Fable of the wise wolf and the nine stupid wolves
The fable of the wise wolf and the nine stupid wolves is a fable from the middle of the 3rd millennium BC. It is preserved on Sumerian cuneiform tablets that were used by scribes for practice, and is one of the first written testimonies of human humor , but also human cunning.
content
The fable tells, briefly and without details, that nine wolves had ten sheep together, which they could not divide fairly. They went to the wise wolf, who suggested the following solution he liked: “You are nine and you get one, make ten. I'm alone and get nine, also makes ten. "
background
It is one of the oldest fables in literature, it is even older than the old Indian collection of pancatantra fables . The title of the fable is not known. The wise wolf is a cunning wolf in one translation and a fox in another.
According to Hans Baumann, this fable was also used as a mathematical teaching text, with which “adding up is practiced in a graceful way”. So it deals with the commutative law of addition (9 + 1 is the same as 1 + 9).
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Bendt Alster: Wisdom of Ancient Sumer , p. 363 and ETCSL: Proverbs: collection 5.x5 .
- ^ A b Hans Baumann: Im Lande Ur , Bertelsmann Jugendbuchverlag, 1968, pp. 104/105.