Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 3 1885.djvu/14

6 This, then, is the broad outline of what is now included under the generic title of folk-lore. It is, however, necessary to consider somewhat in detail the constituent elements of our study under each of the four radical groups into which they seem to divide themselves.

1. Traditional Narratives. These perhaps form the most important item of folk-lore. They are either fairy tales, nursery tales, hero-legends, legends about particular places or objects, ballads, and songs. The so-called fairy tales and nursery stories make up a class which has become generally known as folk-tales, or märchen. The other items may be termed hero-tales and folk-songs, these being the terms most generally adopted by writers on the subject. All three classes—folk-tales, hero-tales, and folk-songs—deal with the marvellous adventures of various personages—human beings, giants, witches, marvellous animals, and the like. The folk-tale, the most archaic in form, treats of its dramatis personæ under what may be termed an impersonal system, that is to say, the various characters are known under some such general title as "a certain" king, queen, princess, or the like, or under some such indefinite name as Cinderella, Snow White, Swan-maidens, &c. In course of time when the folk-tale has become more and more a part of the local life of the people, and less of its old tribal life, these impersonal or general names for the dramatis personæ become in some instances displaced by the special names of ordinary individuals. In some Spanish stories this is so. In Irish stories and more particularly in Scottish stories we meet with specific names applied to the heroes of the tales. It is to be noted, however, that this naming stops short with the hero or heroine, the other characters generally retaining their impersonal character, and that even the names so used are significant of their popular and indefinite signification. Jack and Tom in Irish and English stories do not convey much more personality than "a certain king," "a miller," and so on. Though, therefore, there is this modification of the definition of the folk-tale as impersonal, the definition holds good as a general characteristic of the folk-tale; because the personality attached to an every-day name does not carry with it any historical associations, and does not therefore tend to influence to any sensible degree the form of the folk-tale. This qualification of impersonal is all the better established when we