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Tracking Anansi (Simeon Falconer, Santa Cruz Mountains)Reading time: 4 minutes. Word Count: 400 words |
Anansi live into a tree with wife and children, then go about and robber the others and they can't find where he live. So Tiger and Bredder Tacoomah dog him and see when he send down the rope and swing up whatever he provide for the family. So Bredder Tiger go to a tin-smith to give him a fine v'ice and went to the tree and him sing,
"Mama, mama, sen' down rope,
Sen' down rope, Brer Nansi deh groun' a!"
Then the mother find out it was not Bredder Nansi from the coarseness of the v'ice. So he go to a gold-smith now, and he come back again and sing again. Now he get a v'ice same as Bredder Nansi.
"Mama, mama, sen' down rope,
Sen' down rope, Brer Nansi deh groun' a!"
Then the mother let the rope down to receive him. Brer Nansi coming from a distance see the mother swinging him up in the tree now and say, "Mama, cut de rope! mama, cut de rope!"
And she cut the rope and Bredder Tiger fell and broke his neck. Bredder Nansi tak him and have him now for him dinner. They couldn't eat Bredder Nansi at all; him was the smartest one of all.
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Source: Jamaica Anansi Stories by Martha Warren Beckwith (1924). Weblink. |
Modern
Languages / Anthropology 3043: Folklore & Mythology.
Laura Gibbs, Ph.D.
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