"Dogs Rescue Master from Tree Refuge," an African folktale with world-wide analogs

Western Folklore, Winter 1998 by Goldberg, Christine

7. The villain is the hero's mother in Bascom's no. 2 (Berber), Dawkins 1953 no. 27 and Argenti and Rose 1949 no. 26 (both Greek). This is a Mediterranean rather than an African detail, and is interchangeable with the preceding detail, the treacherous sister.

The Tree Refuge

In Bascom's material, the hero climbs the tree for either of two reasons. Sometimes he is attempting to pick some fruit or leaves and is then trapped when the ogre waits for him at the foot of the tree. Alternatively, he is already fleeing from the ogre and climbs the tree in order to escape from his reach. Either scenario gets him to the same position. In the Cannibal Sister tales, the hero is always fleeing when he climbs the tree.

The ogre usually tries to chop the tree down, often with an ax. Sometimes the force is still more brutish: the ogre tries to shake, knock down, or uproot the tree (Bascom's nos. 1, 9, 23, 25, 74), or attacks it with its claws, sex organ, thumbnail, or ax-like tail (nos. 15, 17, 38, 51, 67). Quite often, the ogre gnaws at the tree with its teeth (nos. 3, 30, 33, 41, 47, 50, 53, 54, 70, 78, 80, 82, 84, 100). Chiefly in the Caribbean (nos. 87, 88, 90, 92-94, 98, 101, 103, 104, 106, 107, 111), but also in Africa (no. 36, cf. 43), numerous devils come out of the ogre's belly and cut at the tree.

The details of the hero's experience in the tree are many and varied. By adding these details, the narrator can make the escape more exciting and more wonderful. Suspense is added, very simply, by repetition: when one tree succumbs to the destruction of the ogre, the hero climbs over to another and then to another (Bascom nos. 30, 36, 37, 47, 51, 53, 63, 64, 74, 88). Or, when after the tree has been damaged, it grows back strong again (nos. 8, 26, 43, 55, 56, 57, 61, 71, 109, 110, 111). Sometimes the wooden chips return to their former places (nos. 45, 58, 71, 73, 77). Sometimes a bird (nos. 45, 47, 48, 58) or another animal (no. 15 lizard; 38 toad; 110 frogs) strengthens the tree. Or a magic powder or a gourd (which may contain such powder) does this ( nos. 8, 9, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 31,113). Magic incantations (nos. 30, 33) and objects, such as eggs and grain (nos. 67, 68, 83, 93, 94, 97, 104, 105, 107) can help. The trees themselves can grow magically from such objects as seeds and hair (nos. 4, 27, 51, 60, 61, 62-64, 91, 92, 96, 99); in the Americas, from arrows (nos. 74, 84, 88, 107, 112). In Mediterranean tales (Klaar 1987:3949; Argenti and Rose 1949 no. 26; Walker and Uysal 1966 no. 9), the trees sometimes grow from date pits that the hero had dropped earlier in the tale.

Those of us who stay firmly on the ground may be surprised to find how common the action of climbing a tree is in folktales. Characters in tales climb a tree to play tricks, to hide, and, in particular, to escape from an ogre. The following examples illustrate how escapes up a tree to take refuge from an ogre in other folktales are both similar to and different from the escape in *Dogs Rescue Master from Tree Refuge."