Notes on the motif of precocious children

Note: this text is extracted from Book II, chapter 14:

“Thereupon the child, pointing out the reflection of his father in the mirror, said: ‘There is my second father’. When he heard that, Rudraśarman dismissed his suspicions and was immediately reconciled to his wife, whom he had blamed without cause”

“Thus even a child may do mischief if it is annoyed, and therefore we must carefully conciliate all this retinue”.

Tales of precocious children are widely spread both in the East and West. In the Simhāsana-dvātriṃśikā (or Thirty-two Tales of a Throne) the sagacity of a young boy brings a jewel thief and his accomplices to justice. There is one Enfant Terrible story which is found in several Persian and Arabic collections.

It appears as one of the Prince’s stories in the Sindibād Nāma, and relates how a child of three, speaking from its cradle, rebuked an adulterous king about to gratify an unlawful passion, on whom its words made such an impression that the king abandoned his intention and became a paragon of virtue. It appears in Sindban and Syntipas, and also in the Nights (Burton, vol. vi, p. 208), as “The Debauchee and the Three-year-old Child.”

Another famous story of a clever child is that of “The Stolen Purse.” The outline of the story is as follows:—Three (sometimes four) people enter into partnership. They amass money and deposit it with a trusted woman, telling her she is not to give it up unless all partners are present. One day they are all together and one of the men calls in at the old woman’s house ostensibly for a comb (or other articles for the bath) and says: “Give me the purse.” “No,” says the woman; “you are alone.” He explains the others are just outside, and calls out: “She is to give it me, isn’t she?” They (thinking he refers to the comb) say: “Yes.” He gets the purse and escapes out of the town. The others refuse to believe the woman’s explanations and take her to the judge. She is about to lose her case when a child of five, hearing the details, tells her to say to the Kazi that she intends to keep strictly to her original agreement and will give up the purse when all the partners are present. This could certainly not be done as one had run away, and so the woman is saved.

This story with minor differences occurs in Persian, Arabic, Turkish, Hebrew, Greek and Italian collections. It is also found in numerous English jest-books. Burton (Nights, vol. vi, pp. 210, 211) gives a long note on the subject.

Further references should be made to both Clouston and Comparetti’s works on the Book of Sindibād, and also to Chauvin, Bibliographie des Ouvrages Arabes, viii, pp. 62-64.— n.m.p.