available at anytime, not just for digital checkout, and you can also download it directly from the Open Books website with various free download options.

That World Oral Literature project is also where you can find free downloads of Ruth Finnegan's Oral Literature in Africa which I have written about previously at this blog.

It is also home to Storytelling in Northern Zambia: Theory, Method, Practice and Other Necessary Fictions by Robert Cancel, a book which has not been uploaded to the Internet Archive, but which you can download directly at Open Books. Cancel's book is also accompanied by a series of YouTube videos; for example, here is Tabwa storyteller Stanley Kalumba:

There are other great books at the World Oral Literature project, and you will find Haring's book at Internet Archive, just a click away and available anytime, not just for digital checkout:

How to Read a Folktale:
The Ibonia Epic from Madagascar
by Lee Haring