μῦθοι Mythoi
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Filed under Rude retorts.

2 finer motifs beneath it
The burden of two asses. A king and his son hunting on a hot day put their fur coats on the fool's back. King: "You have an ass's load on you." Fool: "Rather the burdens of two asses."Age is relative. Young rival derides old one for his age. Oldster: "An ass of twenty is older than a man of seventy."
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Women call each other prostitutesWhom it concerns. There is someone carrying a goose. How does that concern me? He is carrying it to your house. How does that concern you?Not in his line of business. At market a man enquires of another: "How is the moon, three-quarters or full?" "I don't know. I have neither bought nor sold one."The one exception. "You are a good man; there is not your equal on the earth. You have everything for yourself alone; only your wife is public property."The flatterer's retort. Two men meet a homely girl. One of them: "Who wouldn't call that girl pretty?" The girl overhears and says, "No one would say it of you." The man: "Anyone might say it who would lie as I have lied about you."Ancient and modern ancestors. To a prince who boasted that he was descended from the Trojans a doctor replies: "My people are of Nurenberg. Everyone knows who they are; but of the Trojans no one knows anything except that Aeneas was a traitor and Romulus a robber."No thanks to the messenger. A messenger tells a man that he has a newborn son. "Thanks are to God, but I am not beholden to you for it."Monk says that he is a stallion. In reply to women's taunts he boasts of his powers. A woman calls on the devil to come and ride himToo late for the same advice. Impoverished spendthrift sarcastically to thrifty person: "Stop spending so freely!" "It's too late to give you the same advice."To be rewarded by his kind. Unworthy person is rewarded. Asks worthy one: "Why is it that I am rewarded and you are not?" Answer: "Because you have found more of your kind than I have of mine." (Also told of Dante and a minstrel.)Rude retorts – miscellaneous

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