| Motif | Name | Description |
| a32 | Figure on lunar disc | 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) |
| a32d | Man in the Moon | Human being or imprint of human being is seen in the moon |
| a32e | Person with an object in hands | Person who holds some object in his or her hands is seen in the moon (rare: in the sun) |
| a44 | Moon the protector | A person pursued by an enemy or tyrannized by others asks the Moon to take her or him to the sky. The request is granted and the person is now seen in the Moon |
| b124 | Depression on human foot | Since a piece of flesh was torn off from somebody’s foot, there is a depression beteen toes and heel |
| b2f | Difficult funerals | (While the earth is still absent or liquid), a bird buries its relative in its own head that usually explains its appearance (a swell on its beak, a crest of feathers) or unpleasant smell |
| b2f2 | Carrying the unburied corpse | Person carries a dead body for a long time having no possibility to bury it or being ignorant how to do it but ultimately buries the corpse in the earth |
| 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) |
| 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 |
| e9d | Dog-wife | Man marries a girl who initially has guise of a dog |
| e9e | Puppy as a reward | Youth gets to supernatural beings, rejects any treasure, asks for a puppy, a dog's skin, a fruit, etc. When he returns home, the puppy (skin, etc.) turn into magic wife |
| f2 | Pregnant limb | Child is born from a tumor or swelling on person's body (on thigh, knee, finger, etc.) or is temporarily placed there or child grows from blood that flew out from a cut |
| 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 |
| f62 | Incognito at the feast | An (ostensibly) sick (ugly, weak, poorly clad) person remains at home when others go to the feast. The person comes by himself or herself looking like a handsome man or beautiful girl. The man (woman) does not recognize him (her) and feels against her (him) sexual interestю (All texts with motif k57, Chinderella, are also included into f62) |
| h44 | Demonic spouse cuts in two her offpring from human being | Human person becomes a wife (husband) of a demonic being. When they part with each other, the demon cuts (wants to cut) their offpring in two |
| i120b | Extracting values from animal’s ear | Person takes from the ear of an animal (usually a horse or a cow) food, clothes and other valuables |
| i13d | Hibernating with snakes | A man gets into the dwelling of snakes and after a long time escapes or is permitted to go. In While in the dwelling of snakes, he usually licks a special stone that allows to live without water and food |
| i48a | Falling down into the underworld | At the terminal part of the narrative the antagonist of the hero descends into the underworld |
| i7 | The cloud serpent | A flying reptile produces rain, thunderstorm |
| j47b | The two ropes | A strong rope (chain, etc.) is thrown to the person pursued by a demon but a rotten rope is thrown to the pursuer. The person is saved and the demon falls down (drowns) and dies |
| k102 | Woman associated with the hero conspires in favor of his enemy | A woman who initially is friendly to the hero (his mother, sister, more rare his wife, sexual partner) begins to cooperate with his enemy. For this she provokes the hero to do something that is mortally dangerous for him |
| k102a2 | Conflict between mother and son | Mother tries to kill her son (children) because he interferes with her love affair
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| k103 | Helpful cow | Cow (ox, bull) helps an orphan child or a young woman who got into trouble |
| k103d | To enter an ear of the horse, to take something from an ear of the cow | An animal (a demonic being) asks the hero or heroine to take objects necessary for him (her) from its ear or to enter its ear to make himself or herself handsome, to sleep. etc. |
| k119 | Animal helper marries a poor boy to a princess | To make a poor man rich (usually to marry him to a rich girl or to marry a poor girl to a prince), an animal makes other people believe that the groom is rich already. The man becomes prosperous indeed |
| k119a | The ungrateful master | An animal saves a man or helps him but the ungrateful man humiliates the animal, kills or tries to kill it |
| k131 | Men fight over magic objects | A man on a journey meets tree or two persons who are quarreling over the division of magic objects (a flying carpet, seven mile boots, etc.). The man promises to render a judgment, but he asks first to try our the objects or suggests the owners to run a race and uses opportunity to escape with the objects |
| k25 | Magic wife | A man consciously marries a woman related to the non-human world |
| 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 |
| k27g4 | To plow, to sow and to reap in one day | During impossibly short time person must to realize all works of agricultural cycle and to present food made of new crops |
| k27hh | To sort grain | A task: to sort a large amount or small particles of different kind (usually seeds of different plants) mixed in container or to count such particles or to pick up the spilled grains |
| k27q | Milk of the wild beast | Hero is sent to bring milk of a wild animal or milk in possession of a dangerous creature or person |
| k27x3 | The man persecuted because of his beautiful bride | A powerful person coverts a beautiful bride or wife of a man and gives him impossible tasks to get rid of 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. |
| k33 | Drowned woman remains alive | A young woman is transformed into an animal, pushed into the water, into the underworld or she herself has to plunge into water (acquire animal form). Her connection with the human world is not completely lost, however, and usually she is helped to return to the people |
| k33g | Fruits of two kinds | One who eats certain fruit (leave, etc.) gets horns (long nose, etc.) or turns into an animal. After eating another fruit (leave) person recovers his or her normal body |
| k33h | The cat, the dog and the magic object | 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) |
| k34 | Fatal swing | Person kills others inviting them to sit on a swing and launching them into water, on rocks, etc. |
| k38 | Hero helps the nestlings | For helping its children, their powerful mother or father who is a giant bird or (rare) other flying being helps the hero |
| k38b | The nestlings and the aggressive snake | A serpent or water monster regularly devours or injures children of a bird or other flying creature (almost always nestlings of giant bird). The hero kills the serpent (monster) |
| k38c | Bird brings the hero to his destination | After the hero helps a powerful bird (usually does good to her nestlings), the grateful bird brings him to the place where he is eager to get or tells to do it one of her nestlings. (It is not the vertical movement between layers of the world. According to the Sumerian variant, the bird endows the hero with capability to move with extraordinary speed and directs him to his destination) |
| k56 | The kind and the unkind girls | One of (step)sisters, co-spouses or young female neighbors meets a being that is able to reward and to punish. She behaves herself properly and is rewarded. Another (other) girl comes to the same being but behaves in a wrong way and is punished (not rewarded). |
| k56a | The unworthy girl fails, the worthy one succeeds | Two or three sisters are sent in succession to powerful person. The first or the first and the second sister behave in a wrong way, perish or do not succeed. The last one behaves correctly, gets a reward |
| k56b | The worthy man is rewarded, the unworthy punished | First one, then another man meets a powerful person or persons. The first man is worthy and rewarded with treasure, prestige or the like. The second man (or two men) follows him, behaves in a wrong way and is punished |
| k60b | Invitation to coffin | Person is lured into a trap being invited to lie in a box or a hole to measure it. Being unable to liberate himself from the box etc., the person remains in power of his enemies |
| k66 | Extraordinary companions | Several companions have extraordinary abilities (one who runs fast, one who eats great quantities, one who produces or can withstand severe frost, etc.); a hero comes across and takes for companions several men, each of them being involved into a special and unusual activity |
| k67d | Flight of the master with his goods in the bag | A master (ogre, devil, wife) tries to get away from his farmhand (her husband). The farmhand hides in the master’s bag (chest) so that the master unwittingly takes him along |
| k74 | Hero, his companions and a dwarf | The hero and his companion or companions live together. Every morning one stays at home while another or others go to hunt, etc. A demonic person comes, eats up all the food and beats the cook. Or the man who remained at home comes to the demon himself in search of fire and is maltreated by him. The hero kills or neutralizes the demon |
| 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 |
| k76 | A strange son | 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 |
| k76a | Frog as a marriage partner | Frog or toad marries a girl or a handsome youth marries a frog or road |
| k77a | Small objects and animals defeat the ogre | Small objects and animals (rare: animals alone but including those who really are harmless) revenge on a powerful enemy making attack on him in succession (usually they hide in his or her house); the enemy is badly injured, runs away or dies |
| 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 |
| k90 | The black and the red ones | A man gets to see two fighting monsters or animals (usually of contrasted colors like red and black, black and white). He helps one of them and/or one of them helps him |
| k95 | The twining branches (united in death) | Two persons who loved each other (usually a man and a girl) are buried in one grave or not far from each other. After the burial something related to this event takes place (two plants grow up and stretch their branches to each other, smoke of two funeral pyres is merged, two birds flu out from the grave, two stars appear on the sky, etc.) |
| l100e | The lover, the husband and the guest | Before coming in, a guest gets to notice that the housewife is with her lover. When the husband comes home, the guest pretends to possess magic object or the like that helps him to reveal where the good food and the lover are hidden |
| l15d | The external soul | Life of a person or creature is preserved outside of his (her, its) body. Person or creature dies after the corresponding object is destroyed |
| l39 | Hero is compelled to descend from a tree | When a person climbs a tree, a demon comes to it and carries the person away, or the person follows the demon to his world by his own will |
| l39d | To pass an apple from hand to hand | A boy climbs a tree to eat fruits. A demon asks him to share the fruits with her (him) but not to throw them to the ground but give them from hand to hand. The demon grabs the boy and carries him away |
| 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 |
| l41a | Stone in basket | Hero escapes from the demon's basket or bag letting stone (a piece of wood, some sand) instead of him |
| 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 |
| l42e | Caught again | An ogre catches a person and carries his or her prey home but the person escapes on the way. The ogre comes back, this time carries the person to his home. Or the ogre catches a group of children, most of them escape on the way, one is brought to the ogre's place |
| l44b | The blind got his sight, the lame got his legs | A blind man and a lame man live together and help each other. When they got mortally scared or became to fight with each other, their eyes and legs were cured |
| l45 | Duped watchman | An ogre or a stronger animal catches a man or a weaker animal or drives him into a small enclosure and goes away for a time leaving a watchman. The hero dupes the watchman, escapes. (Most, though hardly all American cases can have post-Columbian African origin) |
| 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) |
| 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 |
| l81 | Demon’s fire | Person sets off in search of fire and finds it in the house of a demon. The demon makes harm to the person |
| l81a | Cat brings a misfortune | Because a girl or young woman offends a cat (rare: a dog, a cock), it plays a trick that brings the girl a misfortune (usually extinguishes the fire and in search of it the girl gets to a demon) |
| l93c | Helpful monkey | Cunning monkey saves person, helps him or her |
| l94 | Child promised to demon | A demon helps a man or a woman or lets him or her free. As a reward, the person is forced to promise to give the demon his child |
| m106f | A guest from the paradise | A stranger tells a woman that he comes from the other world and had seen there her dead relative. The woman gives him money and goods for the latter. Usually when her husband goes after the trickster to retrieve the money, the trickster steals his horse |
| m109 | The tail-fisher | Animal person puts his tail (penis) down and waits in hope to get something edible. The tail (penis) is torn or cut off, the person escapes or dies |
| m113 | For certain bird water is taboo | During the hottest month of the summer or permanently birds of certain species are prohibited to drink from the water bodies. Usually they can quench their thirst only from rain drops and dew on leaves and cry calling for rain |
| m118 | Source of values is destroyed imprudently | Person or animal gets access to values that are inside an animal, a tree, a rock or other enclosure. Later he himself or more often somebody else tries to do the same but destroys source of values, blocks access to it or makes it too dangerous |
| m124 | A bull’s tail | Person buries a tail or head of a bull or other domestic animal with a tail or horns outside. He explains that the animal sank into the ground and usually asks the others to pull the tail (horns). When they are “torn off”, he tells that people are guilty of the animal being lost |
| m144 | The wasp nest as king’s drum | One animal person gets to convince another that dangerous or disgusting objects are attractive and delicious (a wasp nest is a drum, a snake is a girdle, a heap of dung is a delicacy, etc.) |
| m152 | Why only one wolf? | When a weak animal or a person gets to see a predator animal or an ogre, he says in a loud voice (or asks to say his wife or children) something that frightens the predator (ogre): why the predator (ogre) brought to him is lean (small; only one instead of several), or it is good that more food gets to his house, etc. The predator (ogre) runs away |
| m152a | Animal tied to another for safety | A stronger and a weaker predator animals (ogre and an animal) tie together for safety. When the stronger one runs away, he drags the weaker one along with him |
| m154b | The man who does his wife's work | Husband remains home instead of his wife (rare: son instead of his mother) but does everything wrong so as he suffers a series of accidents |
| m193 | Flight inside pumpkin | To pass unnoticed dangerous animals on his or her way back, person crawls into a gourd, a big cattle, etc. and is rolling inside it along the road, or he walks transforming his appearance in a bizarre way |
| m29o1 | The monkey is a failure | Because of its stupidity and unsocial behavior, the monkey suffers a reverse, is injured or dies |
| m29w1 | The leopard is a failure | Because of its stupidity and unsocial behavior, the leopard (panther) suffers a reverse, is injured or dies |
| m38 | Stupid imitation (all versions) | Person sees how others act using magic or according to their animal nature. He or she imitates their actions and gets into trouble. Actions are not heroic deeds, competitions or tests and refer to everyday activity, mostly to providing and cooking food |
| m38a2 | The hen cooks her eggs | The hen (other bird) cooks her own eggs and serves them to other animal persons (who imitated her with disastrous consequences) |
| 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 |
| m57c | Gold producing animal | An animal (ass, cow, horse, goat, bear, leopard) extracts gold or food from its body or person makes others believe that it is so |
| m57d | Beat, cudgel! | Person gets one by one magic objects that bring food or treasure. Other people replace them with common objects or take them away by force. The person takes his property back (usually beating the thieves with magic cudgel or whip) |
| m57d1 | Bird presents objects and fulfills wishes | A bird gives a man several magic objects in succession (or one object which helps to get others) or fulfills in succession a series of his wishes |
| m74 | Vomits compared | Two animals or persons compare their vomits to know about the diet and habits of each other. The weaker one gets to exchange vomits, to swallow the unusual food before, or to swallow his partner's vomits |
| m77 | A soiled bed | While person is asleep, another smears with excrements or something that reminds excrements his or her bed or clothes. The ashamed person runs away or agrees to make what the trickster wants in exchange of his silence |
| m78 | A tiny boy (Thumbling) | Tiny boy as small as a thumb, a pea and the like taunts people, predator animals, ogres |
| m78a | Tail-boy | A wee boy is a transformed tail of a sheep or goat |
| m81 | Blind persons | A man travels and comes to two or several blind (usually old) persons |
| m81e | Not to graze animals on the ogre's land | The young man takes the job of grazing animals and is warned not to cross the border of the ogre’s land. The hero ignores the warning and overcomes the ogre |
| m81e1 | The hero brings to the old man his stolen eyes | Young man lives with an old man whose eye(s) were stolen by an ogre. The youth comes to the ogre, kills him, brings the stolen eyes and the old man gets to see again |
| m94b | Wolf in a basket | Person tricks another to crawl into a basket and closes it. One in a basket is killed or badly injured (usually rolled down a hill) |