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Perry's Index to the Aesopica

Fables exist in many versions; here is one version in English:

THE RIVERS AND THE SEA

The rivers came together in order to make a complaint against the sea. They told her, 'Why is it that we come to you with waters that are sweet and fit to drink, but you change them into something salty and undrinkable?' In response to the rivers' criticism, the sea replied, 'Don't come, and you won't get salty!'
This fable depicts people who criticize someone inappropriately even though that person is actually helping them.

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.

 


Perry 412: Gibbs (Oxford) 258 [English]
Perry 412: Townsend 111 [English]
Perry 412: Syntipas 4 [Greek]


You can find a compilation of Perry's index to the Aesopica in the gigantic appendix to his edition of Babrius and Phaedrus for the Loeb Classical Library (Harvard University Press: Cambridge, 1965). This book is an absolute must for anyone interested in the Aesopic fable tradition. Invaluable.