The Moon is female or bisexual, the Sun is male
The Sun and the Moon are two persons one of which is pursuing another in the sky or pursued him or her when they were rising to the sky from the earth
Some creature or creatures regularly (sunrise and sunset, summer and winter, lunar phases) or irregularly (solar and lunar eclipses, eschatological events) attack the luminaries or shade their light
During an eclipse or at the sunset the Sun or the Moon are attacked by a reptile (a snake, a lizard, a dragon, a crocodile) or a fish
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)
Person who went to fetch water and/or holds in hands a container for liquid is seen in the moon
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
Dark spots on the lunar disc are dirt, blood, paint, traces of beating, burning, scratching, etc. on the Moon person's body or face (Kiliwa: spots on the Sun) and do not form any particular figure
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
When it becomes warm, a person or animal (bird) decides that the winter is over (most often an old woman goes to graze her animals) but dies of cold or the animals that had been deiven to the pasture die
Old woman is incarnation of winter, is associated with snow, or there are several cold days between winter and spring (or fall) associated with a certain old woman
Every one of the seven main stars of the Ursa mayor is a an adult man
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
Woman makes vain overtures to young man and/or falsely accuses him of sexual abuse. Her husband believes that the young man is guilty, kills or tries to kill him
To accuse a man or boy of (sexual) abbuse, a woman tears her clothes, smears or scratches her body pretending to be attacked
An innocent girl or young woman rejects a man who attempts to seduce her. The man accuses her of loose conduct, ultimately the truth comes to light
A horse eats people or is associated with antagonist of the God
Thunder is produced by dragging behind a dry animal skin or (rare) a person (rare) or by shaking clothes
Thunder is produced by an old woman who lives in the sky
Milky Way is a trace of people who spilled on their way something related to agriculture (straw, chaff, hay, more rare flour, peas)
Some valuables (foals, hay, apples, etc.) are regularly stolen. Nobody (the elder brothers) is able to catch the thief and only the hero (the younger brother) finds who it is
Before passing away a man asks his sons to guard his grave for a certain time or to bring something to his grave. The youngest son goes and obtains valuables
When person comes to the water body, waters are split apart so the person reaches the other bank walking on the dry ground
Hero climbs up (e.g. to a tree) or down (e.g. into a deep cave) by ladder, rope, from branch to branch, etc. The rope etc. breaks or is intentionally destroyed and the hero cannot return to the ground. (All cases of motif K2A, besides the Koreans, also contain motif K2)
Hero is sent to the lower world though a well, precipice, etc. After he obtains valuables (young women), his envious companions cut the rope to get rid of him but he succeeds in returning back
By trick or by force, a rival or adversary kidnaps hero's wife or bride. The man gets her back
A task-giver asks the hero to get for him a particular woman
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
A man must fulfill difficult tasks (to win competition) to receive the permission for a marriage
Not the powerful person himself but his official or adviser tries to get rid of the hero and suggests that the person should give the hero difficult tasks
A task: to bring object or news from the land of the dead
Hero demonstrates his supernatural abilities remaining alive in a burning hot chamber, stove, bonfire, among burning vegetation
For helping its children, their powerful mother or father who is a giant bird or (rare) other flying being helps the hero
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)
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)
Person has to feed powerful creature (usually a giant bird) giving it regularly pieces of meat. When meat supply is exhausted, he cuts off a piece of his own flesh
Two (rare more) persons or creatures think that they are doomed but one whose death is slightly delayed is happy while one who will be killed earlier is in grief
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
A man who has a low social position is a nuisance for persons of high position. He gets to know that they plan to drown him or his preperty (rare: to strangle him) and tricks them to drown instead one of them or their own property
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
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
Boy or girl selects one person among many throwing an object (usually an apple) into him or her. This way a girl makes a choice of a husband, a young man of a bride, a boy identifies his father
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
An antagonist possesses a horse which can overtake any other. Hero obtains the brother (sister) of this horse who is the only one to win the race with the antagonist's horse
Many brothers marry or have to marry in such a way that all their wives are (were) sisters
A young man or (rare) a girl has a (day-)dream that predicts his or her future triumph. The dreamer either conceals or reports its contest to his family and in both cases is punished for too high opinion of himself. In the beginning the dreamer sometimes sells his dream to another young man, who becomes the protagonist of the tale. Adventures that follow explain the contest of the dream. The youth becomes rich and happy (e.g. marries heiresses of two kingdoms, that in the dream were symbolized by two suns or a sun and a moon), the girl marries king's son
A young man lets free a fish or an animal that was caught or he or his father renders a help to somebody. When the young man sets off for a journey, the grateful creature or person in guise of a stranger or animal becomes his companion and protector
A young man helps to bury a man (pays the debts of the dead man, honors a saint). When the young man sets off for a journey, the grateful dead (the saint) in guise of a stranger becomes his protector
A woman is abandoned by her magic husband. She finds him and becomes his wife again
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
It is written at a crossroad that following one of the paths person will safely return and following another it will not return (there is often a third path following which person either returns or not). Hero follows the dangerous path
Being (any besides birds) with more than ten heads or with odd (but more than one) number of heads are described in tales or represented in art. If beings with ever more number of heads are named, the row ends with a being that has odd (or more than ten) number of heads
Person sets off in search of fire and finds it in the house of a demon. The demon makes harm to the person
Cunning fox, jackal or coyote saves particular person or many people, helps them
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
Person can transform himself or herself into an animal or an object. Being sold in this guise, he or she achieves his or her aims and becomes a human again
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
A member (usually the youngest) of a group of boys or girls gets with them to a cannibal. The cannibal plans to kill people when they fall asleep. The youngest boy or girl every time answers the cannibal why he or she is still awake and forces him or her to be engaged into different activities instead of killing the sleeping people. Brothers (sisters) run away and return home
In episodes related to deception, absurd, obscene or anti-social behavior the protagonist is fox, jackal or coyote
Hero comes across a (animal-)person from an enemy group and takes his or her appearance, usually dressing himself in a skin of his victim; after this he penetrates the enemy camp
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)
To come unnoticed to his adversaries, the hero takes the guise of a servant (usually a herdsman) and before that gets know from the real herdsman how to act and to speak with his masters (usually what should be said to ferry the cattle across a river)
A servant has to lick soles or a wound of his master or mistress. The hero comes disguised as the servant and instead of licking the soles rubs them (rubs the wound) with a cut off animal tongue
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
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
Using trick, a man sells or exchanges for treasure ashes. Another person tries to sell ashes and is ridiculed
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
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
Person is suggested to twist (or he really twists) a rope or make other object of sand, ash, smoke, etc.
Way to the place of a certain person is guided by dangerous creatures (which often stand on the both sides of the pathway). Person placates them by gifts or nice talk, and they let him or her go the both ways, sometimes being punished for this by their master
Person sees that food put for certain animals is inedible for them and corrects situation (usually gives to herbivorous animals food that was given before to predators and vice versa)
A man gets to the powerful woman who lives in the world unreachable without the supernatural helpers, and then returns back. An imposter claims hero's deeds for himself. The powerful woman comes and finds the real hero, punishes (rejects) the imposter
Every main star of the Big Dipper is interpreted as a particular person or animal
In exchange for temporal advantages, person agrees to be maimed or branded
Hero gives his rivals the food provided by him by order of the king but the king finds this food poisonous, useless or tasteless while the food presented by the hero is excellent even if it looks not so good
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 powerful person coverts a beautiful bride or wife of a man and gives him impossible tasks to get rid of him
A man gives his last money for simple advices. Each of them saves his life or helps to achieve success or he does not follow the advices and gets into trouble
Person must guess which of two horses or cows is older. He does it considering peculiarities of the habits of these animals
Person is suggested to make clothes of stone or iron or to skin a stone
A task: to bring objects (usually fruits) that act like people, i.e. dance, sing and the like
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
Person builds a watercourse or digs a well as a condition of marriage. (Usually the woman breaks her promise to marry the winner and she or her bridegroom die)
A man receives good advice never to act before he is insistently asked to do it. When he decides to be helpful and gives his knife (rare: other weapon) without being insistently asked for it, he is accused of a crime
Astral objects or lunar spots are associated with a story of a stealing and the value of the stolen objects is low (straw, firewoods, cabbage, etc.)
A girl (rare: a youth) with transparent neck is described, food or drinks swallowed by her or him are seen. Such a neck is an evidence of the beauty
A woman (rare: a man) with transparent body is described. This transparence is an evidence of the beauty
The name of an object of the night sky (usually Venus) is like Zakhra, Zukhra, Zura, etc.
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.)
A week animal person immobilizing a strong one becomes to eat him from behind and refuses to come to the head where the stronger one can still bite him; or is waiting till the strong animal dies
An animal or person who crawled into a fresh carcass or put on a fresh animal skin cannot free himself (usually because the carcass or the skin becomes dry). He gets free when the skin becomes soft again or somebody helps him
An animal person becomes a herdsman but eats the entrusted animals up
Person has a dream, another person buys it and acquires the fortune that the dream promised
A man goes to sell a skin of domestic animal and on his way, by trick or thanks to chance, gets a big sum of money. Usually coming back he explains that this was the price of the skin but when other people kill their animals they cannot sell skins for such a sum. (In India the hero sometimes pretends to sold cow meat to brahmins for whom it is forbidden)
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
While the men of the household are not at home, a demonic person comes to drink blood of a girl or young woman. Initially the men do not understand why the girl becomes thin
Person takes for alive coal a red bead (stone) that fell into the hearth and does not understand that the fire is extinguished
After eating a fruit (usually an apple, in Northern traditions also an egg), the sterile woman gives birth to a son or twins
A pretty, faithful wife is courted by one or several men, one of them usually a clergyman. With her husband’s consent, she invites the suitor(s) to a private rendezvous. Before the first man’s wishes are gratified, the next one arrives and then the husband himself. The suitor or suitors are caught in an uncomfortable position and then killed, punished in some other manner, ridiculed, made to pay ransom, to work, etc.
A cleric or administrator visits a woman after the dark. When her husband knocks at the door, the woman, according to the scenario elaborated by her and her husband, tells the guest to lie in the cradle. She answers the husband that it is their baby son. The husband becomes or shams to become transform the adult into the baby (shaves his beard off, knocks out his teeth, grasps an axe to cut his feet off). The disgraced guest runs away
Closing formula of the folktale: the teller says that the characters attained their desires, goals and/or happiness or that God satisfied their desires
Because of its stupidity or unsocial behavior, the bear suffers a reverse, is injured or dies
After certain time a snake or fish turn into a dragon
Game animals were concentrated in one single place. Certain person lets them disperse in the world
A reptile monster demands humans (usually virgins) as a sacrifice or abducts a girl or closes sources of water. Hero kills him. Monster’s victims do not play an active part in the plot
To choose a companion, the youth suggests each of the candidates to make something simple (to eat the served food, to set off). The chosen one demonstrates that he cares for the hero while others keep in mind only their own interests
An imprisoned man is rescued and exalted because only he gets to resolve problems that trouble the king or to save the princess (prince, the king himself)
Dark spots on the Moon are scars and wounds on her face
Many brothers marry or have to marry in such a way that all their wives are (were) sisters
An antagonist orders to kill the first one who will come in the morning to a certain place. The hero becomes late by chance, the antagonist or his wife or son come and are thrown into the fire
Master of the house allows person to feel himself (herself) free bit not to look into particular place. The person breaks prohibition
Roasting meat or baking bread for his master, a servant sees a girl (rare: small boy) and is so impressed with her (or his) beauty, that the meat or bread get burnt
A magician orders a boy to fetch a magic object (often a lamp). The boy finds the object (but refuses to give it to the magician). A helpful genie appears and fulfills the boy’s wishes
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
The strongest predator (usually a lion) suggests one of his companions to shares the booty. He is not satisfied by results and beats the companion. When another companion becomes to divide, he gives everything to the strongest one and explains that the injured one taught him the right way of sharing
A weak predator eats part of a body of a killed animal and explain to the strong one that this animal did not have such a part at all
At night a demonic person comes to the tomb to harm the dead
The antagonist believes that the hero was burned but returned from the other world alive and prosperous therefore he asks burn him (her) or his representatives
A girl or young woman sets off to find or return her fience or her husband or she escapes from a fanger and ultimately marries happily
A (young) man sets off to find or to return his bride or his wife
The sovereign orders his youngest daughter (together with a man chosen by her) to live in conditions that do not correspond to her high status. Her father does not know that her chosen one is not a poor wretch as he seems to be but a prince
A poor boy whom his animal helper has made rich passing him off as a rich man at the king’s court, is a miller or son of a miller
A young man has a dream: he sees the Sun, the Moon and a star (all of them or some of these luminaries). When the narrative come to the end, the man understands the meaning of the dream: these are people who love or adore him
After seeing a portrait of an unknown beauty, a man is eager to meet her
Описывается или изображается чудовище (обычно змей) о семи головах. При перечисления существ по мере возрастания у них числа голов ряд заканчивается на семи
Several imprisoned (driven out) co-wives give birth but only the son of the youngest woman survives. The boy saves the women
The formula that describes the confusion of feelings: when a person looks in one direction, he or she cries, when in another – begins to laugh or smile; or one eye of a person laughs and another laughs; or person laughs looking at one object and weeps looking at another; or one of two persons who share the same fate laughs and another smiles, etc.
Powerful bird has its nest on the tree that stands in or nearby the body of water. The serpent (reptilian monster) comes out of it to devour the nestlings
A bald person acts in narratives (thence his usual name: Taz, Tazchi, Kal, Keloglan, Kechal etc.)
A youth studies magic but answers his master that he has learned nothing. Thank to this, the master lets him go
The Sun and the Moon are or were enemies, either permanently or in particular situations
On her or his way to the destination, person (on his or her way back) names dangerous or repulsive objects and beings beautiful and nice, thus securing their loyalty
Persons of high status cannot reveal the hidden difference between two or more objects or creatures (or two sides of an objects of creature) which look similar. A smart or lucky person of lower status does it