Cumulative tale facts for kids

Cumulative tale This Is the House That Jack Built

In a cumulative tale, sometimes also called a chain tale, action or dialogue repeats and builds up in some way as the tale progresses. With only the sparest of plots, these tales often depend upon repetition and rhythm for their effect, and can require a skilled storyteller to negotiate their tongue-twisting repetitions in performance. The climax is sometimes abrupt and sobering as in "The Gingerbread Man." The device often takes the form of a cumulative song or nursery rhyme. Many cumulative tales feature a series of animals or forces of nature each more powerful than the last.

Classification

In the Aarne-Thompson classification system, types 2000–2100 are all cumulative tales, including:

• Chains Based on Numbers, Objects, Animals, or Names 2000–2020

  How the rich man paid his servant 2010

  The house is burned down 2014

  The goat that would not go home 2015

  Fair Katrinelje and Pif-Paf-Poltrie 2019

• Chains Involving Death 2021–2024

  The cock and the hen 2021

  An Animal Mourns the Death of a Spouse 2022

• Chains Involving Eating 2025–2028

  The Fleeing Pancake 2025

  The fat cat 2027

• Chains Involving Other Events 2029–2075

  The Old Woman and Her Pig 2030

  The Sky Is Falling 2033

  This Is the House That Jack Built 2035

  The Mouse Who Was to Marry the Sun 2031C (Japanese, Indian)

  Pulling up the turnip 2044

  Tales in which animals talk 2075

Other examples of cumulative tales

• "The Death of the Little Hen"
• Why Mosquitoes Buzz in People's Ears
• The Fisherman and His Wife
• The Stonecutter
• Chad Gadya
• Green Eggs and Ham
• Drummer Hoff
• There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly
• I Bought Me a Cat, featured in the 1950 Aaron Copland song set Old American Songs
• The Train to Glasgow by Wilma Horsbrugh [1], later set to music by The Singing Kettle
• And The Green Grass Grew All Around
• Old MacDonald Had a Farm
• A Fly Went By
• Court of King Caractacus - song by Rolf Harris, later recorded by The Singing Kettle
• The Twelve Days of Christmas
• Green Grow the Rushes, O
• Fruit dropping on animal, then animal & fruit in conflict. (New Guinea)