Reading Notes: Congo, Part A

 Notes for Folklore of the Fjort stories, collected by R. E. Dennett 

"How Nsassi (Gazelle) Got Married"

• Nenpetro 
• Man with 2 wives who each had a daughter 
• Rich 
• Would not take a present for daughters' hands in marriage but would allow whoever figured out their names to marry them 
• Lunga
• Lenga 
• Antelope 
• Offers valuables 
• Does not know their names 
• Nsassi
• Well-known prince of a faraway town 
• His dog
• Feels sorry for him when he does not know their names 
• Hears their names and tries to tell his master 
• Catches a wild kitten for food 
• Forgets names
• Returns to Nenpetro's home 
• Hears names again but forgets them when he drinks from a stream on his way back to his master 
• Returns again to Nenpetro's home 
• Remembers names on his journey home 
• Will not tell Nsassi the names unless he is paid
• Nsassi gives the dog a pig, then learns their names 
• Journies back to tell Nenpetro the names 
• Forgets names when he drinks from a stream 
• The dog learns them again, and they both go back, finally telling Nenpetro the names and claiming the daughters as wives 
• Antelope declares war, and Nsassi kills and eats him

A Gazelle in Profile, Moving Toward the Right from the Robert Lehman Collection, 1975 (source: Wikimedia) 

"The Younger Brother Who Knew More Than the Elder"

• Two brothers live in a certain town 
• They cannot agree with one another 
• The younger brother says he knows more than, the older brother 
• Makes the older brother mad 
• Younger brother 
• Leaves town with his wife when angered by the older brother 
• They wander far away to a wood with a stream 
• They drink from the stream and wade across it 
• They hear strange voices 
• The wife is scared 
• They see two or three huts 
• Huts are inhabited by a man and his wife 
• Man and wife 
• Allow the younger brother and his wife to live with them after asking, "are you a bad man?"
• The group digs holes to catch animals after four days of doing nothing
• The man and wife eat only female animals
• The younger brother and wife eat only male animals 
• They catch an ox, an antelope, a chimbibi, and a hog
• They do not share with the older couple 
• The brother sends his wife to gather things for smoking the meat 
• She does not return 
• They find her in the trap 
• The older man says she is fair game for him to eat 
• The older brother finds them and throws the older man into the trap
• The old man knows he is now fair game and agrees to let the wife go
• Both brothers return home