tales

Segons la rondalla, una vegada un bon pagès anava per la fira menant un ase. Uns estudiants miseriosos i adelerats de diners van tractar de veure si li podien robar la bèstia. Mentre el camperol caminava tot distret, sense que ho advertís li van treure el cabestre del ruc; un dels estudiants se'l va posar, mentre els altres fugien amb l'ase. En adonar-se que el ruc no caminava amb el ritme acostumat, el pagès es va girar i va veure que, en lloc d'un ruc, menava un home. L'estudiant se li va agenollar als peus i, mig plorant, li demanà perdó. Li contà que era un estudiant molt mal aplicat i que, en càstig a la seva ruqueria, fou damnat a tornar-se ase durant un llarg termini d'anys, que el termini aleshores finia, i tornava, per tant, a la condició d'home. El pagès va creure la facècia. Va demanar perdó a l'estudiant per les garrotades que li havia donat mentre havia estat el seu amo i el va acomiadar.

Els estudiants van córrer a vendre's l'ase i el pobre pagès, en trobar-se sense, determinà de comprar-ne un altre. Rondant per la fira, trobà en una parada l'ase que li acabaven de robar, i pensà que havien tornat a castigar el mal estudiant per desaplicat i que, si el comprava, passat cert temps tornaria a quedar-se sense ruc. I s'acostà a l'orella de la bestiola, que, en veure'l, tota s'estarrufà, i li va dir a cau d'orella: - Qui no et conegui, que et compri.

(Amades, 1982, I:1124-25).

'The one who does not know you, will buy you

According to the tale, once a good peasant went to the market with a donkey. Some students, miserable and greedy for money, looked for a way how they could steal the animal. While the peasant walked dreamy, in a way that the peasant did not notice anything, the students grabbed the halter of the donkey and put it on one of them, while the others fled with the animal. When he noticed that the donkey did not walk that fast as normally, he turned around and noticed that in place of a donkey he was guiding a man. The student kneed down and nearly crying asked him for pardon. He told him that he was a bad student and as a punishment he was damned to be a donkey for some years, that the curse ended today and therefore he became a human again. The peasant believed this trick. He begged for pardon the times he hit him while he has been his owner and said him goodbye.

The students went to sell the donkey, and the poor peasant, as he now did not have one, decided to buy another one. Walking around the market at one stand he found the same donkey the students took from him. Thinking that the bad students had been punished again he assumed that if he bought this donkey in some time, he would become a human again and he would lose a donkey again. He came closer to the donkey, which was very happy to see him and said into its ear: “The one who does not know you, will buy you”.'