Village Folk-tales of Ceylon (Sri Lanka), vol. 1-3

by Henry Parker | 1910 | 406,533 words

This folk-tale entitled “the royal prince and the carpenter’s son” is gathered from oral sources sources, tracing its origin to ancient Ceylon (Sri Lanka). These tales are often found to contain similarities from stories from Buddhism and Hinduism. This is the story nr. 80 from the collection “stories of the cultivating caste”.

Story 80 - The Royal Prince And The Carpenter’s Son

IN a certain country there were a King and a Queen. In the same city there were a Carpenter and his wife. There was a Prince of the King’s. There was a son of the Carpenter’s.

They sent these two near a teacher to learn letters and sciences. After a number of years, one day, in order to look at this Prince's learning, the King, having gone near the teacher who teaches the sciences, and made inquiry regarding the Prince’s lessons, [ascertained that] the King’s Prince was not able to [understand] any science; the Carpenter's son was conversant (nipuna) with all sciences.

Thereupon the King, having become grieved, went to the palace, and said to the Queen,

“Thy Prince is a decided miserable fool.[1] Because of it, I must behead the Prince,”

the King settled.

Then the Queen said to the Prince,

“As you have not got any learning he has settled to behead you. Because of it, leave this city, and go somewhere or other.”

Having said [this], and, unknown to the King, tied up and given the Prince a package of cooked rice, and given him a horse and a sword and a thousand masuran, she sent him on his journey.

This Prince and the Carpenter’s son were very great confidential friends. Because of it, the Prince, having said that he must go [after] having spoken to his friend, went near his friend, and said,

“ Our father, because I am unable to [understand] letters and sciences, has settled to behead me. Because of it, I am going to another country.”

Thereupon the Carpenter’s son said,

“If you, Sir, are leaving this city and going away, I also must go to the place where you are going.”

Having said [this], the Carpenter’s son set out to go with the Prince.

Then the Prince said,

“As for me, blame having fallen on me from the King, I am going; there is no reason at all for you to go.”

That word the Carpenter’s son would not hear. Both of them having mounted on the horse, entered the jungle, and began to go away.

At the time when they had gone a number of gawuwas (each of four miles), it became night; and having gone upon a high rock, and eaten the packet of cooked rice that was brought, at the time when the two persons were talking the Prince saw that a great light had fallen somewhat far away. Having said,

“Friend, get up and look what is that light,”

when that one arose and looked, a great Nagaya, having ejected a stone, is eating food.

The Prince said,

“How is the way to take the stone ?”

The Carpenter’s son said,

“You go, and, taking the stone, come back running, without having looked back. The Cobra will come running; then I will cut it down.”

The Prince said,

“I cannot; you go and bring it.”

Thereafter, the Carpenter’s son having gone, at the time when he was coming back [after] taking the stone, the Cobra came after him, crying and crying out. The Prince, taking [the stone] and having waited, cut it down. Instantly, both of them having mounted on the back of the horse, began to run off.

Having gone very far, after they halted they looked at the stone. On the stone was written,

“There is a well in this jungle. When one has held the stone to the well, the water will dry up. Having descended into the well, when one has looked there will be a palace; there will also be a Princess in the palace. If there should be a person who has obtained this stone, it is he himself whom this Princess will marry.”

[This] was written upon the stone.

Thereafter, after it became light, these two persons began to seek the well. At the time when they were seeking and looking for it they met with the well. When they held the stone to the well the water dried up. Both of them having descended into the well, when they looked about, they met with the palace also; the Princess, too, was there.

Thereupon the royal Prince said to the Carpenter’s son,

“Owing to your good luck we met with this gem-treasure[2] and the Princess. Because of that, let the Princess be for you.”

The Carpenter’s son said to the Prince,

“You, Sir, are a great fool. You are my royal Prince; it is not right to say this word to me.”

Thereafter, having married the Princess to the Prince, and united the two persons, and set that Naga gem in a ring, and put it on the Prince’s finger, he said,

“On the Princess’s asking for this ring on any day whatever,[3] don’t give it. Women are never to be trusted.”

Having taught the Prince [this], having said,

“In any difficulty whatever, remember me,”

the Carpenter's son, plunging into the water, came to the surface of the ground, and went [back] to their city.

While this Prince and Princess were [there], one day she begged and got the ring that was on the Prince’s hand, in order to look at it. When she begged and looked at it, this Princess saw that these matters were written in Nagara letters.

On the following day, begging the ring from the Prince, and having gone noiselessly, when she held it out to the well the water dried up. Thereupon, the Princess, having mounted upon the well mouth, and stayed looking about, came again to the palace. In that manner, several times begging for the ring she stayed on the well mouth, and came back.

One day, at the time when the Vaedda who goes hunting for the King of that city was going walking [in the forest], the Vaedda, having heard that this Princess sitting on the mouth of the well is singing, went and peeped, and remained looking at her. Thereafter he went and told the King of that city,

“In such and such a jungle there is a well. Sitting on the well mouth, a Princess was singing and singing songs. Having stayed there, she jumped into the well. When I went and looked there is only water. The beauty of her figure is indeed like the sun and moon. In this city there is not a woman of that kind.”

Thereupon the King having become much pleased, on the following day the Vaedda, and the King, and the Minister, the whole three persons, went to look at the Princess. Having gone, at the time when they were hidden the Princess came that day also, and sitting on the well-mouth sang songs. Thereupon the King, taking the sword, went running to seize the Princess. As soon as the Princess saw them she jumped into the well. The King having gone near the well, when he looked there is only water. The Princess was not to be seen.

Thereafter, the King, having been astonished, came to the city. Having come, he gave public notice by beat of tomtoms that if there should be a person who brought and gave him the Princess who is in the well in such and such a jungle, he will give him goods [amounting] to a tusk-elephant’s load, and a half share from the kingdom. [This] he made public by the notification tom-toms.

At the time when they were going in the street beating the notification tom-toms, a widow woman stopped the notification tom-toms, and asked,

“What is it ?”

The notification tom-tom beater said,

“The King said that to a person who brought and gave him the Princess who is in the well in such and such a jungle, he will give these goods, and a share from the kingdom.”

Thereupon the widow woman said [to the King],

“I can.[4] Having constructed a watch-hut near the well in that jungle, you must give it to me,”

she said. The King very speedily sent men, and built a watch-hut, and gave it.

This old woman went [there], and at the time when she was in the watch-hut, the Princess came, and sitting down upon the well mouth, sang songs.

Thereupon the widow woman, drawing together the folds of her rags, breaking [loose] her hair and letting it hang down, placing her hand to her head, weeping and weeping, crying and crying out, came to the place where the Princess is.

The Princess asked, " What, mother, are you weeping and weeping for ?”

“Ane ! Daughter, there is a male child of mine. The child does not give me to eat, and does not give me to wear. Having beaten me he drove me away, to go to any place I like.”

Then the Princess said,

“I will give you to eat and to wear. There is not anyone with me.”

Calling this old woman she went to her palace. The Prince also having become pleased, amply provided for the old woman.

Very many times calling this old woman, [the Princess] having gone to the well-mouth, and stayed [there] singing songs, returned.

One day this old woman, taking a piece of stone in her hand, unknown (himin) to the Princess, asked at the hand of the Princess,

“Ane ! Daughter, how does the water dry up in this well ? How does it fill ?”

The Princess said,

“Mother, there is a stone in my hand. By its power the water dries up, and fills it.”

[Saying],

“Ane ! Daughter, where is it ? Please let me, too, look at it,”

she begged for and got the stone. Having been looking and looking at it a little time, she dropped that piece of stone which was in her hand, for the Princess to hear. This gem-treasure the woman hid.

[The Princess] having said,

“Appoyi! Mother, you dropped the stone !”

the two persons, striking and striking themselves, began to cry, saying and saying,

“For us, in the midst of this forest, from whom will there be a protection from everything (saw-saranak) ?”

At the time when they were weeping and weeping, having said,

“It is becoming night,”

the old woman said to the Princess,

“Now then, daughter, for us two to remain thus, a fine place (hari taenak) is this forest wilderness ! There will be elephants, bears, leopards. Because of that, let us go. There is my house; having gone [there], early to-morrow morning let us come again here.”

Having said [this], deceiving the Princess, they went away.

The old woman with dishonest secrecy having sent word to the King, the King came, and calling the Princess went [with her] to the palace.

Thereafter, the King published by beat of tom-toms that he has brought the Princess who stayed on the well mouth. He made public that on such and such a day he will marry this Princess.

Thereupon the Princess said,

“In that manner I cannot contract marriage. My two parents have told me that the Prince [I am to marry] and I, both of us, having rowed a Wooden Peacock machine[5] in the sky, and having come back, after that must contract marriage, they have ordered.”

This word the Princess said as the Princess knows that the first friend of the Prince’s, that is, the Carpenter’s son, can construct the Wooden Peacock machine.

Thereafter, the King of this city employed the notification tom-tom,

“Who can construct the Wooden Peacock machine ? If there should be a person who can, speedily come summoning him near the King.”

At the time when they were beating the notification tomtom, that Carpenter's son, having caused the notification tom-tom to halt, said,

“I can construct the Wooden Peacock machine.”

Thereupon, summoning the Carpenter’s son, they went to the royal house.

The King ordered that he should receive from the palace many presents. The King commanded that having quickly constructed the Wooden Peacock machine, and also prepared a person to row it, he should bring it.

Thereafter, the Carpenter’s son, ascertaining about the Princess who stayed at the well, quickly having set off, went near the well in the jungle, and diving into the water, and having gone to the palace, when he looked, the Prince having become stupefied through want of sleep,[6] had fallen down unconscious.

Thereupon the Carpenter’s son, having spoken to the Prince, said,

“Didn't I tell you, Sir,

‘Don’t give the ring into the hand of the Princess,’

ascertaining that this danger will happen ? But,”

he said to the Prince,

“don’t you at any time become unhappy.[7] I will again bring the Princess near this palace, and give her to you.”

Saying,

“Please remain in happiness,”

the Carpenter’s son returned to the city, and began to construct the Wooden Peacock machine.

While constructing it, he made inquiry how this widow woman was, [and learnt that] a male child of this widow woman’s was lost while very young (lit., from his small days).

One day, in the night the Carpenter’s son, tying up a bundle of clothes and a packet of cooked rice, went, just as it was becoming night,[8] to the house at which is the widow woman. Having gone [there] he spoke:

“Mother, mother !”

Thereupon the woman quickly having arisen and come, asked,

“Where, son, where were you for so many days ?”

Thereupon the Carpenter’s son said,

“Ane! Mother, having tramped through many countries, I have not obtained any means of subsistence. I obtained a few pieces of cloth and a little rice.”

Saying “Here,” he gave them into the hand of that woman.

“What are these for, son ? Look; I have received from the King much goods, and a part of the kingdom,” she said to the Carpenter’s son.

The old woman thought he was her own son. Having allowed him to press her eyes while she is lying down, the old woman said,

“Son, I have still got something.”

Having said,

“Ane ! Mother, where is it ? Please let me look at it,”

begging for it, when he looked [it was] that gem-treasure.

Thereafter, having given it [back] into the hand of the old woman, and waited until the time when the woman goes to sleep, stealing that stone the Carpenter’s son came away. Then, constructing the Wooden Peacock machine, he went near the King.

Having gone, he said,

“Except myself no one else can row this.”

At that time, the King and the Princess, both of them, having mounted on the Wooden Peacock machine [after] putting on the royal ornaments, these three persons rowed [aloft in] the Wooden Peacock machine.

Having rowed very high above the sea, and stopped the Wooden Peacock machine, the Carpenter’s son, taking the sword in his hand, asked the King whence the King obtained this Princess. Thereupon the King said that a widow woman of this city brought and gave him the Princess who stayed at a well in the midst of the forest.

Then the Carpenter’s son said,

Why do you desire others’ wives ? How much [mental] fire will there be for this Princess’s husband! What His Highness (tuma) did is a great fault.”

Having said this, he cut down the King and dropped him into the sea, and, taking the Princess, rowed near that well in the jungle. Having gone [down the well] to the palace, and caused that Prince to put on these royal ornaments, the Prince, and the Princess, and the Carpenter’s son, the whole three persons, having gone on the Wooden Peacock machine to the city, and said that the King and the Princess had contracted the marriage, that day with great festivity ate the [wedding] feast; but any person of the city was unaware of this abduction[9] [of the King] which he effected.

Thereafter, this Prince and Princess having been saluted[10] by that widow woman, having tried her judicially they subjected her to the thirty-two tortures and beheaded her, and hung her at the four gate-ways, it is said.

The Carpenter's son became the Prince’s Prime Minister. The Prince exercised the sovereignty with the ten [royal] virtues, it is said.

North-western Province.

 

Note:

The ten royal virtues are: Almsgiving, keeping religious precepts, liberality, uprightness, compassion, addiction to religious austerities, even temper, tenderness, patience, and peacefulness (Clough).

Regarding the flying wooden Peacock, see also the next story and No. 198 in vol. iii. In Cinq Cents Contes et Apologues (Cha-vannes), vol. ii, p. 378, there is also an account of a similar flying-machine called a Peacock, on which a young man, accompanied by the maker, first went to marry a girl, and afterwards, against the advice of its maker, flew aloft to show the people his own skill. He did not know how to make it return, and at last the cords broke, it fell in the sea, and he was drowned.

In Folklore of the Santal Parganas (collected by Rev. Dr. Bodding), pp. 378, 380, etc., there are several accounts of houses under the water; these were the residences of Bongas or deities.

In The Indian Antiquary, vol. i, p. 115, Mr. G. H. Damant gave a Bengal story in which a King’s son descends into a well, and finds there a Princess in a house, imprisoned by Rakshasas.

In Folk-Tales of Bengal (L. Behari Day), p. 17 ff., a Prince and a Minister’s son who was his bosom friend, while on their travels obtained a Cobra’s jewel, and by means of it saw a palace under the water of a tank. They dived down to it, found a Princess who had been imprisoned there by the Cobra, which had died on losing its magic jewel, and the Prince married her by exchanging garlands of flowers. After the Minister’s son left them in order to prepare for their return, the Princess, while the Prince was asleep, by means of the magic jewel ascended to the surface of [the water, and sat on the bathing steps. On the third occasion when she did this, a Raja’s son saw and fell in love with her. As soon as she observed him she descended to her palace, and the young man went home apparently mad. The Raja offered hjs daughter’s hand and half his kingdom to anyone who could cure his son. An old woman who had seen the Princess offered to do it, and a hut was built for her on the embankment of the tank. When the Princess came to the bank the woman ofiered to help her to bathe, secured the jewel, and the Princess was captured. When the Minister’s son returned on a day previously arranged, he heard that the Princess was to be married in two days. He personated the widow’s son, who was absent, and was well received by the widow, who handed him the magic jewel. He saw the Princess, managed to escape with her, and they joined the Prince.

In The Kathakoga (Tawney), p. 91, a serpent Prince saved a Queen who had been pushed into a well by her stepmother, and made a palace in the well, in which she lived until she was able to rejoin her husband.

In Folk-Tales of Hindustan (Shaik Chilli), p. 52, a Princess who had been carried off and was about to be married to a Raja’s son, stated (by pre-arrangement with her husband’s party, who had come to rescue her) that it was

“the custom of her family to float round the city in a golden aerial car with the bridegroom and matchmaker,”

The Raja sent men to find a car. Two of her husband’s friends, a goldsmith and a carpenter, now produced such a car. When the Raja, his son. the Princess, and the witch who had abducted her, began to sail above the city in it, at the Princess’s request the car was stopped at a pre-arranged place, the Prince and his four friends sprang into it, took it high in the air, drowned the Raja, his son, and the witch, and returned with the Princess to their own city.

In the Arabian Nights (Lady Burton’s ed., vol. iii, p. 137 fi.) there is an account of a flying ebony horse, which rose or descended when suitable pegs were turned. When it was brought to a Persian King, his son tried it, was carried away like the Prince in the next story, and at last descended on the roof of a palace, where he saw and fell in love with the royal Princess, and returning afterwards, carried her ofi.

In the Tota Kahani (Small), p. 139, a young man made a flying wooden horse, by means of which a merchant’s daughter, who had been abducted by a fairy, was recovered.

In the Katha Sarit Sagara (Tawney), vol. i, p. 57, a young Brahmana who plunged into the Ganges to rescue a woman who appeared to be drowning found a temple of Siva, and a palace in which the girl who was a Daitya (an Asura) lived.

In the same volume, p. 392, there is an account of a flying chariot,

“with a pneumatic contrivance,”

made by a carpenter. A man flew two hundred yojanas (each some eight miles in length) before descending; he then started it afresh and flew another two hundred. On p. 390 wooden automata made by the same carpenter are mentioned; they “moved as if they were alive, but were recognised as lifeless by their want of speech.” A similar automaton is mentioned in Cinq Cents Contes et Apologues (Chavannes), vol. iii, p. 170; it was able to sing and dance. (This work consists of translations from the Chinese Tripitaka ; all appear to have been translated from Indian originals, usually in the early centuries after Christ.)

In The Indian Antiquary, vol. x, p. 232 (Tales of the Panjab, p. 42), in the story of Prince Lionheart, by Mrs. F. A. Steel, his carpenter friend went in search of a Princess who had been carried ofi by a King. He made a flying palankin, and returned in it with her.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

Tindu kalakanni modaya.

[2]:

Manikka-ralne, the jewel of a Cakravarti sovereign or universal monarch. It casts a light for a distance of four miles (Clough).

[3]:

Kaemati dawasaka, on any day you like.

[4]:

So, also, in the Maka Bharaia, it was an old woman who, when others were unable to do it, undertook to bring to Lomapada, King of Anga, the horned son of an ascetic whose presence was declared to be indispensable for causing rains to fall. She effected it by the aid of her pretty daughter, who decoyed him.

[5]:

Dandu monara yantrayak.

[6]:

Ahomat-wela.

[7]:

Kalasan—kalya+ a+ san.

[8]:

Rae-wenda, rae-wenda.

[9]:

Upaharana.

[10]:

According to the text, nawala, bathed, probably intended for namala.

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