Ethiopian Folktales

Narrated by Chilot Amara

Once a lion was visiting all the wild and domestic animals and was asking them, “You, who is the king of all the animals?” and they all replied, “You are the one!”

He met the fox and asked her the same thing, and she replied the same.

After having covered all the animals, he finally went to the elephant and asked him the same question.

The elephant didn’t answer but just said, “Just come nearer,” so the lion came nearer to the elephant.

At once the elephant picked him up with his trunk and threw him to the sky. And when he fell he was severely hurt.

The lion said, looking up to the elephant, “Why did you do that while you could just say, ‘I am the king’?”