Perry's Index to the Aesopica
Fables exist in many versions; here is one version in English:
THE FISHERMAN AND THE OCTOPUS
When a fisherman happened to see an octopus during the winter, he said, 'If
I take off my clothes and jump in after him, I will freeze! But if I do not
catch that octopus, I condemn my children to die of starvation!' |
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 425: Gibbs (Oxford) 545 [English]
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.
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