"The Lion Grown Old" is counted among Aesop's Fables and is numbered 481 in the Perry Index. [1] It is used in illustration of the insults given those who have fallen from power and has a similar moral to the fable of The dogs and the lion's skin. Parallel proverbs of similar meaning were later associated with it.
In the fable as Phaedrus tells it, after the lion had grown old and feeble, a boar and a bull took their revenge for past attacks by injuring him. But when a donkey joins in and kicks him, the lion laments that suffering insult from such a base creature is like a second death. Different animals figure in later accounts. For Marie de France in the 12th century, the bull that gores the lion and the ass that kicks him are joined by a fox that bites at his ears. In her version too, it is not simply that they take advantage of his loss of kingly power but that some of his courtiers have now forgotten past favours. [2] In La Fontaine's 1668 version the attacks come from a horse, a wolf and a bull, as well as the ass, but it ends with exactly the same sentiment as in Phaedrus. [3] La Fontaine's choice of animals is influenced by a tag drawn from Horace, a frequent source for him. Used of the natural instinct of self defence, the Latin Dente lupus, cornu taurus petit (the wolf attacks with his teeth, the bull with his horns, Satires II.1.55) had become proverbial. [4]
The Neo-Latin poem "Leo Senex" by Hieronymus Osius shifted the emphasis to the pain that a formerly powerful human feels now that he cannot protect himself, [5] leaving the cautionary story as no more than a metaphor. William Caxton urged the necessity of humility in his retelling, [6] while tempering tyranny is counselled by other English authors, including Francis Barlow (1667), [7] Roger L'Estrange (1692) [8] and Samuel Croxall (1722). [9]
The English versions of La Fontaine's fable which began to appear from early in the 18th century were also individual interpretations. That in Bernard de Mandeville's Aesop Dress'd (1704) is largely an elegant paraphrase and ends with a clever pun. [10] Charles Denis (Select Fables, 1754) translates the title as "The Old Lion", adds an ape and a fox to the attackers and ends on a new moral, summed up in the line "be good as you are great". [11] The moral stanza added by John Matthews (London 1820) is given a topical twist by being applied to the conduct of politicians and pamphleteers during the madness of King George III. [12] Of Ivan Krylov's two Russian versions of the fable published in 1825, "The Aged Lion" was faithful to La Fontaine's. The second, "The Fox and the Ass", was more of an adaptation: there the Ass boasts of his deed in conversation with a Fox afterwards and the moral drawn at the end is that the most lowly and sycophantic people will be the first to settle scores once the tables are turned.
More modern reinterpretations of La Fontaine's fable have included Ladislas Starevich's film using animated puppets (1932) [13] and several musical settings: by Louis Lacombe as part of his 15 melodies (op. 72, 1875); by Florent Schmitt in his Fables sans morales (Op. 130, 1954); and by Isabelle Aboulker in Les Fables Enchantées (2004). [14] In 1926, Marc Chagall began his series of gouache illustrations of La Fontaine's fables, commissioned by Ambroise Vollard. In that devoted to Le lion devenu vieux, the lion is stretched out at the base, gazing wide-eyed at the viewer while the bull charges, the horse turns its back as it prepares to kick, and the wolf leers at the scene from one side. The colouring is characterised over-all by ochres and browny reds, but toward the top the capering ass is painted blue and lights up the canvas. [15]
The line from Horace inserted by La Fontaine into his Le lion devenu vieux was far from the only Latin proverb associated with the fable. The meaning of two more parallel the fable's moral that those who lose power must suffer from those they had tyrannised previously. One concerns the false valour of tearing the beard of a dead lion (barbam vellere mortuo leoni) that reappears, among other places, as an insult in Shakespeare's play King John (2.i):
The other proverb also concerned the hare, traditionally the most timorous of beasts, and spread to the rest of Europe from an epigram in the suspect version of the Greek Anthology edited by Maximus Planudes. In this the defeated Hector recalls that even a hare will leap on a dead lion [17] in a line that was later imitated by Andrea Alciato in the poem accompanying his emblem on the futility of wrestling with the dead. [18]
The same proverb was later adapted into a fable by Pieter de la Court in his Sinryke Fabulen (Amsterdam, 1685). His version is prefaced by the Latin equivalent, mortuo leone et lepores insultant, and tells how a selection of animals take their revenge on the dead beast, including wolves, bears, foxes and apes. Finally a hare leaps on the corpse and tears at the beard. [19] While this fable retains scarcely a detail from those of Phaedrus or La Fontaine, its dependence on them is unmistakable.
The popularity of La Fontaine's fables gave rise to still more proverbs that alluded to them, most notably in this case, le coup de pied de l'âne. [20] There were even dialect equivalents such as the Picard L'caup d' pied du baudet, which is glossed in the dictionary that records it as a cowardly insult to someone from whom one has nothing to fear. [21] But the fable's title itself eventually came to be used proverbially, for example as the title of a novel by Ernest Feydeau (Paris 1872) and a historical play by Jean Schlumberger (Paris, 1924). Poetically it appeared as a refrain in a ballade by Alexandre Marie, [22] a mourning of lost powers that has more or less the same theme as Starevich's film. Similarly the fallen Baron Haussmann justified himself in the poem Confessions d'un lion devenu vieux (Paris 1888). [23]
Aesop's Fables, or the Aesopica, is a collection of fables credited to Aesop, a slave and storyteller who lived in ancient Greece between 620 and 564 BCE. Of varied and unclear origins, the stories associated with his name have descended to modern times through a number of sources and continue to be reinterpreted in different verbal registers and in popular as well as artistic media.
The Fox and the Grapes is one of Aesop's Fables, numbered 15 in the Perry Index. The narration is concise and subsequent retellings have often been equally so. The story concerns a fox that tries to eat grapes from a vine but cannot reach them. Rather than admit defeat, he states they are undesirable. The expression "sour grapes" originated from this fable.
The Frog and the Ox appears among Aesop's Fables and is numbered 376 in the Perry Index. The story concerns a frog that tries to inflate itself to the size of an ox, but bursts in the attempt. It has usually been applied to socio-economic relations.
The lion's share is an idiomatic expression which now refers to the major share of something. The phrase derives from the plot of a number of fables ascribed to Aesop and is used here as their generic title. There are two main types of story, which exist in several different versions. Other fables exist in the East that feature division of prey in such a way that the divider gains the greater part - or even the whole. In English the phrase used in the sense of nearly all only appeared at the end of the 18th century; the French equivalent, le partage du lion, is recorded from the start of that century, following La Fontaine's version of the fable.
The Frogs Who Desired a King is one of Aesop's Fables and numbered 44 in the Perry Index. Throughout its history, the story has been given a political application.
The Dog and Its Reflection is one of Aesop's Fables and is numbered 133 in the Perry Index. The Greek language original was retold in Latin and in this way was spread across Europe, teaching the lesson to be contented with what one has and not to relinquish substance for shadow. There also exist Indian variants of the story. The morals at the end of the fable have provided both English and French with proverbs and the story has been applied to a variety of social situations.
The Cat and the Mice is a fable attributed to Aesop of which there are several variants. Sometimes a weasel is the predator; the prey can also be rats and chickens.
The Fox and the Crow is one of Aesop's Fables, numbered 124 in the Perry Index. There are early Latin and Greek versions and the fable may even have been portrayed on an ancient Greek vase. The story is used as a warning against listening to flattery.
The Lion, the Bear and the Fox is one of Aesop's Fables that is numbered 147 in the Perry Index. There are similar story types of both eastern and western origin in which two disputants lose the object of their dispute to a third.
The Ass in the Lion's Skin is one of Aesop's Fables, of which there are two distinct versions. There are also several Eastern variants, and the story's interpretation varies accordingly.
The Fox and the Sick Lion is one of Aesop's Fables, well known from Classical times and numbered 142 in the Perry Index. There is also an Indian analogue. Interpretations of the story's meaning have differed widely in the course of two and a half millennia.
The Wolf and the Lamb is a well-known fable of Aesop and is numbered 155 in the Perry Index. There are several variant stories of tyrannical injustice in which a victim is falsely accused and killed despite a reasonable defence.
The Mountain in Labour is one of Aesop's Fables and appears as number 520 in the Perry Index. The story became proverbial in Classical times and was applied to a variety of situations. It refers to speech acts which promise much but deliver little, especially in literary and political contexts. In more modern times the satirical intention behind the fable was given greater emphasis following Jean de la Fontaine's interpretation of it. Illustrations to the text underlined its ironical application particularly and went on to influence cartoons referring to the fable elsewhere in Europe and America.
Jean de La Fontaine collected fables from a wide variety of sources, both Western and Eastern, and adapted them into French free verse. They were issued under the general title of Fables in several volumes from 1668 to 1694 and are considered classics of French literature. Humorous, nuanced and ironical, they were originally aimed at adults but then entered the educational system and were required learning for school children.
The Dog and the Wolf is one of Aesop's Fables, numbered 346 in the Perry Index. It has been popular since antiquity as an object lesson of how freedom should not be exchanged for comfort or financial gain. An alternative fable with the same moral concerning different animals is less well known.
The Man with Two Mistresses is one of Aesop's Fables that deals directly with human foibles. It is numbered 31 in the Perry Index.
Hercules and the Wagoner or Hercules and the Carter is a fable credited to Aesop. It is associated with the proverb "God helps those who help themselves", variations on which are found in other ancient Greek authors.
The situation of the Eagle Wounded by an Arrow vaned with its own feathers is referred to in several ancient Greek sources and is listed as fable 276 in the Perry Index. It is generally applied to the misery of realising that one has contributed to one's own injury but also as a warning against self-reliant pride.
There are no less than six fables concerning an impertinent insect, which is taken in general to refer to the kind of interfering person who makes himself out falsely to share in the enterprise of others or to be of greater importance than he is in reality. Some of these stories are included among Aesop's Fables, while others are of later origin, and from them have been derived idioms in several languages.
The Eagle and the Fox is a fable of friendship betrayed and avenged. Counted as one of Aesop's Fables, it is numbered 1 in the Perry Index. The central situation concerns an eagle that seizes a fox's cubs and bears them off to feed its young. There are then alternative endings to the story, in one of which the fox exacts restitution, while in the other it gains retribution for its injury.
