<< Home Page | Oxford (Gibbs) Index

Aesop's Fables, translated by Laura Gibbs (2002)

203. THE OLIVE TREE AND THE FIG TREE
Perry 413 (Syntipas 31)

When a fig tree lost all her leaves during the winter, a nearby olive tree made fun of her nakedness. 'In both winter and summer,' the olive tree said, 'I am beautifully adorned with leaves, ever green with new life, whereas your beauty lasts only as long as the summer.' While the olive tree was boasting, a thunderbolt suddenly fell from the sky and burned her to cinders, while the fig tree stood there safe and sound.
The fable shows that people who boast of their wealth or their fortune can meet with unexpected disaster.

Note: In Aphthonius 22, it is a snowstorm that destroys the olive tree: the snow gets caught in its leaves and breaks off the branches.

Source: Aesop's Fables. A new translation by Laura Gibbs. Oxford University Press (World's Classics): Oxford, 2002.
NOTE: New cover, with new ISBN, published in 2008; contents of book unchanged.