The Language of the Birds

In a town somewhere in old Russia there lived a rich merchant and his wife, and they had one son, a bright, brave boy named Ivan. One fine day, as the family sat at dinner, the nightingale in the cage by the window began to sing, trilling and rippling in high silvery notes. The merchant listened for a long time. “How I wish I knew what all the birds are saying!” he said. “I’d give half of everything I own to anyone who could explain their songs to me, if only there were such a person.”

Ivan never forgot those words. Wherever he went and whatever he was doing, he kept wondering how he might learn the speech of birds.

Some time later he was out hunting in the forest when the wind rose, the sky went black, lightning flashed, thunder crashed and the rain came down in sheets. Under a big tree Ivan noticed a large nest in the branches with four baby birds in it, all alone, with no mother or father to shelter them from the cold and wet. Feeling sorry for them, he climbed up and spread his kaftan, his long coat, over the nest. When the storm had passed, a great bird flew down, perched beside the nest and spoke to him kindly. “Ivan, thank you for keeping my little ones out of the cold and rain. I would like to repay you. What do you wish for?”

“I don’t need anything,” said Ivan. “I have all I want. But teach me the language of the birds.”

“Stay with me for three days and you shall know it.”

So Ivan stayed in the forest for three days, learned everything the great bird taught him, and went home wiser than before.

Soon afterwards, as he sat with his parents, the caged nightingale sang again, but this time its song was so sorrowful that the merchant and his wife grew sad just hearing it. Ivan, who understood every note, was even more upset, and tears ran down his face. “What’s wrong, dear son? Why are you crying?” “Because I understand what the nightingale is singing,” he said, “and it is sad news for all of us.” “Then tell us the whole truth. Don’t hide anything.” “Oh, it sounds so sad! It would be better not to have been born!” “Don’t frighten us like this,” said his parents. “If you really understand it, tell us straight away.” “Can’t you hear it yourselves? The nightingale says that a day will come when Ivan the merchant’s son will be Ivan the king’s son, and his own father will serve him like a common servant.”

The merchant and his wife were alarmed, and from then on they did not trust their good son. One night they gave him a sleeping draught, and when he was fast asleep they carried him to a boat, raised its white sails and pushed it out onto the open sea.

For a long time the little boat bobbed about on the waves, until at last a big merchant ship bumped into it so hard that Ivan woke up. The sailors felt sorry for him and took him aboard. High overhead a flock of cranes was flying. “Watch out,” Ivan told the crew. “The birds say a storm is coming. Let’s get into a harbour, or our sails will be torn to rags and our masts will snap.” Nobody listened, and they sailed on. Before long a storm blew up and nearly wrecked the ship, and the crew had to work hard to mend the damage.

They had only just finished when a flock of wild swans flew over, calling loudly to each other. This time the sailors were curious. “What are they saying?” “Be careful,” said Ivan. “I can hear them clearly. They say pirates are close by. If we don’t get into harbour at once, the sea robbers will take us prisoner and kill us.” This time the crew did as he said. They had barely reached the harbour when the pirate ships went sweeping past, and the merchants watched them capture several ships that had not been warned.

When the danger had passed, they sailed on and on until at last they dropped anchor beside a large town none of them knew. The king of that town was plagued by three black crows that perched day and night by his bedroom window, cawing. Nobody could chase them off and nobody could kill them. So the king had notices posted at every crossroads and on every big building. Whoever rid him of the noisy birds would marry his youngest daughter, but whoever tried and failed would lose his head.

Ivan read the notice once, twice and a third time. Then he crossed himself and went to the palace. “Open the window and let me listen to the birds,” he told the servants. They did, and he listened for a while. “Now take me to your king.”

He was led to the room where the king sat on a tall, rich chair. Ivan bowed and said, “Your Majesty, the three crows are a father, a mother and a son. Their trouble is this: they want you to decide whether the son should go with his father or with his mother.”

“The son should go with his father,” said the king.

The moment the king gave his judgment, the father crow and the son crow flew off one way and the mother crow vanished the other way, and nobody heard the noisy birds after that. The king gave Ivan half his kingdom and his youngest daughter, and the tale says Ivan began a happy new life.

Meanwhile, back home, Ivan’s mother had died and his father had lost all his money. With nobody left to look after him, the old man went begging from window to window, village to village and town to town. One bright day he came to Ivan’s palace and humbly asked for help. Ivan knew him at once. He brought him inside, gave him food and good clothes and asked, “Old man, what can I do for you?”

“If you are so very kind,” said the father, not realising who he was talking to, “let me stay here and work as one of your servants.”

“Dear, dear father!” cried Ivan. “You didn’t believe the nightingale’s song, but you can see now that it was true. We were meant to meet like this, just as it foretold long ago.”

The old man was terrified and fell on his knees, but Ivan chose to welcome him. He lifted his father lovingly into his arms, and they cried together over all their sorrows.

A few days later the old man found the courage to ask, “Tell me, son, how is it that you didn’t drown in that boat?”

Ivan laughed happily. “I suppose it wasn’t my fate to end up at the bottom of the sea,” he said. “My fate was to marry my lovely princess and to make my dear father’s old age a sweet one.”

About this story

“The Language of the Birds” is the third tale in Verra Xenophontovna Kalamatiano de Blumenthal’s Folk Tales from the Russian (Project Gutenberg #12851). She explains in passing that a kaftan is “a long-skirted coat which the Russian peasants and merchants usually wear.” She calls the princess a korolevna and, at the end, Ivan a korolevitch. In her notes these are the words for a king’s daughter and a king’s son, as distinct from a tsar’s.

The whole tale grows out of one prophecy. Ivan’s parents try to escape it by casting him off, and that is exactly what brings it true. The crows’ quarrel over whether the son should follow his father or his mother quietly mirrors what happens to Ivan himself.

Read the original: Verra Xenophontovna Kalamatiano de Blumenthal, Folk Tales from the Russian (Project Gutenberg #12851)

Best for ages 9–12 with adult discussion. Includes parents drugging and abandoning their child at sea, threats of beheading and parental death. Ivan’s eventual forgiveness is his choice, not a duty owed by a child to someone who harmed them.

Reading the story closely

Bird language has three different uses: predicting a reversal of rank, warning of danger, and translating a dispute. The sailors change their response after ignoring one warning; Ivan’s parents respond to the prophecy by trying to remove the child. Their fear concerns serving their son, revealing how strongly they value hierarchy.

Compare the king’s swift decision for the father crow with Ivan’s later welcome to his own father. The tale supplies no reasons for the crow judgment and gives the princess no say in the marriage reward. Readers can appreciate Ivan’s generosity while asking whose wishes remain unheard and what repair beyond reunion would require.

Questions to ask

• How does one small kindness in the storm change Ivan’s whole life?
• Why do you think Ivan’s parents were so frightened by the nightingale’s song?
• How does Ivan treat his father when they meet again, and what does that tell you about him?

You may also like

• The Golden Mountain — another Blumenthal tale about a merchant’s son, a long journey and a reversal of fortune
• The Tsarevna Frog — another Russian tale from the same book
• Sadko the Rich Merchant: Echoes from the Deep — a Russian tale of a merchant, a ship and a perilous sea