A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.
Overview
A female quail lays an egg on a rock, which closes over it while she is away feeding. She asks a mason to cut it free, then seeks increasingly indirect help when he refuses. A village headman, pig, hunter, thorny Timbol creeper, fire, water-pot, elephant and rat each decline her request to compel the preceding helper. Only the cat agrees, setting the entire chain moving back toward the mason.
Parker prints the North-western Province narrator’s ending at the mason’s departure to retrieve the egg. When he asks whether it was actually returned, the narrator replies tentatively and a listener insists it was; that small disagreement remains part of this collected witness. A Southern Province variant instead has two eggs between stones, a lizard sent into an elephant’s trunk and a jackal as the willing final predator. The talking natural forces and objects belong to this cumulative animal story, without a claim that the quail transforms or performs a spell.
Origins & earliest records
Sri Lankan narratives collected and translated by H. Parker
Records & interpretation
Complete tale and all its printed variants/comparative notes read; relevant introduction passages on collection and translation directly read.
Selected bibliography
Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.
- 01
Village Folk-Tales of Ceylon, Volume I
No. 28, The Female Quail, pp. 201–205
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.
Primary records and illustrations
Village Folk-Tales of Ceylon, Volume I
Volume I. No. 28, The Female Quail, pp. 201–205
Complete tale and all attached variants, comparisons and footnotes read in cached Parker volume I. Narrator/listener disagreement, imitative-song glosses and absent human transformations retained explicitly.
References
Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.
- Historical collected oral narrative translationParker, Village Folk-Tales of Ceylon I — No. 28, The Female Quail, pp. 201–205Research access: 2026-10-05
Image credits
A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.