The resemblance which this North German tale bears to the first part of “All Baba” is striking, and is certainly not merely fortuitous; the fundamental outline of the latter is readily recognisable in the legend of The Dummburg, notwithstanding differences in the details. In both the hero is a poor woodcutter, or faggot-maker; for the band of robbers a monk is substituted in the German legend, and for the “open, sesame” and “shut, sesame,” we have “little door, shut,” and “little door, open.” In both the borrowing of a corn-measure is the cause of the secret being revealed — in the one case, to Kasim, the greedy brother of Ali Baba and in the other, to a miserly old hunks; the fate of the latter and the disappearance of all the treasure are essentially German touches. The subsequent incidents of the tale of Ali Baba, in which the main interest of the narrative is concentrated; — Ali Baba’s carrying off the four quarters of his brother’s body and having them sewed together, the artifices by which the slave-girl checkmates the robber-chief and his followers in their attempts to discover the man who had learned the secret of the treasure-cave — her marking all the doors in the street and her pouring boiling oil on the robbers concealed in the oil-skins in the courtyard; — these incidents seem to have been adapted, or imitated, from some version of the world-wide story of the Robbery of the Royal Treasury, as told by Herodotus, of Rhampsinitus, King of Egypt, in which the hero performs a series of similar exploits to recover the headless body of his brother and at the same time escape detection. Moreover, the conclusion of the tale of Ali Baba, where we are told he lived in comfort and happiness on the wealth concealed in the robbers’ cave, and “in after days he showed the hoard to his sons and his sons’ sons, and taught them how the door could be caused to open and shut” — this is near akin to the beginning of Herodotus’ legend of the treasury: the architect who built it left a stone loose, yet so nicely adjusted that it could not be discovered by any one not in the secret, by removing which he gained access to the royal stores of gold, and having taken what he wanted replaced the stone as before; on his deathbed he revealed the secret to his two sons as a legacy for their future maintenance. The discovery of Ali Baba’s being possessed of much money from some coins adhering to the bottom of the corn-measure is an incident of very frequent occurrence in popular fictions; for instance, in the Icelandic story of the Magic Queen that ground out gold or whatever its possessor desired (Powell and Magnusson’s collection, second series); in the Indian tale of the Six Brothers (Vernieux’s collection) and its Irish analogue “Little Fairly;” in the modern Greek popular tale of the Man with Three Grapes (Le Grand’s French collection), and a host of other tales, both Western and Eastern. The fate of Ali Baba’s rich and avaricious brother, envious of his good luck, finds also many parallels — mutatis mutandis — as in the story of the Magic Queen, already referred to, and the Mongolian tale of the poor man and the Dakinis, the 14th relation of SiddhÝ K·r. Morgiana’s counter-device of marking all the doors in the street, so that her master’s house should not be recognised, often occurs, in different forms: in my work on Popular Tales and Fictions, vol. ii. p, 165, a number of examples are cited. The pretended merchant’s objecting to eat meat cooked with salt, which fortunately aroused Morgiana’s suspicions of his real characterûfor robber and murderer as he was, he would not be “false to his salt’’410 — recalls an anecdote related by D’Herbelot, which may find a place here, in conclusion: The famous robber Yac·b bin Layth, afterwards the founder of a dynasty of Persian monarchs called Soffarides, in one of his expeditions broke into the royal palace and having collected a large quantity of plunder, was on the point of carrying it off when his foot struck against something which made him stumble. Supposing it not to be an article of value, he put it to his mouth, the better to distinguish it. From the taste he found it was a lump of salt, the symbol and pledge of hospitality, on which he was so touched that he retired immediately without carrying away any part of his booty. The next morning the greatest astonishment was caused throughout the palace on the discovery of the valuables packed up and ready for removal. Yacub was arrested and brought before the prince, to whom he gave a faithful account of the whole affair, and by this means so ingratiated himself with his sovereign that he employed him as a man of courage and ability in many arduous enterprises, in which he was so successful as to be raised to the command of the royal troops, whose confidence in and affection for their general induced them on the prince’s death to prefer his interest to that of the heir to the throne, from whence he afterwards spread his extensive conquests.
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Since the foregoing was in type I discovered that I had overlooked another German version, in Grimm, which preserves some features of the Arabian tale omitted in the legend of The Dummburg:
There were two brothers, one rich, the other poor. The poor brother, one day wheeling a barrow through the forest, had just come to a naked looking mountain, when he saw twelve great wild men approaching, and he hid himself in a tree, believing them to be robbers. “Semsi mountain, Semsi mountain, open!” they cried, and the mountain opened, and they went in. Presently they came out, carrying heavy sacks. “Semsi mountain, Semsi mountain, shut thyself!” they cried; and the mountain closed and they went away. The poor man went up then and cried. “Semsi mountain Semsi mountain, open!” the mountain opens, he goes in, finds a cavern full of gold, silver, and jewels, fills his pockets with gold only, and coming out cries, “Semsi mountain, Semsi mountain, shut thyself!” He returns home and lives happily till his gold is exhausted. Then “he went to his brother to borrow a measure that held a bushel, and brought himself some more.” This he does again, and this time the rich brother smears the inside of the bushel with pitch and when he gets it back finds a gold coin sticking to it, so he taxes his poor brother with having treasure and learns the secret. Off he drives, resolved to bring back, not gold, but jewels. He gets in by saying, “Semsi mountain, Semsi mountain, open!” He loads himself with precious stones, but has forgotten the word, and cries only, “Simeli mountain, Simeli mountain, open!” The robbers return and charge him with having twice stolen from them. He vainly protests, “It was not I “ and they cut his head off.
Here the twelve wild men represent the forty robbers, and, as in Ali Baba, it is the hero’s brother who falls a victim to his own cupidity. In the Arabian tale the hero climbs up into a tree when he sees the robbers approach, in The Dummburg he hides himself behind a tree to watch the proceedings of the monk; and in Grimm’s version he hides in a tree. On this last-cited story W. Grimm has the following note: “It is remarkable that this story, which is told in the province of Munster, is told also in the Hartz, about The Dummburg, and closely resembles the Eastern story of ‘The Forty Thieves,’ where even the rock Sesam, which falls open at the words Semsi and Semeli, recalls the name of the mountain in the German saga. This name for a mountain is, according to a document in Pistorius (3, 642), very ancient in Germany. A mountain in Grabfeld is called Similes and in a Swiss song a Simeliberg is again mentioned. This makes us think of the Swiss word ‘Sine!,’ for ‘sinbel,’ round. In Meier, No. 53, we find ‘Open, Simson.’ In Prohle’s ‘Marcher fur die Jugend,’ No. 30, where the story is amplified, it is Simsimseliger Mountain. There is also a Polish story which is very like it.” Dr. Grimm is mistaken in saying that in the Arabian tale the “rock Sesam” falls open at the words Semsi and Semeli: even in his own version, as the brother finds to his cost, the word Simeli does not open the rock. In Ali Baba the word is “Simsim” (Fr. Sesame), a species of grain, which the brother having forgot, he cries out “Barley.” The “Open, Simson” in Meier’s version and the “Semsi” in Grimm’s story are evidently corruptions of “Simsim,” or “Samsam,” and seem to show that the story did not become current in Germany through Galland’s work.
Dr. N. B. Dennys, in his “Folk-Lore of China, and its Affinities with that of the Aryan and Semitic Races,” , cites a legend of the cave Kwang-sio-foo in Kiang-si, which reflects part of the ta
le of Ali Baba: There was in the neighbourhood a poor herdsman named Chang, his sole surviving relative being a grandmother with whom he lived. One day, happening to pass near the cave, he overheard some one using the following words: “Shih mun kai, Kwai Ku hsen shÛng lai,” Stone door, open; Mr. Kwai Ku is coming. Upon this the door of the cave opened and the speaker entered. Having remained there for some time he came out, and saying, “Stone door, close; Mr. Kwai Ku is going,” the door again opened and the visitor departed. Chang’s curiosity was naturally excited, and having several times heard the formula repeated, he waited one day until the genie (for such he was) had taken his departure and essayed to obtain an entrance. To his great delight the door yielded, and having gone inside he found himself in a romantic grotto of immense extent. Nothing however in the shape of treasure met his eye, so having fully explored the place he returned to the door, which shut at his bidding, and went home. Upon telling his grandmother of his adventure she expressed a strong wish to see the wonderful cavern; and thither they accordingly went together the next day. Wandering about in admiration of the scenery, they became separated, and Chang at length, supposing that his grandmother had left, passed out of the door and ordered it to shut. Reaching home, he found to his dismay that she had not yet arrived. She must of course have been locked up in the cave, so back he sped and before long was using the magic sentence to obtain access. But alas! the talisman had failed, and poor Chang fell into an agony of apprehension as he reflected that his grandmother would either be starved to death or killed by the enraged genie. While in this perplexity the genie appeared and asked him what was amiss. Chang frankly told him the truth and implored him to open the door. This the genie refused to do, but told him that his grandmother’s disappearance was a matter of fate. The cave demanded a victim. Had it been a male, every succeeding generation of his family would have seen one of its members arrive at princely rank. In the case of a woman her descendants would in a similar way possess power over demons. Somewhat comforted to know that he was not exactly responsible for his grandmother’s death, Chang returned home and in process of time married. His first son duly became Chang tien shih (Chang, the Master of Heaven), who about A.D. 25 was the first holder of an office which has existed uninterruptedly to the present day.
Richard Francis Burton’s translation: detailed table of contents
Ali Khwajah and the Merchant of Baghdad — .
Precocious Children. — See note at end of the Tale, . — In the (apocryphal) Arabic Gospel of the Saviour’s Infancy is the following passage:
“Now in the month of Adar, Jesus, after the manner of a King, assembled the boys together. They spread their clothes on the ground and he sat down upon them. Then they put on his head a crown made of flowers, and like chamber-servants stood in his presence, on the right and on the left, as if he was a king. And whoever passed by that way was forcibly dragged by the boys, saying, ‘Come hither and adore the king; then go away.’”
A striking parallel to this is found in the beginning of the Mongolian Tales of Ardshi Bordshi — i.e., the celebrated Indian monarch, Rßjß Bhoja, as given in Miss Busk’s “Sagas from the Far East,” .
“Long ages ago there lived a mighty king called Ardshi Bordshi.411 In the neighbourhood of his residence was a hill where the boys who were tending the calves were wont to pass the time by running up and down. But they had also another custom, and it was that whichever of them won the race was king for the day — an ordinary game enough, only that when it was played in this place the Boy-King thus constituted was at once endowed with such extraordinary importance and majesty that everyone was constrained to treat him as a real king. He had not only ministers and dignitaries among his playfellows, who prostrated themselves before him, and fulfilled all his behests, but whoever passed that way could not choose but pay him homage also.”412
This is followed by an analogous story to that of Ah Khwajah and the Merchant of Baghdad, under the title of “The False Friend,” in which a merchant on a trading journey entrusts a friend with a valuable jewel to give to his wife on his return home, and the friend retaining it for his own use suborns two men to bear witness that they saw him deliver it to the merchant’s wife, so the King dismisses the suit. But the Boy-King undertakes to try the case de novo; causes the two witnesses to be confined in separate places, each with a piece of clay which he is required to make into the form of the jewel, and the models are found to be different one from the other, and both from the shape of the jewel as described by the false friend. A similar story occurs in several Indian collections, with a KßzÝ instead of the Boy-King.
A curious instance of precocity is related in the Third Book of the “Masnavi” (see ante ), of which Mr. E. H. Whinfield gives an outline in his admirable and most useful abridgment of that work: The boys wished to obtain a holiday, and the sharpest of them suggested that when the master came into school each boy should condole with him on his alleged sickly appearance. Accordingly, when he entered, one said, “O master, how pale you are looking! and another said, You are looking very ill to-day, and so on. The master at first answered that there was nothing the matter with him, but as one boy after another continued assuring him that he looked very ill, he was at length deluded into imagining that he must really be ill. So he returned to his house, making the boys follow him there, and told his wife that he was not well, bidding her mark how pale he was. His wife assured him he was not looking pale, and offered to convince him by bringing a mirror, but he refused to look at it, and took to his bed. He then ordered the boys to begin their lessons; but they assured him that the noise made his head ache, and he believed them, and dismissed them to their homes, to the annoyance of their mothers.
Another example of juvenile cleverness is found in a Persian collection of anecdotes entitled “Latß’yif At-Taw’ßyif,” by ‘AlÝ ibn Husain Al-Va’iz Al-KßshifÝ: One day N·rshÝrvßn saw in a dream that he was drinking with a frog out of the same cup. When he awoke he told this dream to his vazÝr, but he knew not the interpretation of it. The king grew angry and said, “How long have I maintained thee, that if any difficulty should arise thou mightest unloose the knot of it, and if any matter weighed on my heart thou shouldst lighten it? Now I give thee three days, that thou mayest find out the meaning of this dream, and remove the trouble of my mind; and if, within that space, thou art not successful, I will kill thee.” The vazÝr went from the presence of N·rshÝrvßn confounded and much in trouble. He gathered together all the sages and interpreters of dreams, and told the matter to them, but they were unable to explain it; and the vazÝr resigned his soul to death. But this story was told in the city, and on the third day he heard that there was a mountain, ten farsangs distant from the city, in which was a cave, and in this cave a sage who had chosen the path of seclusion, and lived apart from mankind, and had turned his face to the wall. The vazÝr set out for this place of retirement, saying to himself, “Perhaps he will be able to lay a plaster on my wound, and relieve it from the throbbings of care.” So he mounted his horse, and went to find the sage. At the moment he arrived at the hill a company of boys were playing together. One of them cried out with a loud voice, “The vazÝr is running everywhere in search of an interpreter, and all avails him nothing; now the interpretation of the dream is with me, and the truth of it is clear to me.” When these words reached the ears of the vazÝr he drew in the reins, and calling the boy to him asked him, “What is thy name? He replied, “Buzurjmibr.” The vazÝr said “All the sages and interpreters have failed in loosing the knot of this difficulty — how dost thou, so young in years, pretend to be able to do it? He replied, “All the world is not given to every one.” The vazÝr said, “If thou speakest truth, explain.” Said the boy “Take me to the monarch, that I may there unloose the knot of this difficulty.” The vazÝr said, “If thou shouldst fail, what then will come of it?” The boy replied, “I will give up my own blood to the king, that they may slay me instead of thee.” The vazÝr took the boy with him, retu
rned, and told the whole matter to the king and produced the boy in his presence. The king was very angry, and said, “All the wise men and dream interpreters of the court were unable to satisfy me, and thou bringest me a child, and expectest that he shall loose the knot of the difficulty.” The vazÝr bowed his head. And Buzurjmihr said, “Look not upon his youth, but see whether he is able to expound the mystery or not.” The king then said, “Speak.” He replied, “I cannot speak in this multitude.” So those who were present retired, and the monarch and the youth were left alone. Then said the youth, “A stranger has found entrance into thy seraglio, and is dishonouring thee, along with a girl who is one of thy concubines.” The king was much moved at this interpretation, and looked from one of the wise men to another, and at length said to the boy, “This is a serious matter thou hast asserted; how shall this matter be proceeded in, and in what way fully known?” The boy replied, “Command that every beautiful woman in thy seraglio pass before thee unveiled, that the truth of this matter may be made apparent.” The king ordered them to pass before him as the boy had said, and considered the face of each one attentively. Among them came a young girl extremely beautiful, whom the king much regarded. When she came opposite to him, a shuddering as of palsy, fell upon her, and she shook from head to foot, so that she was hardly able to stand. The king called her to him, and threatening her greatly, bade her speak the truth. She confessed that she loved a handsome slave and had privately introduced him into the seraglio. The king ordered them both to be impaled, and turning to the rewarding of Buzurjmihr, he made him the object of his special bounty.
One Thousand and One Nights Page 1121