The present study aims to analyse one of the most complex Ancient sources that enable us to study not only history and geography, but – as will be explained – also the ethnology of the life in ancient Greece and Rome, not only in the second century A.D., but in the older periods as well. The great quantity of folklore data is compartmentalized according to the types of literary folklore forms. This system is introduced by the researcher, as the Antiquity did not use such categorizations. The source contains a great number of tales and legends, fewer small folklore forms and also many topics known from later fairy tales. The concluding part of the article focuses on the importance of Pausanias’ work for the culture of the Antiquity in general and to the parallels with similar works produced in the Czech milieu in the nineteenth century.
The article focuses on the analysis of collections of fairy tales and legends of the Czech revivalist Božena Němcová, especially those in the Czech language. The specific clusters of tales are being analyzed one by one, as for the frequency of textual emendations made by B. Němcová. The most modified were the magical tales, less modified the anecdotic and humoristic ones, only slight changes were applied to animal, legendary and cumulative tales. All the changes correspond to the „mythological school“ of her time, but unlike Erben Němcová did not sought for the mythological origins of the texts, but rather aimed at expanding them and adapting them in accord with the conviction of the Czech National Movement on the crucial importance of the popular culture
In the first third of 19th century the romantic movement inspired interest in folklore. Folk art was collected, published and reworked by professional artists, especially as concerned epic folklore genres. Authentic legends, published in Vienna by Alois
Mednyanský, include a romantic novella in a remarkable way utilising a folklore theme from two different European cultures. The study traces and analyses the folklore theme used for the story and tries to reconstruct the path through which the theme from the remote Scotland reached Mednyanský. The novella intentionally
creates an impression to be a historic legend set in the times of
Hussite wars, being interlaced with strongly pro-Catholic criticism of the period happenings. The story adopts the character of the Bohemian sorcerer called Žito 74 and uses elements of Moravian life and institutions. A Moravian patrician in the role of a romantic
pilgrim sets off for a dangerous journey with a tragic end. The description of Scottish life documents profound knowledge and understanding of Scottish legends and local names by the author. In addition it documents period fascination with Scottish history. Past of the novella analyses the ritual of taghairm nan caht - its variants and functions in the traditional Gaelic culture - its description is the literary apogee of the novella and was probably taken over from the London paper The Literary Gazette.