Once upon a time, there lived a rooster in a farmland next to a jungle. He liked to read the books and listen to the stories from time to time that his grandmother had told him. From those books and stories he learnt many things about life, its dangers and about the traps and tricks that its enemies, such as foxes, use to hunt chickens and roosters. One day he had nothing to do and was bored, so he decided to go for a walk. He passed the farmland and suddenly saw himself in the jungle. The weather was nice. The birds were singing and the flowers gave off a beautiful aroma in the air. He enjoyed this a lot and started to sing loudly. The hungry fox heard his voice and decided to hunt the rooster for his lunch, and ran towards him. The rooster saw the fox and jumped over a tree and sat on a high branch.
What a beautiful sound you have. I heard you and came here to hear you better. Why did you stop singing? Why did you jump over there? The fox said.
The rooster answered: I am afraid of you and I feel safe here.
The fox laughed and said: Why? Didn’t you hear that the king of animals ruled that all the animals should be friends with each other, and no one should hurt anybody else from now on? The rooster said to himself that the fox is a liar and this is his trick to take me down and catch me. He thought about it, and then he pretend looking towards the farm far from there. The fox asked: Where are you looking? The rooster answered: I am looking at an animal, which is coming this way that has big ears and long tail and runs very fast. I don’t know its name, but it looks like a wolf. The fox said: I guess that animal must be a big dog. So, I should better run away now.
The rooster said: Did you forget what the King of animals said, "All the animals should be friends with each other and no one should hurt anybody”, so you should not worry. The fox answered: I am afraid, especially if that dog didn’t hear the king of animals’ speech.
The fox ran away and the rooster became free and came down the tree.
Marzban Nameh is a well-known Persian storybook, written at about 1000 years ago by Marzban son of Rostam son of Shervin, who was an Iranian prince from Tabarestan (now known as Mazandaran).
Translated by Morteza Tabatabaee
January 2004