A to Z Theme Reveal: Small Town Legends!

Hello everyone! It's that time of the year again: people doing the A to Z Blogging Challenge are revealing their themes. This is my 15th year participating! Except for my first year, I have always had a theme, and it is always folklore and mythology related.

Here are the themes from past years:

No theme (2012)
Weird Princesses (2013)
Tales with Colors (2014)
Epics A to Z (2015)
Diversity A to Z (2016)
WTF - Weird Things in Folktales (2017)
WTF Hungary - Weird Things in Hungarian Folktales (2018)
Fruit Folktales (2019)
Folktales of Endangered Species (2020)
Tarot Tales (2021)
Gemstone Folklore (2022)
Body Folktales (2023)
Romance Tropes in Folklore (2024)
Women's Epics (2025)

This year, I am bringing another folklore-themed series for A to Z. My chosen theme (after much deliberation) is:

SMALL TOWN LEGENDS FROM HUNGARY

I have combed through a whole lot of historical legends and small town traditions, and picked the most entertaining, strange, memorable ones I could find to share with you. You will learn some hard-to-pronounce Hungarian village names, explore local folklore, and have something to remember about these places should you ever visit. Here is your inspiration to venture outside of Budapest!

There will be ferocious squirrels, village lads mistaking a hoopoe for Jesus Christ, an exploding dragon, a flying monk, and other wild adventures.

See you in April!

(This is a map of small villages [under 1000 inhabitants], tiny villages [under 500], and dwarf villages [under 200] in Hungary, from here.)

Who else is participating?

Leave your links in the comments so I can visit!

Reading list for Hero Team-Up Legends

I had the honor to participate in the Taking the Tradition On series online. I chose "Bands of Heroes" as my topic, since I have been very passionate about these legend cycles for a long time. You can watch the talk on YouTube. I promised Amy and the audience that I would compile a reading list of all the epics and sources I mentioned. So, here it is!

Nart Sagas

John Colarusso - Tamirlan Salbiev (ed.): Tales ​of the Narts: Ancient Myths and Legends of the Ossetians (Princeton University Press, 2016)

John Colarusso (ed.): Nart ​Sagas from the Caucasus: Myths and Legends from the Circassians, Abazas, Abkhaz, and Ubykhs (Princeton University Press, 2016)

Dietrich Cycle

Ian Cumpstey: The Saga of Didrik of Bern (Skadi Press, 2017)

Edward R. Haymes: The Saga of Thidrek (Garland Publishing, 1988)

Wilhelm Wagner: Great Norse, Celtic and Teutonic Legends (2004) 

Katherine M. Buck: The Wayland-Dietrich Saga (1924) 

Lewis Spence: Hero Tales & Legends of the Rhine (1915) 

Donald Mackenzie: Teutonic Myth and Legend (1934) 

Wilhelm Wagner: Epics and Romances of the Middle Ages (1884) 

Henry Weber: Illustrations of Northern Antiquities (1814) 

Comtesse von Günther: Tales and Legends of the Tyrol (1874) 

F.E. Sandbach: The Heroic Saga-Cycle of Dietrich of Bern (1906)

Charlemagne Cycle

Thomas Bulfinch: Legends of Charlemagne (1866)

Luigi Pulci: Morgante: The Epic Adventures of Orlando and His Giant Friend Morgante (Indiana University Press, 1998)

Ludovico Ariosto: Orlando Furioso (Oxford, 1999)

Glyn Burgess: The Song of Roland (Penguin, 2015)

Robert Linker: The Misfortunes of Ogier the Dane (John F. Blair, 1964)

Water Margin

Shi Nai'an: The Water Margin: Outlaws of the Marsh (Tuttle, 2010)

S. L. Huang: The Water Outlaws (Tor Books, 2023)

Romance of Antar

Terrick Hamilton: Antar, a Bedouin Romance (1819)

Princess Fatima

Melanie Magidow: The Tale of Princess Fatima, Warrior Woman (Penguin, 2021)

Attila the Hun

Gárdonyi Géza: Slave of the Huns (Corvina, 2000)

Jómsviking Saga

Lee M. Hollander: The Saga of the Jómsvíkings (University of Texas Press, 1989)

Gulaim and her warrior maidens

David Andresen: Gulaim, Warrior Maiden of Sarkop (Kindle, 2012)

(Of course, there are other hero tale cycles, like King Arthur, the Argonauts, Robin Hood, or the Fianna, but those have a whole lot of sources easily available so I'm skipping them for now)