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Five Fables: Billy Connolly voices an enchanting animation series based on medieval texts rediscovered by the late Seamus Heaney

24 August 2018

Narrated by Billy Connolly, Five Fables is an ambitious re-telling of stories written over 500 years ago by the medieval Scots poet, Robert Henryson.

The Morall Fabillis of Esope the Phrygian was a series of tales written in Scots based on even older stories by the ancient Greek storyteller Aesop.

When the late Irish poet Seamus Heaney caught a glimpse of Henryson’s manuscript, he was mesmerised.

Heaney was so taken by the stories that he wrote his own updated versions, incorporating the language and landscape of his home country. These were then adapted further for an animated series, Five Fables.

Aesop’s fables have had an extraordinary journey through the ages – from Ancient Greece to modern Ireland via medieval Scotland – but the message at the core of each tale has remained relevant as they’ve passed down generations.

And the moral of the story? The old tales are the best.