Perry's Index to the Aesopica
Fables exist in many versions; here is one version in English:
THE MOTHER, THE CHILD AND THE CROW
The mother of a small baby consulted a soothsayer who told her that her child
would be killed by a crow. Terrified, the mother ordered that a large chest
be built and she shut her baby inside, protecting him so that no crow could
harm him. She continued in this way, opening the chest at regular intervals
in order to give the baby the food that he needed. Then one day, after she had
opened the chest and was using an iron bar to prop up the lid, the child recklessly
stuck his head out. At that moment, the iron bar -- it was a crow bar -- fell
down on top of the boy's head and killed him. |
Source:
Aesop's Fables. A new translation by Laura
Gibbs.
Oxford University Press (World's Classics): Oxford, 2002.
NOTE: New
cover, with new ISBN, published in 2008; contents of book unchanged.
Perry 162: Gibbs (Oxford) 467 [English]
Perry 162: Chambry 294 [Greek]
You can find a compilation of Perry's index to the Aesopica in the gigantic appendix to his
edition of Babrius and Phaedrus for the Loeb Classical Library
(Harvard University Press: Cambridge, 1965). This book is an absolute must for anyone interested
in the Aesopic fable tradition. Invaluable.
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