Calumniated Wife

The Calumniated Wife is a motif in traditional narratives, numbered K2110.1 in Stith Thompson's Motif-Index of Folk-Literature. It entails a wife being falsely accused of, and often punished for, some crime or sin. This motif is at the centre of a number of traditional plots, being associated with tale-types 705–712 in the Aarne–Thompson–Uther Index of tale-types.

Studies

• Bawden, C. R., 'The Theme of the Calumniated Wife in Mongolian Popular Literature', Folklore, 74 (1963), 488-97 doi:10.1080/0015587X.1963.9716922
• Jonathan Stavsky, '“Gode in all thynge”: The Erle of Tolous, Susanna and the Elders, and Other Narratives of Righteous Women on Trial', Anglia, 131 (2013), 538-61
• Wood, Juliette, 'The Calumniated Wife in Medieval Welsh Literature', Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies, 10 (1985), 25-38