The Crumbs on the Table facts for kids

"The Crumbs on the Table" is a short and interesting fairy tale from Germany. It was collected by the famous Brothers Grimm, who gathered many well-known stories. This tale is number 190 in their big collection of fairy tales.

It is also known by a special code: Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index type 236*. This code helps experts group similar stories from different parts of the world. This particular type is called "Imitating Bird Sounds." This is because, in the original Swiss dialect version of the story, the characters' words sound like chickens clucking!

What is "The Crumbs on the Table"?

This fairy tale is one of many collected by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm. They were two brothers who lived in Germany a long time ago. They traveled around, listening to people tell old folk stories and then wrote them down. This helped save many tales that might have been forgotten. "The Crumbs on the Table" is a very short story, but it still teaches a small lesson.

The Story of the Crumbs

The tale begins with a countryman who sees some crumbs on the table. He calls his little puppies to come inside the house. He wants them to eat the crumbs.

The puppies are a bit scared. They tell the countryman that their mistress (the woman of the house) will be angry and might hit them if they go inside. But the countryman keeps telling them it's okay. He promises them it will be fine and persuades them to come in.

So, the puppies listen to the countryman and go into the parlor to eat the crumbs. Just as they are doing this, the mistress comes back! She sees the puppies eating the crumbs and gets very upset.

As the puppies feared, the mistress starts to hit them. The countryman, who had promised them safety, just laughs at their trouble. Because of this, the poor puppies have to run away quickly to escape the beating.

Who Were the Brothers Grimm?

Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm were two brothers born in Germany in the late 1700s. They were not just storytellers; they were also very smart scholars who studied language and history. They believed that old folk tales were important parts of German culture and history.

The Grimm brothers spent many years traveling and talking to people, especially older women in villages. They listened carefully to the stories these people had heard from their own parents and grandparents. Then, the brothers wrote down these stories exactly as they heard them.

Their most famous book is "Children's and Household Tales," first published in 1812. This book includes many stories you might know, like "Cinderella," "Snow White," "Hansel and Gretel," and "Little Red-Cap" (also known as Little Red Riding Hood). Their work helped make these tales famous all over the world and showed how important folk stories are.

Understanding Fairy Tale Types

When you hear about the "Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index," it might sound complicated, but it's actually a clever way to organize stories. It's like a giant library catalog for fairy tales! Folklorists (people who study folk tales) use this system to classify stories based on their main plot and characters. This helps them see how similar stories appear in different cultures around the world.

"The Crumbs on the Table" is type 236*, which is about "Imitating Bird Sounds." This means that the story has a part where characters make sounds like birds. In the original version of this tale, the puppies' responses to the countryman sounded like chickens clucking. This small detail is what gives the story its special type number in the index.

Lessons from the Tale

Even though "The Crumbs on the Table" is a very short story, it can still make us think. One lesson might be about trusting people. The countryman tricked the puppies into doing something they knew was risky. He promised them it would be safe, but then he laughed when they got into trouble. This shows that it's important to be careful about who you trust, especially when they ask you to do something you're unsure about.

Another idea from the story is about consequences. The puppies faced a consequence (getting beaten) for listening to the countryman and going against their own good judgment. It reminds us that our actions, and the actions of others, can lead to unexpected results.