What is a fable?

A fable is a very short story with a moral or a lesson to teach. In ancient Greece, fables, myths, and legends were told orally by the traveling Greek storytellers during the Greek Dark Age. Fables gave the early Greeks a common culture, a way of behaving. After the dark age, the fables continued to be told and enjoyed.

A slave named Aesop supposedly collected about 600 of these old stories and wrote them down. No one knows if Aesop could write, or if he even existed, but thanks to someone (perhaps Aesop,) or a bunch of someones, these fun fables created by the ancient Greeks were written down and saved.

Today, we still enjoy these wonderful tales of talking animals and magical events that have a moral. Guessing the moral is part of the fun of a fable.

Aesop's Fables

What is a legend?

What is a myth?

The Greek Dark Ages

QUIZ: Ancient Greece (Interactive with answers)