Note 158 — Appendix. VARIANTS AND ANALOGUES OF THE TALES IN THE SUPPLEMENTAL NIGHTS, VOL. III. (continued 2)

See Thorpe’s “Yule Tide Stories,” Bohn’s ed., pp. 481–486.—Thorpe says that “for many years the Dummburg was the abode of robbers, who slew the passing travellers and merchants whom they perceived on the road from Leipsig to Brunswick, and heaped together the treasures of the plundered churches and the surrounding country, which they concealed in subterranean caverns.” The peasantry would therefore regard the spot with superstitious awe, and once such a tale as that of Ali Baba got amongst them, the robbers’ haunt in their neighbourhood would soon become the scene of the poor woodcutter’s adventure.