| Motif | Name | Description |
| b2a | The female earth | The earth is a female person (alone or together with a male person); she is female being or associated with a woman |
| b36a | Two creatures decorate each other | Two zoomorphic personages decorates each other or somebody decorates each of them |
| b38 | The ruined painting | Person paints birds or animals or they paint each other. Some of them are not satisfied with the result |
| b38a | Two birds decorate each other | Two birds decorate each other, one becomes worse than it was before |
| b38c | Raven and loon paint each other | Raven and loon paint each other |
| b38e | Tail base of the loon | Person kicks loon or other water bird. Since then this bird has flat tail base and it walks on dry land with difficulty |
| b70 | Ears of the hare | Person beats hares, foxes or other medium size animals who became helpless (usually closed in his house). Tale explains why tips of the animals' ears or tails have a particular color |
| b82 | The white raven | Raven or other carrion-eating bird of dark color and a similar size was originally white |
| d1 | Female spirit of fire | Fire is personified as an (elder) woman, alone or with her husband, master of fire |
| d13g | Meet seen on teeth | When person laughs, people see his or her monstrous mouth (many teeth, human meat on teeth). They kill the monster or escape from it |
| d13i | Broken tooth | Person knows that the deceiver and trickster has one of his teeth broken. To identify him, person makes others laugh and thus open their mouths |
| d13i1 | Showing his teeth, person betrays himself | Person’s (demonic) nature becomes clear when he or she laughs and shows his or her teeth |
| d1b | Male spirit of fire | The fire is personified as an elder man (alone or with his wife, mistress of fire) |
| e11 | The burned skin | Magic person reveals his true nature and/or remains with the real people after the object responsible for preserving the non-human appearance (usually an animal skin) is destroyed (usually burned) |
| e13 | Drum is a lake | The shaman’s drum is likened with a lake |
| e30 | The make-believe spouse of wood | Person does not have a spouse, uses wooden fakes for his wife or her husband |
| e9 | The mysterious housekeeper | Person observes traces of some activity that takes place in his (rare: her) house in his (her) absence and then takes by surprise the responsible one |
| e9c | Ungulate animal-wife | A man marries a woman who initially has guise of an ungulate animal (buffalo, elk, derr, etc.) |
| e9i1 | Swan-wife | A man marries supernatural woman who is a swan |
| f10 | Vaginal teeth knocked out | Woman has another toothed mouth (usually in vagina) or biting animals in vagina. Man inserts there a stone, bone, stick, etc. breaking or knocking out the teeth or extracting from there dangerous animals |
| f20 | A strong embrace | Man and woman embrace each other forever or for a long time |
| f35a | Feeding with the kin’s meat | Person does not know that he or she eats or cooks the meat of the member of his or her household (blood relation, more rare a spouse or servant) or serves it to his or her friends, or uses her or his bones for everyday needs, or slowly kills him ort her |
| f45 | The Amazons | There are (or were) women who live apart from men in their own village or villages |
| f64b | Incestuous woman | A woman pretends to be a stranger to have sexual relations with her (grand)son, daughter or brother |
| f65 | The false burial | To realize his or her secret desire (illicit sex, refusal to share food with relations), person pretends to die and is abandoned at a burial place |
| f65b | Death feigned to eat burial food | Man pretends to die because he does not want to share food with the others and eats it alone at his burial place |
| f65c | The feigned burial: boy exposes deceit | A man feigns death to marry his daughter or to eat burial food. One of the younger children recognizes the (adoptive) father or gets to see that the false dead is alive (escapes from the burial pyre, laughs, etc.) |
| f65d | The feigned burial: wife does not believe | A man feigns death and is abandoned at the burial place. His wife (mother, aunt) gets to know about the deceit and provokes the man to show that he is alive |
| f66 | The false house | Person’s father, grandson, brother, or sister pretends to be a stranger to commit incest (accordingly with the daughter, grandmother, sister, or brother), or a husband shams to be his wife’s brother because he wants to be taken by her as her blood relative. To realize his or her stratagem, the hero imperceptibly runs to another house where the object of his or her interest later comes and takes him or her for a stranger |
| f7 | The underwater-maiden | Man takes or attempts to take a wife who is connected with the underwater world (fish, crab, snake, water animal and the like) |
| f9 | A dangerous woman | For different reasons, sexual contact with a woman is deadly dangerous for a man |
| f90 | A tragic incest | Brother and sister marry each other. When their children get to know about the incest, they kill their parents, or father kills children, or parents suicide, or wife/sister suicides when her husband/brother has died |
| h6c | The immortal raven | Raven is associated with death or contrasted with people as an immortal with mortals (is sent to the medicine of immortality; drinks itself water of immortality; gives instructions concerning funeral rites; etc.) |
| h6c1 | Valuables in exchange for the nestling | To obtain a desired object, person catches a child or spouse of an animal person (bird, snake, crab) and promises to release it as soon as its parent (spouse)) brings the object |
| i106 | Ursa major is a person | Ursa major is only one anthropomorphic being, not several persons |
| i14 | No-anus people | Person or creature has no anus opening |
| i17 | Body anomalies of inhabitants of a distant land | Beings without mouth, anus, genitals, whose women do not know how to give birth live in the underworld, in the sky, or in a far-away land |
| i19 | People inhale the odor of food | Anthropomorphic beings satisfy their hunger cooking food and inhaling the odor |
| i27 | Chthonic canine | A dog is the lord, guard or guide of/to the land of the dead; or dogs live on the way to the land of the dead |
| i46a | Old woman’s rainbow | Rainbow is associated with an old woman |
| i46c | Rainbow rope | Rainbow is a rope to which a domestic animal is tied |
| i50 | Ungulate animal with more than four legs | An ungulate animal (a horse, an elk, a moose) with six or more legs is described or represented in art |
| i50a | Torn off legs of the helpful animal | Demon tears off or devours one by one legs of aт animal who helps the hero, usually of his riding horse |
| i55 | Stars are openings | Stars are openings in the firmament; holes in dwelling's covering are thought to be stars |
| j1 | The vengeful heroes | Persons avenge the death of their father, mother or other relatives who are one (rare two) generations older than they |
| j30 | Parents’ remains | Before the hero destroys the antagonists or escapes from them, he finds or receives the remains or possessions that belonged to the antagonists' victim |
| j4 | Revenge for the death of the male relatives | Heroes avenge the murder or captivity of the male relatives: (grand)father, uncles, or the elder relatives in general, the loss of the males being the most traumatic |
| j45 | The stretched out leg (crane bridge) | Person stretches his or her leg or neck as a bridge across water body. The fugitives or those who walk ahead cross the bridge; the persecutor or those who are behind usually fall because the person takes his bridge off |
| j46 | Enemy drowns | Antagonist perishes falling into the water or trying to cross a water body |
| j4b | Revenge inside the family | Children (son, sons, son and daughter) of the murdered woman or man revenge on persons who have marital or close kin relations with the victom |
| j63 | Son saves, daughter betrays | Enemies attack household. The master's wife agrees to live with the enemies' leader, her former husband lies alive but tied up. Somebody (usually his daughter) refuses to release him, but other person (usually his son) does it. The man kills the enemies and usually cruelly kills his wife (and daughter) |
| k10 | Fight with the monstrous bird | Monstrous bird (giant bat) predates on humans. Heroes fight with it |
| k102a2 | Conflict between mother and son | Mother tries to kill her son (children) because he interferes with her love affair
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| k24 | Stolen clothes of supernatural woman | Women (rare: men) who possess supernatural power and usually come from a non-human world (from sky, from under the water, they are winged beings, bird- or animal-persons; rare: a girl of higher social status than the hero) take off their clothes (feather skins and the like) or part of it. Because a person hides the clothes (of one of them), their owner(s) have (has) to marry him or help him (rare: her) |
| k25 | Magic wife | A man consciously marries a woman related to the non-human world |
| k25a1 | Magic wife finds her clothes | Magic wife abandons her mortal husband when she finds her clothes (often, her feathers if she is a bird-woman), makes herself the new clothes, receives them from her kin or her husband gives her her clothing believing that she will not abandon him. (Versions with magic wife abandoning her husband because she feels herself offended is not alternative to the “found clothes but in most of the texts these motifs are not combined) |
| k25a5 | Two brothers and the swan-maidens | The elder brother is a hunter, the younger brother (rare: sister) stays at home. When the elder gets to know that the bird-maidens visit the younger, he instructs him what he should do to catch one of the girls. The elder brother marries her but she finds her feathered clothes and flies away (in many versions the younger brother is a simpleton and tells his sister-in-law where her clothes are hidden). The elder brother goes away in search of his lost wife |
| k25a7 | Two brothers and the winged maiden | The elder brother is a hunter, the younger one is a housekeeper. When the elder brother gets to catch the winged maiden, the younger foolishly gives her winged back and she flies away. The elder brother sets off to return his wife |
| k27 (motif is not in the correlation table) | Competitions and difficult tasks | Person is suggested to fulfill tasks that are mortally dangerous or cannot be fulfilled without supernatural helpers or capacities. The person fulfills the tasks and remains alive. A contest between persons has form of a competition or game in which the loser is deprived of his status or life |
| k27n | Difficult tasks of the in-laws | A man must fulfill difficult tasks (to win competition) to receive the permission for a marriage |
| k27n3b | Task-giver lives in the sky but is not the Sun, Moon, Thunder or Wind | Person who gives difficult tasks or tests to the hero or heroine lives in the sky but is not associated with the Sun, Moon, Thunder or Wind |
| k27o1 | Head used as ball | Severed human heads are compared with balls or used as balls |
| k27s | Contest: a race | Contest: a race |
| k28 | Father or uncle is rival and enemy | Maternal uncle or father (or grandfather if he replaces father who is not mentioned) of the young man is his rival or enemy and tries to kill him |
| k29a | Surviving in a fire | Hero demonstrates his supernatural abilities remaining alive in a burning hot chamber, stove, bonfire, among burning vegetation |
| k30 | Flying enemy abducts woman | Flying person or creature abducts a woman but is ultimately killed or the woman escapes from him |
| k32 | The false wife | An ugly, old, lazy, etc. woman or (in Chaco) a male trickster comes to man under disguise of his wife or bride who is driven out, confined to the underworld, killed, etc. |
| k32a | Travelling man leaves his wife or daughter for a short time | A man travels with his wife or daughter. Another woman or a demonic person replaces her when the man goes away for a short time or (rare) falls asleep |
| k44b | Returning after long absence, person throws food to his mother | Coming home after a long absence, the hero (rare: heroine) peeps into his house and sees his mother (his parents, her husband) who suffers hunger. He or she throws food inside, extinguishes the fire, pushes aside, etc. Usually those who are inside do not understand what is happening |
| k60a | How strong are these bonds? | Person lets be firmly tied up when another one say that it's only a joke (e.g. a test to see can the first one break bonds) |
| k66c | The bear takes human spouse | The bear (lion) takes a woman for sexual partner or the she-bear takes a man. They have children who look like humans or bear cubs. More rare the woman gives birth to her son in the bear den because being abducted by the bear she was pregnant |
| k75 | The youngest daughter is willing (The loathsome bridegroom) | A girl (usually the youngest of several sisters) does not reject but marries a poor, sick, dirty, old, too young, non-human, etc. man who later demonstrates his supernatural qualities |
| k80 | Repetitive reincarnation | Person (usually a young woman) turns into different objects or creatures which another person destroys one by one. However, the person is reincarnated again and again and ultimately acquires her or his original form |
| k86 | Weeping child stolen | Because a small child is ignored or punished by its parents (usually it cries late in the evening), bush spirit or animal carries it away |
| l100c | Duped visitors of a chaste woman | When a man comes to a beautiful woman she tricks him by asking to finish some trivial task, keeping him by her magic in an awkward or ridiculous position until daylight. Episode is repeated next nights with other or (rare) the same suitor. Usually the first suitor being ashamed tells the other that everything was nice, so all of them are humiliated the same way |
| l18 | Multi-headed bird | A bird with two or more heads on top of one body is described in tales or represented in art |
| l38 | Demon’s trap | A demon puts a trap to catch people, hero gets into it |
| l38a | A sticky trap | Person sticks to an object, usually touching it one by one with his body members. The object is a trap of demonic creature or is a non human creature itself |
| l41 | Hero escapes on the way | An ogre or ogress catches a person and carries his or her prey home but the person escapes on the way or immediately after reaching the ogre's house |
| l42 | Hero carried to ogre’s home | An ogre or ogress catches a person and brings him to his or her home where he or she plans to cook and eat him. The hero escapes |
| l42b | Credulous children of the ogre | An ogre's child or (rare) wife believes in what hero tells him (or her) and releases him. Usually the hero kills the child and puts its meat to cook in the very pot where the ogre planned to cook the hero |
| l42c | Now in, now outdoors | Person hides from the powerful one now in his house, now outdoors, the powerful cannot catch him |
| l56 | Fire in monster’s belly | A monster or a big animal dies when fire is kindled in its belly |
| l65a | The cannibal sister | A girl born to the family or found proves to be a monster, devours people. Her brother escapes, (usually marries and returns home, finds that everybody had been eaten up), runs away, she pursues him but cannot get |
| l65a1 | Horse’ legs eaten off | A demonic person devours in succession parts of the hero’s horse, each time coming back to the hero and returning again to the horse. (Often asking the hero, if he has ridden on a three-. two-. one-legged horse) |
| l65b | Dogs save their master | A demonic woman or (rare) her paramour or a monster is going to kill a man usually after driving him up a tree. At the last moment the man's dogs or other animals or birds who are the man's pets come and kill the demon |
| l65b3 | The escape on the tree | Persons climbs a tree and thanks to this escapes from a demon (who usually tries to fell the tree) |
| l65c | Cannibal elder sister | The eldest of three or more sisters becomes a cannibal and devours her sisters and other people |
| l65d | Younger sister of cannibal woman | When the elder sister becomes a cannibal, the younger one (temporarily) escapes. Cf. motifs L1B, L65C |
| l72 | The obstacle flight | Running away from a dangerous being, person throws small objects behind him or her which turn into mighty obstacles on the way of the pursuer |
| l72a | Comb becomes a thicket | Running away from a dangerous being, person throws a comb (a brush) that turns into mighty obstacle (usually a thicket) on the way of the pursuer. (In South America the motif is probably of European origin) |
| l72h | Obstacle flight: the thrown fire-stone | Running away from a dangerous being, person throws a tool (fire-stone, matches, tinder) creating an obstacle on the way of the pursuer. (A flint is considered as a fire-producing tool and ignored as a hard stone that turns into mountain or rock) |
| l73 | Ogre tries to drink a river dry and bursts | The antagonist tries to drink a river or sea and bursts |
| l73c | A towel opens or blocks the pass | Waving a piece of cloth (throwing it on the ground, putting on water, etc.) person creates obstacles (on the way of the pursuer) or a means to overcome them (bridge, dry path between waters, etc.) |
| l85 | One-sided people | One-sided people have one leg and/or also one arm, one half of a head, etc. The second leg is not cut or burned off, preserved as a stump but is absent completely |
| l90 | Mouth from the earth to the sky | Monster's upper lip (fang, horn, etc.) touches the sky, lower touches the ground |
| m101 | Some are afraid of men, and some of partridges | The bear answers the fox (rare sable or wolf) that he is not afraid of the men (often says that he is afraid of the partridges when they fly up suddenly). When the bear attacks a man, he is wounded or killed. Cf. motif M101A |
| m123d | Raven the filth-eater | Raven is going to marry a girl but is rejected after they see that he eats filth |
| m140 | The theft of fish | Trickster pretends to be dead, sick or weak and is picked up by those who carry something edible in a cart (sledge, boat, bag, etc.). The trickster secretly eats the food, often after throwing it out of the cart (sledge, etc.) |
| m140a | The fox ties his companion | The fox lives with an old man or the wolf, ties him by deception and runs away |
| m171 | The profitable exchange: from a pea to a horse | Person or animal stays for a night and the next morning declares that his possessions (which value is none or negligible) are lost. Or other persons whom the trickster meets really use or spoil objects that the trickster gives them. Every time he receives in compensation objects or animals with ever bigger value, the last acquisition usually being a costly animal or a girl. (All texts with motifs M171A and M171C contain also the motif M171) |
| m171b | Shoulder-blade with no meat | Person pretends that he has not a bare should-blade but a good piece of meat, asks people to cook it and then blames them for stealing the meat |
| m29a | Trickster-raven | In episodes related to deception, absurd, obscene or anti-social behavior the protagonist is raven |
| m29b | Trickster-fox, jackal or coyote | In episodes related to deception, absurd, obscene or anti-social behavior the protagonist is fox, jackal or coyote |
| m29b2 | The bear is a failure/enemy | Because of its stupidity or unsocial behavior, the bear suffers a reverse, is injured or dies |
| m39a | Fool takes off boots from animals’ legs | Two or three brothers live together (with their mother). One of them makes stupid actions like (all or some of them): lets free animals that got into a snare but kills his mother; cuts off the legs of domestic animals or flays them; thinks that a certain place on a head of a baby is a tumor, sucks baby's brains out; cuts a cloth into pieces and ties them to reeds of to branches of a tree; hearing a murmur of water throws food into the water; tries to build a hut not on a river bank but in the river |
| m39b | Fool attacks his own dwelling | Person does not put attention in which direction his canoe goes. As a result he returns to his own dwelling and attacks its inhabitants killing his own kin |
| m39b1 | Paddling in both directions | Persons sitting in a canoe paddle in opposite directions and the canoe does not move |
| m45a | Old man and animals | A man falls asleep or pretends to be sleeping or dead. Animals take him for dead: mourn, carry to bury, are going to eat up, etc. The man kills a lot of animals or obtain valuables otherwise |
| m57a | Beads discharged from the body | Instead of common body discharges a man or a woman urinates, spits, etc. beads, flowers, gold and other valuables; valuables are produced by the very presence of particular person |
| m57a3 | Female person is the producer of valuables | Instead of common body discharges a a woman urinates, spits, etc. beads, flowers, gold and other valuables; valuables are produced by the very presence of particular female person. See motif m57a |
| m60b | False doctor: a finished off victim | The deceiver who promised to cure a sick or wounded person or animal devours him or suggests a remedy that makes the sick one to feel ever worse |
| m91 | The killed corpse | Person pretends that a person (often his or her mother, spouse or lover) who recently died is alive, claims that the death of the false alive resulted from negligence of others and gets a reward |
| m91c1 | Herd from the river bottom | Person gets other person’s possessions by trick (or pretends to get it; usually another person is drowned instead of him) and then demonstrates his possessions (usually a herd) and explains that he had received everything at the river bottom. His enemies believe him |
| m91c2 | Put into the bag | Person is put into a bag (a cage, tied up, etc.) to be drowned, burned, etc. He pretends to be in this situation by his own will or because he refuses to marry a princess, to become a chief and the like. Another person is willing to take his place and is killed |
| m91c4 | Pot that does not need fire to cook | Man takes a pot from the fire but it is still boiling or he cooks the food beforehand and tells that his pot cooks it in no time (or that his stick touching ground creates the food). Another man buys the pot (the stick) |
| m94 | Sliding downhill | One person or animal suggests another to slide downhill to kill or harm him or her |
| m94a | Sliding downhill: victims of antagonist | A demonic person provokes his victims to slide downhill and kills them |
| n10 | The transparent body | A woman (rare: a man) with transparent body is described. This transparence is an evidence of the beauty |
| n10c | Inner organs are seen through the body | Inner organs of a girl or food that she swallowed are seen through her body. This transparence is an evidence of the beauty. |
| n5 | They recognize winter by rime, summer by rain | Long trips, campaigns, flights or battles are described using cliché which contain expressions like “they get to know that it is winter seeing rime, that it is summer, seeing rain” and the like |