R. Köhler, “Ueber J. F. Campbell’s Sammlung gälischer Märchen,” No. XVII (d) (in Orient und Occident, 2 [1864] : 303–313); Sir George Cox, “The Migration of Popular Stories” (in Fraser’s Magazine, July, 1880, pp. 96–111); W. A. Clouston, “Popular Tales and Fictions” (London, 1887), 2 : 115–165. See also F. H. Groome, 48–53; McCulloch, 161, note 9; and Campbell’s bibliography. The “Master Thief” cycle has been examined in great detail as to the component elements of the story by Cosquin (2 : 274–281, 364–365). See also Grimm’s notes to the “Master Thief,” No. 192 (2 : 464); and J. G. von Hahn, 2 : 178–183.
F. Max Müller believed that the story of the “Master Thief” had its origin in the Sanscrit droll of “The Brahman and the Goat” (Hitopadesa, IV, 10 = Panchatantra, III, 3), which was brought to Europe through the Arabic translation of the “Hitopadesa.” Further, he did not believe that the “Master Thief” story had anything to do with Herodotus’s account of the theft of Rhampsinitus’s treasure (see Chips from a German Workshop [New York, 1869], 2 : 228). Wilhelm Grimm, however, in his notes to No. 192 of the “Kinder- und Hausmärchen,” says, “The well-known story in Herodotus (ii, 121) … is nearly related to this.” As Sir G. W. Cox remarks (op. cit., p. 98), it is not easy to discern any real affinity either between the Hitopadesa tale and the European traditions of the “Master Thief,” or between the latter and the “Rhampsinitus” story. M. Cosquin seems to see at least one point of contact between the two cycles: “The idea of the episode of the theft of the horse, or at least of the means which the thief uses to steal the horse away … might well have been borrowed from Herodotus’s story … of Rhampsinitus” (Contes de Lorraine, 2 : 277).
A brief analysis of the characteristic incidents of these two “thieving” cycles will be of some assistance, perhaps, in determining whether or not there were originally any definite points of contact between the two. The elements of the “Rhampsinitus” story follow:—
1 A Two sons of king’s late architect plan to rob the royal treasure-house.
2 (A¹ In some variants of the story the robbers are a town thief and a country thief.)
3 A² They gain an entrance by removing a secret stone, a knowledge of which their father had bequeathed them before he died.
4 B The king discovers the theft, and sets a snare for the robbers.
5 C Robbers return; eldest caught inextricably. To prevent discovery, the younger brother cuts off the head of the older, takes it away, and buries it.
6 D The king attempts to find the confederate by exposing the headless corpse on the outer wall of the palace.
7 D¹ The younger thief steals the body by making the guards drunk. He also shaves the right side of the sleeping guards’ beards.
8 E King makes second attempt to discover confederate. He sends his daughter as a common courtesan, hoping that he can find the thief; for she is to require all her lovers to tell the story of their lives before enjoying her favors.
9 E¹ The younger thief visits her and tells his story; when she tries to detain him, however, he escapes by leaving in her hand the hand of a dead man he had taken along with him for just such a contingency.
10 F The king, baffled, now offers to pardon and reward the thief if he will discover himself. The thief gives himself up, and is married to the princess.
In some of the later forms of the story the king makes various other attempts to discover the culprit before acknowledging himself defeated, and is met with more subtle counter-moves on the part of the thief: (D²) King orders that any one found showing sympathy for the corpse as it hangs up shall be arrested; (D³) by the trick of the broken water-jar or milk-jar, the widow of the dead robber is able to mourn him unsuspected. (D⁴) The widow involuntarily wails as the corpse is being dragged through the street past her house; but the thief quickly cuts himself with a knife, and thus explains her cry when the guards come to arrest her. They are satisfied with the explanation. (E²) The king scatters gold-pieces in the street, and gives orders to arrest any one seen picking them up; (E³) the thief, with pitch or wax on the soles of his shoes, walks up and down the road, and, unobserved, gathers in the money. (E⁴) The king turns loose in the city a gold-adorned animal, and orders the arrest of any person seen capturing it. The thief steals it as in D¹, or is observed and his house-door marked. Then as in E⁶. (E⁵) Old woman begging for “hind’s flesh” or “camel-grease” finds his house; but the thief suspects her and kills her; or (E⁶) she gets away, after marking the house-door so that it may be recognized again. But the thief sees the mark, and proceeds to mark similarly all the other doors in the street. (E⁷) The king puts a prohibitive price on meat, thinking that only the thief will be able to buy; but the thief steals a joint.
However many the changes and additions of this sort (king’s move followed by thief’s move) rung in, almost all of the stories dealing with the robbery of the king’s treasury end with the pardon of the thief and his exaltation to high rank in the royal household. In none of the score of versions of the “Rhampsinitus” story cited by Clouston is the thief subjected to any further tests of his prowess after he has been pardoned by the king. We shall return to this point.
The “Master Thief” cycle has much less to do with our stories than has the “Rhampsinitus” cycle: hence we shall merely enumerate the incidents to be found in it. (For bibliography of stories containing these situations, see Cosquin.)
1 A Hero, the youngest of three brothers, becomes a thief. For various reasons (the motives are different in Grimm 192, and Dasent xxxv) he displays his skill:—
2 B¹ Theft of the purse (conducted as a droll: the young apprentice-thief, noodle-like, brings back purse to robber-gang after throwing away the money).
3 B² Theft of cattle being driven to the fair. This trick is usually conducted in one of four ways: (a) two shoes in road; (b) hanging self; (c) bawling in the wood like a strayed ox; (d) exciting peasant’s curiosity—“comedy of comedies,” “wonder of wonders.”
4 B³ Theft of the horse. This is usually accomplished by the disguised thief making the grooms drunk.
5 B⁴ Stealing of a live person and carrying him in a sack to the one who gave the order. (The thief disguises himself as an angel, and promises to conduct his victim to heaven.)
Other instances of the “Master Thief’s” cleverness, not found in Cosquin, are—
1 B⁵ Stealing sheet or coverlet from sleeping person (Grimm, Dasent).
2 B⁶ Stealing roast from spit while whole family is guarding it (Dasent).
We may now examine the members of the “Rhampsinitus” group that contain situations clearly belonging to the “Master Thief” formula. These are as follows:—
1 Groome, No. II, “The Two Thieves,” B² (d), B⁴.
2 F. Liebrecht in a Cyprus story (Jahrb. f. rom. und eng. lit., 13 : 367–374 = Legrand, Contes grecs, p. 205), “The Master Thief,” B²(a, c, d).
3 Wardrop, No. XIV, “The Two Thieves,” B⁴.
4 Radloff, in a Tartar story (IV, p. 193), B⁴.
5 Prym and Socin, in a Syriac story (II, No. 42), B⁴.
It seems very likely that the Georgian, Tartar, and Syriac stories are nearly related to one another. The Roumanian gypsy tale, too, it will be noted,
