Death in Folk Tales (A Brief Note)

Abstract

A dramatic image of death is reflected from a cycle of folktales (Aarne-Thompson Types 505 to 508) in which a man dying in debt is refused burial, until the hero of the tale pays the ransom and fulfills the ancestral funeral ritual. Then the tale may develop into a further sequence centred on the Grateful Dead. The texts alluded to here come from both Northern Europe and the Mediterranean area, and from ancient and modern tales.