Southeast Asian Folk Tales
This selection includes the Si Tanggang story, mouse-deer trickery involving crocodiles, and the founding legend of Sang Nila Utama and Singapura. The pages follow different published sources, including Malay tales and the Malay Annals.
Read their source notes for the relationship between a familiar name and the particular version retold. A legendary explanation of a place is different from evidence about its documented history.
3 stories are in this collection right now.
Browse by region: Southeast Asia.
Southeast Asian Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
Sang Nila Utama and the Lion of Singapura
A prince from Bintan sails toward the white sands of Temasek, throws his crown into a storm to save his ship, and meets a strange beast said to be a lion.
Southeast Asian Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
The Mouse-Deer and the Crocodiles
Mouse-deer needs to cross a flooded river, so he tells the crocodiles that the king wants them counted, and they line up across the water for him.
Southeast Asian Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
Si Tanggang: The Ungrateful Son and the Curse of Stone
A poor couple’s son sails away and comes home rich, but when he is too proud to welcome his parents aboard, his mother’s words turn his ship to stone.