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Trickster Tale

Ananse's Coconut Plot: How Cunning-More-Than-Father Outsmarted His Father with Stinging Ants

1 min read

About this folktale

Ananse's Coconut Plot: How Cunning-More-Than-Father Outsmarted His Father with Stinging Ants is published on Mythopia by Konlan Mikpekoah. The narrative connects to themes and tags including Ghanaian Tales, Ananse, African Stories. Even shorter folktales carry moral and cultural weight: readers often compare how the lesson applies today, and how the same motif appears across regions. If you know another version from your family or community, Mythopia welcomes a respectful retelling so audiences can compare tone, detail, and local wisdom alongside this text.

African folktale illustration – Ananse's Coconut Plot: How Cunning-More-Than-Father Outsmarted His Father with Stinging Ants

Ananse wanted to kill his son Cunning-More-Than-Father.

Cunning-More-Than-Father had gotten away twice,

but Ananse said to Hyena, "Let's try again!"

Cunning-More-Than-Father pretended to be asleep,

but he listened.

"I'll send Cunning-More-Than-Father up the coconut-tree,"

Ananse told Hyena. "You catch him when he comes down."

So Cunning-More-Than-Father filled a bag with stinging ants and hid it in the tree.

Next day Ananse said,

"Son, go get coconuts."

Cunning-More-Than-Father went up the coconut-tree.

Hyena came and waited below.

"Catch the coconuts, Hyena!"

yelled Cunning-More-Than-Father,

and he threw the bag of ants on Hyena.

Hyena screamed and ran away.

Cunning-More-Than-Father had survived again.

THE END...