μῦθοι Mythoi
Motif
Within the index

Filed under Literal obedience.

13 finer motifs beneath it
Feeding the pigs wet meal. The wife throws the meal into the well and the pigs after itPiling up the pottery. The woman breaks the pots into fragments and piles them upFeeding the child. Fool feeds it steaming food and kills itWashing the child. Fool uses boiling water and kills itClearing out the room. Fool throws out all the furnitureWashing the room. Fool floods itOh bother! put it on my head! Numskulls asking old woman where to put grain obey and smother herCutting at the plow. Literal fool told to cut at plow if it sticks on roots cuts at bullock's legs"Sew shirts for servants." Fool sews them to trees"Collect goats under tree." Fool piles up their carcassesFool takes threat to child as an order. Cuts off child's earsPlowing above the tree. Told to plow above a certain tree (on the hillside), numskulls haul oxen and plow into tree and destroy them"Plowing out potatoes." Fool plows them out of ground
Filed beside it
Disastrous following of misunderstood instructions. (To burn land, then sow seed. Opposite done.)What should I have done (said)? The mother teaches the boy (the man his wife) what he should say (do) in this or that circumstance. He uses the words in the most impossible cases and is always punishedFoolish bridegroom follows instructions literallyThe foolish brideThe servant to improve on the master's statements. The wooer makes boasts to the girl and the servant always doubles the master's boast. Finally the master says, "I have poor eyesight." – The servant, "You don't see at all." (Or the master coughs and apologizes; the servant says that he coughs all night.)Literal following of the countInstructions followed literally – miscellaneous

wander