Ten popular tales of the Pathans of the Bannu valley, on the Afghan frontier, collected and translated by S. S. Thorburn and published in his Bannú; or, Our Afghan Frontier (London, 1876). Thorburn, the district's settlement officer, tells how every village had its wits who had studied the story-telling art, and out of the large number of tales he collected he condensed and translated fifty of the shortest and most original. Part 1 tells the first ten of his first class, the humorous and moral tales, in the book's own order.
Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices.
A few tales of the chapter that turn on bloodshed are left untold, as this programme leaves such tales aside; they are named in this shelf's canon, and no completeness is claimed for the chapter.
In this episode:
0:00 Introduction
1:43 The Miserly Akhoond
4:39 The Prophet Proved
5:16 The Silent Princess
7:09 Charity Rewarded
7:56 A Miser's Proof
8:28 The Skilful Physician
9:47 What Not to Trust
11:09 Avarice versus Religion
12:00 The Test of Friendship
13:06 A Good Liar
An instrumental theme, "Tampa Across the Water 2", is heard at the opening and at the close.
Narrated by Benedetto. The reading texts are fresh in-house renderings of Thorburn's printed tales. Source: S. S. Thorburn, Bannú; or, Our Afghan Frontier (1876), public domain — lawful copy: the Internet Archive.
Part 2 returns to the same chapter for more of the popular tales of the Afghan frontier.
