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Welcome to the library guide for Fairy Tales,
Folklore, Myths, and Legends!
Use the links in the table of contents to find definitions, topic overviews, books, articles, web resources, research advice, and more. Throughout the guide you'll find links and call numbers for resources we have in the STCC library. Anywhere you see the 
icon, hover your mouse over it to find out more information about that source. Also, all of the images scattered around the pages are links you can follow to learn more about them!
If you don't find what you are looking for or need help navigating this guide, please use the Ask a Librarian box for library contact info.
Good luck with your research!
Folklore is a basket term for “the rituals, songs, stories, legends, and popular practices handed down orally from one person to another, rather than through written transmission.”¹ People have told fictional stories as a form of entertainment for millennia, and though generally performed and passed on orally, evidence of such tales appear in some of the earliest written records from the ancient Sumerian and Egyptian cultures. Greek tales, such as Homer’s Odyssey, were performed for centuries before being written down. Asian folktales date at least to the beginning of the first millennium BCE, if not much earlier, and exhibit influences from Taoism, Confucianism, Buddhism, and earlier traditions.
Please see the Definitions Page for a full breakdown of the different types of folklore you will encounter.
1. Christine Goldberg, “Folktale,” Encyclopedia of Folklore and Literature, edited by Mary Ellen Brown and Bruce A. Rosenberg (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 1998).
Tales from the Lilypad
Listen to one of your favorite fairy tales from Bedtime Stories Podcast. Put those speakers on! You can listen to tales like “Snow White and Rose Red,” “The Princess and the Pea,” and “Goldie Locks and the Three Bears.”
Take the Fairy Tale Quiz to test your knowledge!
Find out which fairy tale character you are with the Fairy Tale Personality Quiz.