“Hale!” “Halele!”
Ibnasya had a rich and miserly neighbour who never lent anything without working out what he would gain from it. One day, Ibnasya went to see him: “Neighbour, I have guests tonight. Lend me your big copper pot.” The neighbour lent it to him, grumbling.
The next day, Ibnasya brought back the big pot. Inside it was a tiny little pot. “What's this?” asked the neighbour. “Good news, neighbour! Last night, your pot gave birth. Here is its little one: it's yours, of course.”
The neighbour found the story absurd, but he kept the little pot without protest. He was not the one to refuse a present!
A few weeks later, Ibnasya came back: “Neighbour, lend me your big pot again.” This time, the neighbour handed it over with a broad smile, hoping for another birth. But the days went by, and the pot did not come back. In the end, the neighbour went to ask for it.
“Alas, neighbour,” said Ibnasya with a sorrowful look, “your pot has died.” “Died? You're making fun of me! A pot doesn't die!” “What?” replied Ibnasya. “You were quite ready to believe it could give birth. Everything that is born must die one day.”
And the neighbour, caught in his own trap, went home without his pot.
Those blinded by greed accept the lies that suit them… until those lies turn against them.
What we know about it
The cunning hero of this tale goes by different names in different places: Abunuwasi on the Swahili coast, where his adventures (the Hekaya za Abunuwasi) are very popular, Ibnasya, Ibounasuya or Ibn'Aswia among the storytellers of Grande Comore, Boinawassi in Mayotte (see The fisherman and the monster in the bottle). On Grande Comore, he shares this role as defender of the little people with the hare Sungura. The character is distantly inspired by the Arab poet Abû Nuwâs, who in popular tradition became a prankster who makes fools of the powerful and the miserly.
The story of the pot circulates throughout the Indian Ocean and well beyond: it is also told in the Middle East, with other heroes. We tell it here in our own way; other tricks of Ibnasya have been published by Saïd Abdallah.
Further reading
- Voices of the archipelago Saïd Abdallah, Trois ruses d'Ibnasya : contes comoriens. L'Harmattan.
- Voices of the archipelago Saïd Abdallah, Contes des îles de la lune. Contes comoriens, 2000. L'Harmattan.
- Voices of the archipelago Salim Hatubou, Sagesses et malices de Madi, l'idiot voyageur, 2004. Albin Michel Jeunesse.