Riddles are one of the oldest genres in folklore. We can trace them back to ancient Greece and Rome, but they have existed much longer than that. Dialogical form of
question/description – answer, where the question is a challenge to the other person, seems to have been a popular since forever: either in the form of a true riddle, where metaphorical a description is given to provoke an answer, or a joking question, where an answer is not expected to the riddle, but the prime function is an amusement, even laughter, or written forms to guess the meaning of shapes, or thought provoking questions, which are mostly linked to testing knowledge in a witty way. There are many sub-genres of riddles, but this database includes mostly true riddles (witty metaphorical description of object or phenomena; intended to be guessed by reedlee), joking questions (where the prime function is an amusement, even laughter), questions of wisdom (questions which are connected to the knowledge of Bible) and logical riddles (questions linked to math and logic). All of them are taken from the archive of the Slovenian Institute of Ethnology ZRC SAZU. The archive nowadays consists of ca. 2500 units (1413 different types of riddles), which were collected from interviewees, newspapers, fieldwork (Štrekelj collection, Orel team, student fieldwork etc.). The riddles are written in the Slovenian language (some in dialect) and have seven categorisation units: question, answer, archival reference (ŠŽ = Štrekelj collection; UnS = collection of riddles, unpublished manuscript), collector (proper name if it was given in the material), location of collection, date of collection and sub-genre (true riddle, joking question, wisdom question, wisdom joking question, logical riddle). Location and date of collection were only with the riddles where it was given, though there unfortunately weren’t many.
The material is mostly historical and not in use anymore. Only some books or children's magazines bring it to the surface from time to time. Nevertheless, we have a great opportunity to bring digitised material and show, maybe even revive some of them.
ARCHIVAL REFERENCES
Newspapers
Angleček 1899, 1903, 1887
Besednik 1869, 1870, 1871
Cvetje 1852
Goriški Kras
Goriški letnik 1864
Koledarček Mohorske družbe 1861, 1862
Letopis Matice Slovenske 1882-83
Mohorjev koledar 1880, 1881
Novice 1843, 1844, 1845, 1847, 1854
Prijatelj III, 1854
Slavjan 1874
Slovenska bčela III (1852), IV (1853)
Slovenski glasnik 1861, 1858
Nanos 1862
Šolski prijatel 1854
Vedež 1848
Vrtec 1877, 1872, 1888
Books
Bibaugiba, 1996
Koroške uganke 1933 (1946)
Slovenske uganke 1965
Manuscripts
Štrekljeva zbirka
Uganke na Slovenskem
