Indian Tales - Panchatantra and Hitopadesha

Tales From Panchatantra

Panchatantra, is a collection of five volumes of stories written by a teacher to help instruct the different aspects of kinghood for princes. The five volumes together serve as a manual for a prospective king, to help him in deciding how to rule, how to choose his fellow friends, fellow ministers, how to conduct himself in daily life etc. The collection of stories in Pancha Tantra are a real treat for parents to help them in guiding them towards values in human life. Every story in Pancha Tantra is accompanied by a moral.

The story of Panchatanra itself is an interesting one in that, the intention of writing it was precisely the one mentioned in the previous paragraph, namely, to serve as a manual for a prince to rule as an ideal king. The background story of Panchatantra goes as follows:

Hitopadesha

Is a collection of Sanskrit fables in prose and verse; it is similar to, though distinct from, the Panchatantra.

The Hitopadesa is known to be at least several centuries old. Originally written in Sanskrit, its stories have travelled to several parts of the world.

The work has been translated into most of the major languages of the world. An english translation, rendered by by Sir Edwin Arnold , then Principal of Puna College, Pune, India, was published in London in 1861.

Here we present a series of stories from these volumes.

Story Collection

A Friend in need... A story fom Hitopadesha

The story of the foolish lion and the clever rabbit from The Loss of Friends
The story of the monkey and the crocodile from Loss of Gains
The story of the elephant and the sparrow from the Loss of Friends
The Story of the Blue jackal from The Loss of Friends
The greedy jackal
The heron and the crab
The crows and the serpent
The swan and the owl
The geese and the tortoise
The bird with two necks
The jackal and the drum
The heron, serpent and the mongoose
The mice and the elephants
The cat partridge and the hare
The gold giving serpent
The day dreaming priest
The mongoose and the farmer's wife
The sage's daughter
The moon lake
The fox reared by the lion
The brahmin's gift

The Lion and The Foolish Donkey