<< Home Page | Perry Index

Perry's Index to the Aesopica

Fables exist in many versions; here is one version in English:

THE CLAY POT AND THE RAIN

Driven by the winds and a heavy build-up of clouds, a great thunderstorm erupted in a downpour of winter rain. The gale let loose its flood, drowning the land with water and drenching the work of a potter that had been placed out in the fields (exposure to warm air begins the process of fixing the softness of the clay, preparing it to be properly baked when it is set in the fire). The storm cloud asked the fragile pot by what name she was called. Heedless of what was going on around her, the pot replied, 'My name is Amphora, and my gently sloping sides were designed by the potter's skilful hand, aided by his swiftly spinning wheel.' The cloud replied, 'So far you have managed to retain that form of yours, but a deluge of rain is about to come down and wash you away.' At that very moment the flood waters violently shattered the pot and she cracked and split into pieces, plunging headlong into the watery stream. Unhappy creature: she claimed to have a lofty name and dared to address the thunderclouds who were able to launch such arrows of rain!
This illustrative fable will serve to warn poor people not to lament their fate when it rests in the hands of the high and the mighty.

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 368: Caxton Avyan 26 [English]
Perry 368: Gibbs (Oxford) 208 [English]
Perry 368: Gibbs (Oxford) 207 [English]
Perry 368: Steinhowel Avyan 26 [Latin, illustrated] Mannheim University Library
Perry 368: Chambry 320 [Greek]
Perry 368: Avianus 41 [Latin]


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.