The Sun is female, the Moon is male or (more rare) also female
Human being or imprint of human being is seen in the moon
Person who holds some object in his or her hands is seen in the moon (rare: in the sun)
A figure or an imprint of some being or object are seen in the Moon. (For statistical analysis motifs A32A – A32J are also included into A32)
Person who had been carried up to the moon took hold of a bush or a small tree and is seen now on the lunar disc together with this bush
The Moon-person runs out of the lodge and flies up. He forgets to put his footwear on one foot, or somebody attempts to seize him grasping his foot or cuts the foot off. Now the Moon-person lacks one foot or footwear on one of his (or her) feet
While being transformed into a bird or ascending to the sky a person was in a hurry and put a footwear only on one foot, or somebody attempted to seize him grasping his foot. Now the corresponding bird or a sky-person is believed to have different feet
Water is the original element, the dry earth appears later
Certain stars or constellations are interpreted as hunters, their dogs and game that the hunters pursue
The Belt of Orion is the animal or three animals, other star (of the Orion or outside of this constellation) is the hunter
In context of the Cosmic Hunt myth one of the stars (group of stars) is an arrow or a bullet which hit the animal or three animals identified with the Belt of Orion
One of the stars of the Pleiades was separated from others (usually abducted) by stars of Big Dipper and now is seen among them)
Person turns into the cuckoo so quickly that one of his or her legs remains bare or one of her braids not plaited. Now it is believed that the cuckoo has different legs or wings
Alcor (a weak star near the second star of the handle of the Big Dipper) is selected as a particular sky object
An animal or a person eats up the first book (writing, important document). (In some of European traditions the eating up of the book is not directly described but follows from the context)
People or God get know a secret thanks to listening in its possessor when he speaks aloud with himself or with his relations. The received knowledge is related to cosmogony or acquisition of cultural values
Fire is personified as an (elder) woman, alone or with her husband, master of fire
Certain person is made of improper material and proves to be short-lived or unfit for fulfilling his functions
One of the trees is the principal, original one (emerged before all the other; ancestor of wild or cultivated plants; ocean or rivers inside it; world axis; higher than all the others; overshadows sky)
Stinging insects (rare diseases) had been inside a container or some enclosure. They escaped to the world when the container or enclosure was foolishly opened
The Creator's antagonist demands for himself as much ground as would be enough to put a pole or staff
Dog guards (successfully or unsuccessfully) the (still unfinished) physical body of man or the entrance to paradise
One supernatural creates the body of the first people, another revives them
The sky or the earth rests upon four or five (cardinal points and the center) supports of any kind (poles, mountains, giants)
A turtle, toad, or frog supports the earth (sky) or is its embodiment
A tree or post pierces and unites different layers of the universe
There are objects which remaining on the same place are moving permanently or periodically (meet and part. rise and fall down, shut and open, rotate)
The sky is constantly moving up and down in respect to earth
Migratory birds (or shamans in guise of birds) fly from our world to the outer world through the narrow opening, between clashing rocks, under the edge of the sky which is rising and falling, etc. Many birds perish; and/or the person who lives at this place feeds on these birds; the person can be mistress of birds, lives on another side of the pulsating obstacle
The name of the Venus is like Čolpan, Čolbon, Tsulmon, etc.
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
A man must fulfill difficult tasks (to win competition) to receive the permission for a marriage
Person who gives difficult tasks to the hero and/or person who demands the fulfillment of certain conditions from those who want to marry his daughter is a prominent figure in social hierarchy. He is a head of the socio-political unit of community or super-community level and is neither a member of the hero’s household nor a mythical being
A man obtains an object that fulfills his wishes. The object is stolen but brought back by the animals (which had been saved by the man before)
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
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
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
Person hides from the powerful one now in his house, now outdoors, the powerful cannot catch him
Monster's upper lip (fang, horn, etc.) touches the sky, lower touches the ground
A fugitive turns in succession into different animals or objects. A pursuer does the same, every time becoming an animal or a person who is dangerous for the fugitive in his given guise
After an extensive search powerful man finds a smart wife for his son. Being caught by his enemies he sends some a message to his daughter-in-law, the messengers being chosen among the enemies. The young woman understands the real meaning of the received text, destroys the enemies and releases her father-in-law. (In Malagasy version the youngest wife is insyead of the daughter-in-law)
A person sends to his or her kinsmen or spouse through other persons a text or an object. Only the receiver understands the real meaning of words or of the object, saves the sender and/or destroys his enemies
An animal (ass, cow, horse, goat, bear, leopard) extracts gold or food from its body or person makes others believe that it is so
After warning his wife about the planned trick, person lets free a wild animal or bird asking it to pass a message to his wife. Seeing the same (actually another) animal or bird in his companion’s house another man buys the animal for a lot of money
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)
Person is suggested to make clothes of stone or iron or to skin a stone
When a person is suggested to make something and simultaneously not to make it or to make it differently than it could be made at all (to come clothed and naked, with and without a gift, etc.), he or she finds the solution
Person cannot understand why the clothes (firewood, etc.) of another are dry after the rain – he protected them with his own body (during the rain was in a shelter)
Person claims that a man or a male animal had given birth (or is menstruating) or that a female gave birth to a young of another species or that a woman gave birth to an animal
Person proves the absurdity of the claims of another person saying that his or her father (or other man or a male animal) had given or is giving birth or is menstruating
Person demands from the other to bring him an offspring or milk of a male animal
During the night a strong predator (a tiger, a lion, etc.) and a thief not knowing about each other get into stable to steal a domestic animal. The thief takes the predator for domestic animal or for a person and acts accordingly
Person sends a long object that looks identical from each end or is inside a box. Another person is smart enough to give a correct answer
Persons or animals dive or otherwise decend to the lower world to get a desired object and to bring it to earth (besides episodes in the fairytales, cf. motif k27x9)
The dry land (the earth) grows from a small amount of solid substance (sand, clay, dirt and the like) brought from the lower world (usually from the bottom of the ocean)
Dog is responsible for people being mortal or imperfect. Usually the antagonist bribes dog with a warm fur and the dog lets him spoil the half-ready human figures
After creating the bodies of the first people or after getting a conception how to do it the Creator goes away for a while. During his absence another person, because of his or her ignorance or intentionally, spoils the creation or makes himself or herself what the Creator would make in a better way. Usually because of this people are mortal and subject to diseases
In the past a particular groups of people possessed scripture and knowledge that were later lost or the people missed opportunity to obtain them
Becasue sacred book gets wet or sinks when people were crossing a river, it is lost or the text becomes unreadable. Or it is destroyed when people try to dry it or when they go to bath and let it lie on a shore
Female person is incarnation of wind, mother of winds, etc.
A boy born into a family or found by his adoptive parents has a strange guise (ball of meat, nut, bag, half of a man, an animal). He possesses magic power, becomes a handsome man and usually marries a girl of high social status. The magic spouse of a princess originally has a non-human or monstrous appearance
Several young men (usually three brothers) decide to choose wives (usually shooting arrows or throwing objects on the off-chance). The wife of the youngest initially is ugly or non-human (a frog, a snake) but proves to be beautiful enchantress. She and her husband triumph. Or girls choose their husbands and the youngest one gets a youth who has guise of a snake
The nose of anthropomorphic being is like a beak of copper or iron
Person promises to give (sacrifice) to a supernatural the being that will be the first to come to him when he will return home (or something that he has never seen in his house, or an object that he will first see behind the door; etc.). The person thinks that it will be something insignificant but it is his own child
Cumulative tale: a small bird cuts itself with a sharp blade of grass or a thorn and asks the others to punish the plant. Everyone finds an excuse why they cannot do anything (sheep, wolves, boys, etc.). The last one is the wind, it blows making all other persons act
A woman (rare: a man) with transparent body is described. This transparence is an evidence of the beauty
A woman (rare: a man) with transparent body is described: bones are seen through the skin and marrow through the bones. This transparence is an evidence of the beauty
It is told about an ornithomorphic person or creature that he is sitting on several (three or more) trees
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
Demonic person considers a man to blame for treading on the tail of a tale
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
At the terminal part of the narrative the antagonist of the hero descends into the underworld
Closing formula of the folktale: the teller represents himself as being present at the wedding and/or feast, which were organized by characters of the tale
A man consciously marries a woman related to the non-human world
Some migratory birds (or shamns in guse of birds) perish when they reach the border of our world
The acquiring of the earth from the sea bottom or from the lower world, the creation of humans and attempt to spoil it are successive episodes of the same narrative
God sends his enemy to bring earth from the bottom of the waterbody. In the beginning, the enemy or also the god can have guise of birds. When the earth is brought up and dry land created, two persons, now always anthropomorphic, are engaged into confrontation
Creator made human figuers. When he goes away for a time, the anatagonist revives them instead of him. Because of this, humans are mortal (imperfect)
A big reddish star (Betelgeuse or Aldebaran) is associated with an arrow