Fables are short stories which illustrate a particular moral and teach a lesson. The characters of fables and tales are usually animals who act and talk just like people while retaining their animal traits. One of the important story tellers in history is Aesop.
It is believed that Aesop lived from about 620 to 560 B.C. in Samos, a Greek island in the eastern Aegean Sea. The name of his first owner was Xanthus. It is certain he spent much of his life living in Greece at the court of King Croesus in Athens. The name Aesop is derived from the Greek word Aethiop which means Ethiopia. It is believed that he eventually became a free man. In Aesop's biography--written over a millennium after his death--Planudes describes Aesop an ugly, deformed dwarf, and the famous marble statue at the Villa Albani in Rome depicts Aesop accordingly.
His fables were first printed in English by William Caxton in 1484, from his own translation made from the French. (William Caxton, b. 1415-d. 1492, was the first English printer and with several others created an English standard through his publishing. He printed 108 works, translated many and his choice of the Fables is significant.) Many of Aesop's fables have in fact since been found on Egyptian papyri known to date between 800 and 1000 years before Aesop's time, so he compiled as well as wrote.
It is believed that Aesop lived from about 620 to 560 B.C. in Samos, a Greek island in the eastern Aegean Sea. The name of his first owner was Xanthus. It is certain he spent much of his life living in Greece at the court of King Croesus in Athens. The name Aesop is derived from the Greek word Aethiop which means Ethiopia. It is believed that he eventually became a free man. In Aesop's biography--written over a millennium after his death--Planudes describes Aesop an ugly, deformed dwarf, and the famous marble statue at the Villa Albani in Rome depicts Aesop accordingly.
His fables were first printed in English by William Caxton in 1484, from his own translation made from the French. (William Caxton, b. 1415-d. 1492, was the first English printer and with several others created an English standard through his publishing. He printed 108 works, translated many and his choice of the Fables is significant.) Many of Aesop's fables have in fact since been found on Egyptian papyri known to date between 800 and 1000 years before Aesop's time, so he compiled as well as wrote.
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