Hungarian Folk Tales: The Pork Pudding
Once upon a time, there lived a man who had a pig.
The pig grew very big and fat so the man decided to slaughter it for food.
By the time spring came, the man and his family had eaten everything but the pork pudding.
One day the man went to tend his vines while his wife and three daughters stayed at home to cook supper.
The wife told the eldest daughter:
Go up into the attic and fetch the pork pudding, my girl, and will cook it for your father's supper.
The eldest girl did as she was told, and was about to cut the pork pudding down when it spoke to her:
What do you want? You won't eat me, because I'll eat you first!
And with these words, it ate the girl up.
The wife could not imagine why her daughter had not come back down with a pork pudding.
So she sent the second eldest daughter up to the attic to fetch it.
But the fat pork pudding ate the second daughter up as well.
So the wife sent the youngest girl up to fetch the pork pudding.
But the youngest daughter did no better than her sisters and the bulging pork pudding ate her up too.
The wife could not imagine what had happened to her three darling daughters...
Well, I shall see for myself! – she said and went up into the roof.
When she saw the size of the enormous pork pudding, she was pleased.
But when she tried to cut the pork pudding down it ate her up in a single mouthful.
That evening the man returned home from his vines to find no one at home to cook his supper.
There was no supper on the stove and not even a fire inside it.
The man searched high and low for his wife and three daughters.
He realized that he would go hungry so he went up to the attic to fetch the pork pudding to eat for his supper.
But when the man got up into the attic and tried to cut the round pork pudding down
it shouted at him, like it had all the others:
You won't eat me, I'll eat you first!
And without any ado, the pork pudding ate the man up.
By now, the heavy pork pudding was so weighty that the string could no longer hold it.
It fell from the beam, rolled down the ladder,
onto the porch and out into the garden.
The little house was on a big hill, so the gigantic pork pudding rolled all the way down the street.
The local folks are just coming back from the fields and the massive pork pudding ate them all up.
The roly-poly pork pudding met a herd of pigs at the edge of the village
being led by a swineherd, eating bacon with a pocketknife.
The preposterously large pork pudding ate all the pigs up and then the swine-herd too.
But the pocket knife was open, and the swine-herd cut his way out of the pork pudding.
And everybody followed him out into the sunshine.
If that pork pudding had not split as it did my story would have never ended.