ATU 751B* The Old Man with the Live Coals
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The tale in brief
A man who needs fire comes upon a mysterious fire in the night, and an old man (or several strange men) tending it shovels live coals into the lap of his coat; the coals do not burn him, and at home they have turned into gold or silver coins. In the East Slavic form a greedy neighbour tries the same, and his house burns down.
Summary written for RunoVerse and checked against the Finnic texts linked on this page.
Estonian treasure legends
Types of Estonian treasure legends that RunoVerse links to this tale type. A canonical reference rests on a catalogue number in the legend type’s name; strong parallels and experimental matches rest on a shared plot or shared motifs.
- P 219: Söed rüppe/hõlma · 83 records · strong parallel
Motifs and related tale types
Motifs: Kind and Unkind Q2
Sources
Tale-type number, title, classification, related types and the Finnic sources: Hans-Jörg Uther, The Types of International Folktales (FF Communications 284–286, Helsinki 2004). · Uther 2004, part I (FF Communications 284), free online ↗
Treasure-legend links: RunoVerse’s matching of the Estonian treasure-legend types with the tale types.
Motifs and combinations with other tale types: the Trilogy dataset, from Stith Thompson’s Motif-Index of Folk-Literature and the ATU catalogue.
The plot summary, the notes and the arrangement of this page are RunoVerse’s own.