While the frogs were hopping about in the freedom of their pond they began shouting to Jupiter that they wanted a king to hold their dissolute habits in check. Jupiter laughed and bestowed on the frogs a small piece of wood which he dropped all of a sudden into their pond. As the wood splashed slightly into the water, it terrified the timid frogs. They plunged into the mud and hid there a long time until one frog happened to raise her head cautiously up out of the water. After studying the king, she summoned the other frogs. Putting aside their fear, the frogs all raced over and began jumping on the piece of wood, rudely making fun of it. When the frogs had showered their king with shame and scorn, they asked Jupiter to send them another one. Jupiter was angry that they had made fun of the king he had given them, so he had sent them a water-snake, who killed the frogs one by one with her piercing sting. As the water-snake was happily eating her fill, the useless creatures ran away, speechless in their fright. They secretly sent a message to Jupiter through Mercury begging him to put a stop to the slaughter, but Jupiter replied, “Since you rejected what was good in order to get something bad, you had better put up with it – or else something even worse might happen!”[1]
[1] Aesop’s Fables, tr. Laura Gibbs (Oxford: OUP/Oxford World’s Classics, 2008), p. 17. Aesop’s Fables enjoy a long tradition in ancient Greek and Roman culture with early beginnings, for example, in the writings of Herodotus (5th century BC). They can also be traced to the Greek poet Hesiod (8th century BC). They were revived in the Middle Ages, around the 10th century AD, and continue today. The fable quoted above is also known as “The Frogs Who Asked for a King”.
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