Folklore plays a crucial role in the preservation of the local heritage, and it can provide valuable information regarding cultural and religious norms, language, and environment of that people. The folktale is one of the many forms of folklore and it represents the product of the individual traditional heritage that originates from a population’s collective cultural imagination and background. In the Arabian Gulf societies, the oral tradition of storytelling has been prominent for a very long time and it has somehow been preserved until fairly recent times. The folktale belongs to the Emirati intangible cultural heritage, and it constitutes a deeply rooted element related to Bedouin tribal clans and to the desertic and maritime environments which characterised the territory. The United Arab Emirates is very attentive to the conservation of their heritage, both at national and international levels. This study provides a socio-cultural and linguistic analysis of the Emirati folktale, based on a sample of three stories from Al-Ain, written in Emirati Arabic, which share a common feature: the wickedness of wives.

The city of Homs, formerly known as Emesa, strategically located in the central region of Syria, has been long linked to a folk belief that portrays its inhabitants as mad and fool. Historical and traditional sources also link the alleged madness and foolishness of the Homsians to the day of Wednesday, the so-called “Day of the Fool” or “Homsians’ Feast”, which is considered a special day. The legend regarding the “Day of the Fool” and its celebration during Wednesdays has been passed down orally in the local culture and its origins likely trace back to ancient times when the city was still called Emesa. Therefore, this article attempts at reconstructing history and origins about this folk belief, and exploring the reasons behind the supposed madness and foolishness of the inhabitants of Homs and their connections to Wednesdays by comparing three studies published after 2000s in Arabic by Homsian intellectuals, namely Al-Aḥmad, Samʽān, and Kadr.