Moyshele and Sheyndele

Once upon a time there was a poor woodcutter who had a wife and two small children, a boy and a girl. The boy was called Moyshele, the girl Sheyndele. The woodcutter’s wife died and he married a second wife who was a very wicked woman and a cruel stepmother to the children.

One day the woodcutter left the house to chop wood in the forest, and the stepmother got ready to go to market to do the Sabbath shopping. Before she left, she gave the children some food, putting Moyshele’s in a pot and Sheyndele’s on a plate. She said,

“Moyshele, if you break the pot

I’ll chop off your head,

So you’d better not.”

She told Sheyndele,

“Sheyndele, Sheyndele, just you wait,

I’ll chop off your legs

If you break this plate.”

Then she slammed the door and went to market.

The children were afraid to eat lest they break something, but the rooster suddenly flew up on the table and knocked over the pot. It fell to the ground and broke into teeny-tiny pieces. Moyshele, seeing them, was terrified and began to cry. Sheyndele comforted him, saying, “Hush, Moyshele. Don’t cry.” And she took the shards of the pot and pushed them into a corner of the room.

When the stepmother came home, she couldn’t find the pot. “Where is the pot?” she asked Moyshele.

“The rooster broke it,” he said.

The stepmother was very angry, but she pretended that nothing was the matter. Later she said to Moyshele, “Come with me and I’ll wash your hair.” So Moyshele went with her. She took him into another room and cut off his head, after which she cooked it for supper.

When the woodcutter came back from the forest he said, “Where is Moyshele?”

“I don’t know,” said the stepmother. Then they sat down at the table and ate the soup and the meat. Sheyndele, unaware of what she was eating, sucked the marrow from the bones and threw them out the window.

A little mound of earth covered the bones and when the glad summer came again, a new Moyshele grew up out of it. Moyshele stood there on his little mound until, seeing a tailor pass by, he called, “Tailor, tailor, make me a pair of trousers and I’ll sing you a song:

Murdered by my mother,

Eaten by my father,

and Sheyndele, when they were done,

Sucked the marrow from my bones

And threw them out the window.”

The tailor, hearing the song, pitied him and made him a pair of trousers. Moyshele put them on, and then a shoemaker went by. Moyshele called, “Shoemaker, shoemaker, make me a pair of boots and I’ll sing you a song:

Murdered by my mother,

Eaten by my father,

and Sheyndele, when they were done,

Sucked the marrow from my bones

And threw them out the window.”

The shoemaker, hearing the song, pitied him and made him a pair of boots. Moyshele put them on, and then a hatmaker went by. Moyshele called, “Hatmaker, hatmaker, make me a hat and I’ll sing you a song:

Murdered by my mother,

Eaten by my father,

and Sheyndele, when they were done,

Sucked the marrow from my bones

And threw them out the window.”

The hatmaker, hearing the song, pitied him and made him a hat. And Moyshele put it on and ran off to school.

One log there,

One log gone.

As for my tale—

My tale is done.

* * *

Glossary

* * *

Annotations

TELLER: Rokhl Cahan, aunt of collector, Vilna, before 1928.
COLLECTOR: Y.-L. Cahan.
SOURCE: Cahan (1928), no. 3, pp. 223–24; Cahan (1940), no. 15, pp. 54–56.
TALE TYPE: 720.
COMMENTS: Most often names are not mentioned in folktales. When they are, they are common to other tales as well. Sheyndele (the generic “little girl”) and Moyshele (the generic “little boy”) appear to be favorites in such Yiddish tales. Cf. Cahan (1938), no. 23, p. 133.

sphere of the sacred worm

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Moyshele and Sheyndele