Year-riddle facts for kids
The year-riddle is a very old and popular type of riddle found all over the world, especially in Europe and Asia. These riddles ask questions about the year, using clever comparisons to everyday things. The oldest known year-riddles come from ancient India, dating back more than 3,000 years!
Scholars have studied how widely these riddles are found. They often use different main ideas, or "metaphors," to describe the year. These ideas usually reflect the culture where the riddle comes from. Famous riddle collectors like Archer Taylor and Stith Thompson have listed many year-riddles in their books.
Contents
How Year-Riddles Work
Most year-riddles use one or more of four main ideas to describe the year:
- Wheels: Like a turning wheel, showing how time moves.
- Trees: Comparing the year to a tree with branches, leaves, or fruit.
- Animals: Often using ideas of families or groups of animals.
- Objects: Describing the year as a building or another man-made item.
Let's look at some examples!
The Tale of Ahikar
One of the oldest stories featuring a year-riddle is the Tale of Ahikar. This story is thousands of years old and comes from the Middle East. In one part of the story, a king asks his wise advisor, Aḥiḳar, to solve a riddle:
"A pillar has on its head twelve cedars; in every cedar there are thirty wheels, and in every wheel two cables, one white and one black."
Aḥiḳar wisely answers: "The pillar is the year. The twelve cedars are the twelve months of the year. The thirty wheels are the thirty days of the month. And the two cables, one white and one black, are the day and the night."
Wheels and Turning Time
Ancient Indian riddles are some of the oldest year-riddles we know. They often use the idea of wheels because the "Wheel of time" was a very important concept in Asian cultures. It showed how time keeps moving in a cycle.
For example, in the ancient Indian text Rigveda (from around 1500-1200 BCE), there's a riddle that goes something like this:
"What has twelve spokes and never gets old? It's a wheel of truth that turns around the sky. It has seven hundred and twenty sons and daughters standing there in pairs."
The answer is the year. The twelve spokes are the months. The wheel is the year itself, always turning. The "sons and daughters" are the days and nights (360 days and 360 nights make 720).
Another riddle from the Rigveda asks:
"The rim has twelve pieces, the wheel is one, the hub has three parts. Who understands this? On it are placed, as it were, 360 pegs that don't wobble."
This riddle also describes the year. The twelve rim pieces are the months. The one wheel is the year. The three hub parts could be the three main seasons. And the 360 pegs are the days of the year.
Later, in the Mahabharata, another famous Indian story, a king asks a similar riddle: "What has six hubs, twelve axles, twenty-four joints, and three hundred and sixty spokes?" This is also the year, with its months, weeks, and days.
Trees and Plants
Many year-riddles compare the year to a tree. This is a very common idea, especially in Europe and Asia. People often saw trees as symbols of the world or life itself.
These "tree" riddles often include some of these parts:
| What it says | What it means |
|---|---|
| A tree | The year |
| Twelve branches | The months |
| Fifty-two flowers or four nests | The weeks or seasons |
| 365 or 366 leaves or seven eggs | The days of the year or week |
| Three or six eggs | Special holidays like Christmas or Easter |
| Twenty-four young birds | The hours |
| Their sixty steps | The minutes |
One example from the early 11th-century Persian epic Shahnameh asks:
"What are the dozen cypresses standing tall and beautiful, each one with thirty branches? In Persia, there are never more or less."
The answer is the twelve months of the year, each with about thirty days.
Another riddle from Persia says:
"What is that good tree, green-veiled? Its branches are twelve in number. If you count wisely, you will find thirty leaves on every branch. The answer is the year."
And an English riddle asks:
"Yonder stands a tree of honor, twelve limbs grow upon her, every limb a different name. It would take a wise man to tell you the same."
Animals and Families
Some year-riddles use animals or human families as their main idea. These are less common in English, but you can find them in other languages.
One ancient Greek riddle, thought to be very old, says:
"There is one father and twelve children. Each of these children has twice thirty daughters of different looks. Some are white to look at, and others are black. They are immortal, but they all fade away."
This riddle means: The father is the year. The twelve children are the months. And the "twice thirty daughters" (sixty) are the days and nights, some white (day) and some black (night), which keep coming and going.
A French riddle from 1811 uses a similar idea:
"We are twelve sisters, daughters of the same father, but not always of the same mother. Each one gives birth to four males, who then produce more than three hundred daughters a day. Those males are born from their females; we are born just as those females are; the male ones form us, we form them, after which we start again."
This riddle describes the year (the father), the months (the twelve sisters), the weeks (the four males), and the days (the daughters). It shows how they all depend on each other in a cycle.
Man-Made Objects
Finally, some year-riddles use objects made by people as their main idea. For example, a modern Greek riddle talks about a barrel made with twelve staves (the wooden strips that make up the barrel).
Another example comes from central Myanmar:
"It is a beautiful house with twelve rooms and thirty people can sleep in each room. There are four doors left open. Have you ever passed through these doors?"
The answer is "A year." The house is the year, the twelve rooms are the months, and the thirty people are the days. The four open doors might refer to the seasons.
