(b)Many popular fairy tales could be more than 4,000 years old. The oldest known tale, The Smith and the Devil, datesback 6,000 years to the Bronze Age. This is a time between the Stone Age and the Iron Age. Dr. Tehrani said, "It’ssurprising that many tales have lived so long without being written down. They are older than the English language andwould have been first told in a language and the language is now gone." Well-known tales like Beauty and the Beast were atleast 4,000 years old. Dr. Tehrani’s research shows that many tales were told in ancient languages, long before they werewritten down. 《adapted from Breaking News on Jan. 24th, 2016 》