Turkish fairy tales and folk tales

Synopsis

THESE stories were collected from the mouths of the Turkish peasantry by the Hungarian savant Dr. Ignatius Kunos, during his travels through Anatolia,  and published for the first time in 1889 by the well-known Hungarian Literary Society, “A Kisfaludy Társaság,” under the Title of Török Népmések (“Turkish Folk Tales”), with an introduction by Professor Vámbery. That distinguished Orientalist, certainly the greatest living authority on the primitive culture of the Turko-Tartaric peoples, who is as familiar with Uzbeg epics and Uiguric didactics as with the poetical masterpieces of Western Europe, is enthusiastic in his praises of these folk-tales.

He compares the treasures of Turkish folk-lore to precious stones lying neglected in the byways of philology for want of gleaners to gather them in, and he warns the student of ethnology that when once the threatened railroad actually invades the classic land of Anatolia, these naively poetical myths and legends will, infallibly, be the first victims of Western civilization.

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