- Genre
- Mythological legend
- Source status
- folkloric
- Motifs
- feeding horses, tiny helpers, gift of clothes, end of service
The story
A poor farmer had no fodder to fatten his thin horses. He remarked that it would be good to have a tranas, a mysterious helper. The next morning the horses had been well fed. This continued, and they soon grew strong.
The farmer wanted to know who was tending them. On a moonlit night a farmhand hid beside the pigs and watched the stable. When everything was quiet, two tiny men appeared. They gathered scraps of fodder and carried them to the horses until the animals had eaten enough.
Their clothes were in rags. When the farmhand told the household, a tailor was called to make new garments, and the mistress knitted foot coverings. They placed everything in the corner where the helpers appeared and hid to watch.
Seeing the gifts, the traneliai began to weep. They understood the clothes as payment of their wages: now they had to leave. After lamenting, they vanished and never returned.
Reading the story
The source calls these beings traneliai, and their name is retained. The edition places the story in its aitvarai and kaukai section, but clothing these helpers ends their service rather than securing it forever.
Told by Veronika Grajauskienė in Lebedžiai; recorded by A. Štilpaitė in 1948, LTR 2851(148).
Source and retelling
Lietuvių tautosaka, IV (1967), Nr. 531, p. 540–541: „Traneliai“. An original retelling of the recorded traditional narrative cited here. The sequence of events and ending are retained in modern language.