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Prakrit and Apabhraíśa Studies
key verses also seem to have been altered to suit the new orientation given to the tale. So it has not been taken up here for .consideration.
But in the Dhammapada-aţthakathā, the tale of the world-renowned teacher, the young man, and the king of Benares'16, we have a new version of the basic motif of the tale of Yava which has persisted in varying forms down to the present day. A dull-witted man, repeating at night a stanza taught him as a charm by his teacher with great difficulty, scares away, later on, the thieves who took the uttered verse as addressed to them. The king of the city who happened to witness this scene on his secret nightly rounds, learns the charm from the man and as he repeats it loudly while he is being shaved, the barbar thinks that the king has detected his murderous design. The barbar confesses and thus the king's life is saved.
An irrelevant, seemingly nonsense verse, memorized and uttered by a dullard, becomes meaningfuily applicable in an unsuspected situation so as to save the life of the utterer--this features is commonly shared by this tale and the tale of Yava. But the Dhammapada-atthakathā tale represents a basic transformation of the tale of Yava, and so the three key verses of the latter do not figure in it. From these various versions of the tale of Yava we ean see that here what we have is a folk-tale set in an alien frame for religious purposes. This impression is further confirmed by the fact that the characteristic motifs similar to this tale are found recurring in several later tales down to the present day.
There is a tale-type known as Doctor Know-All (Aarne-Thompson, 'Types of the Folk-Tale', no. 1641), having more than four hundred variants current all over Europe and Asia17. In the version which we have in the Kathāsaritsägara18, the Brāhmaṇa Hariśarman, posing as an astrologer, first-finds a lost horse (which he had previously hidden). Thereafter, placed alone in a chamber in the royal palace to detect the theft of the king's treasure, as he was loudly blaming his tongue (jihvā) for his present plight19, the maid named Jihvā, who had stolen the treasure and who, alarmed by Harišarman's reputed knowledge, was outside the chamber, close
