CHAPTER III.
STORIES OF ORIENTAL ORIGIN.
The geographical situation of Italy and its commercial connections during the Middle Ages would lead us to expect a large foreign element in its popular tales. This foreign element, it is hardly necessary to say, is almost exclusively Oriental, and was introduced either by direct communication with the East, or indirectly from France, which received it from Spain, whither it was brought by the Saracens. Although this Oriental element is now perfectly popular, it is, as far as its origin is concerned, purely literary. That is to say, the stories we are about to examine are to be found in the great Oriental collections of tales which were early translated into all the languages of Europe, and either passed directly from these translations into circulation among the people, or became familiar to them from the novelists who made such frequent use of this element.1 A few stories may have been taken from the French fabliaux or from the French translations of the Disciplina Clericalis, as we shall afterwards see.2 The Pentamerone, and especially Straparola's tales, may finally be mentioned as the source from which many Oriental stories have flowed into popular circulation.3 In this chapter it is proposed to notice briefly only those stories the Oriental origin of which is undoubted, and which may be found in the great collections above mentioned and in some others less known. For convenience, some stories of this class have been referred to chapter VI.
The first of this class which we shall mention is well known from the version in Lafontaine (IX. i), Le Dépositaire infidèle. The only Italian version we have found is Pitrè, No. 194, which is as follows:
