Help-Me Spoon of Shaihu’s Tale

Overview

A famine-stricken woman whose husband favors another wife finds a mara spoon in the bush. It challenges her for passing without a greeting, returns her salutation and prompts her to ask its name. Its name is rendered Help Me. When addressed in the prescribed manner within the story, it asks for her calabash and fills it with food. She feeds her husband and children while initially concealing the source. Later she takes him to meet the articulate spoon.

The husband removes it by night and keeps it in the grain store, allowing the favored wife access while excluding its original finder. That wife reveals the spoon while washing it at the stream, and the chief’s wife demonstrates its greeting and food-giving capacity. The chief has it brought to court, declares it too valuable for a poor household and retains it to supply his own home. The original household is hungry again. The subsequent whip episode drives its members away; the final explanation places the spoon and whip first in the wilds and later among people. The spoon’s speech and ongoing responses distinguish it from an ordinary utensil merely carrying a spell.

Origins & earliest records

Malam Shaihu supplies the written Hausa material translated and transliterated by R. Sutherland Rattray. The compiler’s Author’s Note describes a mixed written and Arabic-manuscript mediation process; this tale is not labeled a verbatim oral field transcription by a separately named narrator.

Records & interpretation

Shaihu/Rattray, Hausa Folk-Lore, Customs, Proverbs, etc., Volume I (1913), tale 5, complete pp. 80–106; compiler methodology p. xii.

Selected bibliography

Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.

1. 01

   Hausa Folk-Lore, Customs, Proverbs, etc., Volume I

   Malam Shaihu, manuscript contributor; R. Sutherland Rattray, transliterator and translator · 1913

   Shaihu/Rattray, Hausa Folk-Lore, Customs, Proverbs, etc., Volume I (1913), tale 5, complete pp. 80–106; compiler methodology p. xii.

Family & connections

A source-supported family tree or inspiration record has not yet been compiled for this profile. Related reading below indicates a connection in subject matter, not a proven lineage or creative influence.

References

Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.

1. Bilingual manuscript tale; digitized primary OCRShaihu/Rattray 1913 — Help-Me Spoon of Shaihu’s TaleResearch access: 2026-10-05
2. Compiler methodologyAuthor’s NoteResearch access: 2026-10-05

Image credits

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