Scheherazade
The Sultan is very distrustful of women because of his first wife's impropriety. He marries a new woman each day, and has her killed the next by the Grand-Vizir. Eventually, the Grand-Vizir's own daughter volunteers to become the Sultan's wife in an attempt to stop him, and he reluctantly agrees. Her sister joins her, and asks her to tell a story, which the Sultan allows, and she tells The Story of the Merchant and the Genius.
Scheherazade and the Sultan by Sani ol Molk
Source: Wikipedia
The Merchant and the Genius
A merchant is traveling and, after completing his journey and leaving for home, stops under a tree to rest and eat, drinking from the nearby fountain. The genius comes to him in rage claiming the merchant had killed his son, for which the merchant is sorry. He convinces the genius to spare him for a year so that he may see his family, to which he agrees. After making amends at home, the merchant returns, and is met by dogs and old men, who decide to stay and see what happens. When the genius arrives, one of the old men begins to tell the genius The Story of the First Old Man.
The Hind
The old man travels with a hind, which is his wife. His wife disliked the man's son and his son's mother, so when the man went on a journey, she transformed the mother into a cow, and the son into a calf. The man returned, and requested a cow for a feast, which was the mother, who was killed. He then asked for a calf, which was his son, but he could not kill his son due to the emotion it showed. He then finds out it is his son, and has him transformed, but his wife becomes a hind in return. After this story, the second old man begins to tell The Story of the Second Old Man.
The Two Black Dogs
The two black dogs are the second old man's brothers, who grew jealous of him. They both left on voyages only to return a beggar, though he helped them by giving them some money to replace what they lost. They convinced the old man to travel with them, and he reluctantly agreed. He meets a beautiful wife, and the brothers throw them overboard out of jealousy. His wife was a fairy, who curses them to be dogs for 10 years, which are nearly up. Scheherazade then says the third old man's story is even more magnificent, saving the merchant's life, but she does not know it. In its place, she tells The Story of the Fisherman.
The Fisherman
A fisherman heads out for the day, and his first three casts are unsuccessful. On his fourth and final cast, he happens to capture a lamp with a genius inside. The genius says the fisherman must die for freeing him due to frustration at his length of entrapment. The fisherman asks how such a large genius fit into the lamp, so the genius enters the lamp again, only to be trapped again, and is told The Story of the Greek King and the Physician Douban.
The Greek King and the Physician Douban
A Greek King is a leper who no doctor has been able to cure. A cunning physician offers to help the king, and does so with a polo club by having the king play a game of polo, then bathing and resting for the night. The King's grand-vizir grows jealous of the physician, and attempts to cause the King to distrust the physician, which he sees right through, and tells the grand-vizir a story of King Sindbad's Grand-Vizir: The Story of the Parrot.
The Parrot and the Ogress
A man loved his wife very much, and bought a parrot that would tell all it saw, and had it placed in the room. The parrot told of the wife's actions, who had the parrot distracted by slaves so it would not tell her actions to her husband, who killed the parrot for these apparent lies caused by the distractions. The Vizir hears the story, and tells of a king's son who enjoyed hunting. The son was separated from his Vizir in excitement for a stag, and finds a woman crying. The woman takes him home in a plan to eat him, and he runs away, gets directions from an ogress, and arrives home, where his father has the Vizir killed for abandoning his son.
The Physician's Revenge
The Vizir convinces the King that the physician is there to kill him, and sets up the execution for after the physician prepares for his death. The physician gives the king a book, which is laced with poison, and after his head is cut off, tells the king to read the book, transferring the deadly toxin to him. Thus the king died due to his choice to kill the physician. We return to the fisherman, who lets the genius out on the promise the genius will make him rich in return.
The Sultan and the Fish
The fisherman is taken to a lake, and has great success catching fish, and is told to sell them to the Sultan for massive wealth. However, he can only throw a net once a day. The Sultan is intrigued by the fish, and orders the fisherman to show him this lake, and the Sultan goes off exploring by himself. He discovers a palace covered in black marble, which appears empty. He enters and stumbles on a sad young man who is made partially of black marble, and is therefore unable to leave this building. He proceeds to tell the Sultan his story.
King of the Black Isles
The young man is King of the Black Isles, and married his cousin, an enchantress, who he loved, but who did not love him back. He punished a slave for terrible crimes, and she cried for him for 2 years, turning against the king. She turned him into half black marble in her anger. She also flooded the kingdom, leaving the fish as the colors of the former citizens of the kingdom. The Sultan kills the slave, who is still barely alive, and takes his place when the enchantress enters, and has her free the young man, who runs away happy to be free. He then gets her to unflood the palace and city of the young man's kingdom, and then kills her, freeing them from her. The Sultan is thanked by the young man, and makes the young man his heir when he returns home. The Sultan then makes the fisherman very wealthy for all he did for him.
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