KING JOHN AND THE ABBOT OF CANTERBURY


In King John’s reign the Abbot of Canterbury was so rich and grand that the king became  jealous, and sent for the Abbot to reproach him. The Abbot claimed that he was only  spending what had been given in pious gifts to the Abbey. But the king replied that  everything in the kingdom belonged to the king. However, he promised to spare the  Abbot’s life if he could answer three questions. These were: “Where is the centre of the  world?”, “How soon can I ride round the world?” and “What do I think?”  He gave the Abbot a week to find the answers, and the Abbot was in despair for he  thought the questions unanswerable. No learned man in Oxford could help him, and he  returned to Canterbury to say farewell to his monks. On the way he met his shepherd,  who at once offered to take the Abbot’s place, for a fool could sometimes succeed where  a wise man could not. The Abbot at last gave an unwilling consent, and the shepherd, his  face hidden in a monk’s cowl, and attended by the Abbot’s usual great retinue, returned  to London.  To the question “Where is the centre of the earth?” the shepherd, planting his crozier  in the ground, said, “Here. Measure it and see.” “A merry answer and a shrewd,” said the  king. “How soon may I ride round the world?” “Rise with the sun, and ride with him, and  you will go round it in twenty-four hours.” The king passed this answer also, and asked,  “What do I think?” “That I am the Lord Abbot of Canterbury, your Grace, but I am only  his poor shepherd, come to ask pardon for us both.”  The king was delighted with this, and would have made the shepherd Abbot in place  of his master, but the shepherd could neither read nor write, so the king gave him the  pardon, and a princely present, as well as a pension of four nobles a week for the rest of  his life.  

Joseph Jacobs, More English Fairy Tales, p. 146. Child, no. 45.  TYPE 922. MOTIFS: H.541 [Riddle propounded with penalty for failure]; K.1961  [Sham churchman]; H.561.2 [King and abbot]; H.681.3.1 [Where is the centre of the  earth?]; H.681.1.1 [How far to the end of the earth? A day’s journey; the sun does it  daily]; H.524.1 [What am I thinking?]   

Anderson, Kaiser und Abt, has made a study of this widespread tale-type. A typical  example is one of the Hodscha stories. The well-known ballad, “King John and the Abbot  of Canterbury”, tells the story neatly, adding another question, Motif H.711.1 [What am I  worth?]. 

 See also “The Professor of Signs”, “The Miller at the Professor’s Examination”,  “George Buchanan and the Bishop” (part A.Jocular).

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