Aladino: FRAUDE!

Estava a ler um livro do Orhan Pamuk (The Black Book) quando encontrei uma passagem que me chocou pelo que revelava:

Pelos vistos, a estória de Aladino, das Mil e Uma Noites, não fazia parte das Mil e Uma Noites, tendo sido adicionada pelo tradutor francês, e a partir daí incorporado o texto.

A investigação na net revelou o seguinte na Wikipedia (link):

«No medieval Arabic source has been traced for the tale, which was incorporated into The Book of One Thousand and One Nights by its French translator, Antoine Galland, who heard it from an Arab Syrian Christian storyteller from Aleppo. Galland's diary (March 25, 1709) records that he met the Maronite scholar, by name Youhenna Diab ("Hanna"), who had been brought from Aleppo to Paris, France by Paul Lucas, a celebrated French traveller. Galland's diary also tells that his translation of "Aladdin" was made in the winter of 1709–10. It was included in his volumes ix and x of the Nights, published in 1710.»

Mas o engano não acaba aqui, ohpoisnão! Acredite-se ou não, o Aladino era chinês!!

«Note that although it is considered an Arabic tale either because of its source, or because it was included in The Book of One Thousand and One Nights, the characters in the story are neither Arabs nor Persians, but rather are from "China". The country in the story is however an Islamic country, where most people are Muslims.»

E pior que tudo, era um malandro! Veja-se o texto: «There was [once] in a city of the cities of China a man, a tailor and poor, and he had a son by name Alaeddin, who was perverse and graceless from his earliest childhood.» (link)

Lembro-me de ser gaiato e ter um livro do "Ali Baba e os Quarenta Ladrões", no entanto. Dessa, quase me lembro das ilustrações quando o sésamo se abre. Um lugar secreto e mágico, repleto de perigos.