The classic stone soup tale includes a hungry traveler who asks the people of the town to loan him a pot and spoon to create a delicious meal known as stone soup. None in the crowd have heard of the dish, but as he begins making the meal with a single ingredient, a stone, they offer suggestions about how to make the soup even better. One man offers some meat, another carrots or onions. As the soup boils away in the pot, neighbors and strangers congratulate themselves on the tasty soup they have created together, and the traveler secures a free meal.
Because so many offer items for the recipe, the soup pot yields a huge amount, enough for all to eat their share and take home leftovers as well. The original cooks offer to write out the recipe for anyone who wants it, and all go on their way, happy, healthy, and well fed. Unlike some stories that follow this pattern, no one is tricked into participating, and all, including the originators of the soup recipe, are satisfied with their great afternoon of social activity and delicious food. Other stories that feature a clever man who cheats the townspeople for his own gain are much darker. For example, the Pied Piper of Hamlin comes into town to rid it of its rats by playing his magical flute. However, when the rats are gone, the townspeople decide not to pay the piper for his services, and as his revenge, the piper charms all of the children of the town into the same river where he drowned the rats.
The well-known story “Stone Soup” teaches the value of sharing and the pleasure of good company. The story appeared in print in 1720, and centuries later a popular children’s version written by Marcia Brown and published in 1947 gave the story a nationwide readership. (Grytsaj/Dreamstime.com)
The stone soup story itself is quite old; its first print appearance is in 1720 by Madame du Noyer. According to StoneSoup.com, “Folklorists place the Stone Soup story within the ‘clever man’ category of the Aarne-Thompson-Uther folklore classification system that they use to organize the entire folkloric tradition. Stone Soup is an Aarne-Thompson-Uther type 1548 folktale.” However, teachers and parents have long relied on the story to show the value of sharing and how to enjoy it.
The basic story involves an itinerant man looking for food. He doesn’t beg, however. Instead he begins to fill a large pot with water and either a large stone or pebbles. As the soup begins to boil, bystanders become curious about the recipe. Sometimes the man will make the soup for only one woman, and in other versions, the entire village watches him, and the neighbors volunteer ingredients from their homes, making enough soup for all to enjoy. In some versions, a group of soldiers enter the village to make the soup, and in the original story recorded by Madame du Noyer, the tale takes place in Normandy involving Jesuits who come by, offering to make the soup. Versions of the soup story are found in several different countries in Europe as well as in the United States.
Marcia Brown, a noted children’s author, published a very well-known version of the folktale in 1947. Her variant was the first to feature a group of soldiers arriving in town with their special stones. In her version, as well as in all the others, no one feels at all cheated by the people who make the soup, and, in fact, they all want the recipe. “Stone Soup” is a rare story in which good things happen, and all are satisfied with the outcome. Although we can learn a good lesson from the story, that knowledge does not come with any pain or humiliation, and everyone in the story is one of the good guys.
Linda Urschel
See also Folklore and Folktales
Further Reading
Ashliman, D. L. 2008. “Stone Soup.” Folklore and Mythology Electronic Texts website. Available online at http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type1548.html. Accessed October 6, 2015.
Brown, Marcia. 1947. Stone Soup. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.
“The Original Stone Soup Story.” 2015. StoneSoup website. Available online at http://www.stonesoup.com/the-original-stone-soup-story/. Accessed October 6, 2015.