Keloglan Carries the Door

Once upon a time, Keloglan and his mother lived in a village. One day his mother was invited to a wedding in the next village. Before she left, she gave Keloglan strict instructions: "Son, I'm going to the wedding. You stay at home and mind the door. Don't you dare leave the door, or a thief will get in."

For a while Keloglan sat in front of the door. The sun climbed high in the sky, he got hungry and he got bored. From far away came the sound of the wedding drums and pipes. "My mother told me to mind the door," he thought, "but if I take the door with me, I'll still be minding it." He got up, lifted the door off its hinges, swung it onto his back and set off for the wedding house.

When he arrived, everyone nearly split their sides laughing. His mother slapped her knees when she saw him: "Son, I told you to mind the door, not to bring it!" "But Mother, I am minding the door. I haven't taken my eyes off it once," said Keloglan. His mother was cross and amused at the same time. "Go back home now. But it's getting dark and the forest road is dangerous, so be careful."

With the door on his back, Keloglan went into the forest on his way home. He went a little way, he went a long way, and darkness fell. He lost his way. In the distance he saw a fire, and when he came closer he saw forty bandits sitting around it. They were counting the gold they had stolen. Keloglan was frightened. He climbed a tree, door and all, and hid among the branches.

The bandits spread their rugs under the tree and began to cook their supper. Keloglan's door grew heavier and heavier, and his arms grew tired. At one point it slipped from his hands; the door crashed down through the branches and landed right in the middle of the bandits, on top of the fire. Sparks flew up into the air.

The bandits looked up in astonishment. In the darkness Keloglan's shiny head was gleaming in the moonlight. The bandit chief shouted: "Doors are raining from the sky! There's a giant up there with an eye burning like fire!" Keloglan understood what was happening. He made his voice deep and thundered: "Who dares to light a fire in my forest? I'll crush you all under my door!"

Without understanding what was going on, the bandits dropped the gold, the rugs and the cauldrons and fled in every direction. Keloglan climbed down from the tree and picked up his door. Beside the fire lay huge purses full of gold. Keloglan put the purses on the door and, dragging the door like a stretcher, reached his village just before dawn.

When his mother came home from the wedding and saw that the front door was missing, she was alarmed. But when she went inside, she found Keloglan sitting beside the purses of gold. "Son, what are these?" Keloglan told her everything. His mother was amazed: "So whoever minds the door also minds his luck."

The next day Keloglan went to the headman and showed him the gold. The headman recognised the seals on the purses: this was money the bandits had stolen from the villages round about and from passing caravans. Every purse was returned to its owner. The owners were so happy that they gave Keloglan a purse of gold as a present. With that gold Keloglan had a new, strong door made for the house, and he hung the old one in front of the stable as a keepsake.

From that day a saying remained in the village: "Mind the door like Keloglan." In other words, do exactly the job you are given, but take your wits along too. Three apples fell from the sky: one for the one who told this tale, one for the one who listened, and one for Keloglan, who never let go of his door.