fable
Didactic animal story
A fable is a short story that teaches a moral lesson, typically featuring animals who speak and act like humans.
Aesop's fables—the tortoise and the hare, the fox and the grapes—established the form.
By extension, fable can mean any fictitious tale or falsehood: His account of that night was pure fable.
The adjective fabled means legendary or famous: the fabled city of El Dorado.
Unit of teaching
- moralConcerning right conduct
- wisdomGood judgment from experience
- proverbTraditional saying expressing truth
- cautionaryServing as warning
parable · maxim · precept · teaching · virtue · axiom · advice · principle
Spoken or written narrative
- narrativeAccount of events
- storyAccount of events
- allegorySymbolic tale with deeper meaning
- parableInstructive allegorical narrative
folklore · fiction · yarn · anecdote · bedtime · retelling · narrator · storyteller
Ancient Greek fable writer
- tortoiseLand-dwelling shelled reptile
- hareLarge wild lagomorph
- foxCunning wild canine
- crowLarge black corvid
ant · grasshopper · wolf · lion · mouse · stork · frog · goose
Deliberately untrue statement
- fictionImagined narrative work
- tall taleWildly exaggerated story
- inventionNew device or method
- untruthA false statement
myth · fantasy · embellishment · exaggeration · concoction · yarn · whopper · story
lesson
Unit of teaching
- moralConcerning right conduct
- wisdomGood judgment from experience
- proverbTraditional saying expressing truth
cautionary · parable · maxim · precept · teaching · virtue · axiom · advice · principle · guidance
tale
Spoken or written narrative
parable · folklore · fiction · yarn · anecdote · bedtime · retelling · narrator · storyteller · plot
Aesop
Ancient Greek fable writer
crow · ant · grasshopper · wolf · lion · mouse · stork · frog · goose · swan
fabrication
Deliberately untrue statement
untruth · myth · fantasy · embellishment · exaggeration · concoction · yarn · whopper · story · made-up
anthropomorphism
Attributing personality to things
trickster · predator · prey · personification · creatures · woodland · barnyard · jungle · clever · foolish
antiquity
Great age, ancient era
folklore · papyrus · tablets · Sumerian · Babylonian · Greek · Roman · Indian · La Fontaine · African
- fantasywizard, witch, magic, dragon, elf
- storiesstory, tale, tales, myth, legend
- talestale, funny stories, tall tales, short story, yarns
- folklorefairy tales, fairytales, folktales, folk tales, folk tale
- folktalesfolktales, folktale, fairy tales, fairy tale, ghost tales
- literary formsnovel, novels, novella, poetry, poetry collections
fablefact
Verifiable piece of information
truth · reality · non-fiction · actuality · history
fablehistory
Record of past events
non-fiction · chronicle · documentary · journalism · biography
fablenovel
New and unusual
epic · saga · realist fiction · literary fiction · psychological drama
- animal fableMoral story with talking creatures
- moral fableDidactic story with lesson
- Aesop's fablesAncient Greek moral stories
- children's fablesShort moral stories for youth
- classic fablesAncient morality stories
- Aesop fablesMoralistic animal stories
fabulous, fabled, affable, fables, ineffable, affability, affably, fabulist, ineffably