Please click here to leave an anniversary message (in any language you choose). You do not need to be a member of Lowlands-L to do so. In fact, we would be more than thrilled to receive messages from anyone. Click here to read what others have written so far.
What’s with this “Wren” thing?
The oldest extant version of the fable
we
are presenting here appeared in 1913 in the first volume of a two-volume anthology
of Low
Saxon folktales (Plattdeutsche
Volksmärchen “Low German Folktales”)
collected by Wilhelm Wisser (1843–1935). Read
more ...
Western American
Listen to
this translation narrated with native pronunciation:
There was a wren who had made his nest in a garage. He lived there with his family.
One day he and his mate went out to look for some food to bring their chicks,
leaving the young birds all alone.
After a while the father wren returned home.
“What’s been going on here?” he asked. “Has something happened? You guys look scared to death!”
“Dad!” they said, “a big monster just came by. He looked so scary! He glared into our nest with his big eyes! That scared the crap out of us!”
“I see,” he said. “Where’d he go?”
“He went that way!”
“You guys wait here,” said the father wren, “I’m gonna kick his ass. Don’t worry, kids. I’ll get him.” So he took off after the monster.
He came around a corner and saw a mountain lion walking along, but the wren wasn’t afraid. He landed right on the mountain lion’s back and started yelling at him. “Who the hell do you think you are coming to my nest and scaring the crap out of my kids?!”
The mountain lion didn’t listen to the wren though, but rather just kept on walking.
That pissed the wren off even more, and he started really yelling at
the mountain
lion. “You have no reason coming to my nest, and if you come back,” he said,
“then you’ll really regret it! I don’t wanna get violent,” he said lifting one
of his legs into the air, “but I’ll snap your back in a heartbeat!”
Having said that, he flew back to his nest.
“There’s nothing to worry about now, kids,” he said, “I’ve taught him a lesson.
He won’t be coming back.”
Frontpage
[Version
1] 
There was a wren who had made his nest in a garage. He lived there with his family.
One day he and his mate went out to look for some food to bring their chicks,
leaving the young birds all alone.