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
A task-giver asks the hero to get for him a particular woman
Person is ordered to bathe in a (boiling) milk or other hot liquid or to jump into fire. He remains unharmed but his adversary usually dies
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 strong man has to race with a woman (often with an old woman). He cannot surpass her or does it with much difficulty
A monster blocks sources of water (or sends floods) and usually gives some (promises not to send floods) in exchange for human victims or valuables. Hero kills the monster
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
A man is going to kill but spares a giant bird. Later when the bird carries him high in the air it pretends to drop him or to abandon him on a rock. This way the bird wants him to feel the same terror that it felt when the man was going to kill it. Or the bird first drops and picks up a man and he later makes the bird feel a similar terror
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
An animal saves a man or helps him but the ungrateful man humiliates the animal, kills or tries to kill it
Cunning fox, jackal or coyote saves particular person or many people, helps them
A lung or a liver lies on a road or floats in a pond etc. As soon as person touches them, a dangerous demon appears in front of him
When person sighs or utters an interjection, another one (usually a demon) emerges because his name is spelled like Ahh, Ohhoi, etc.
In episodes related to deception, absurd, obscene or anti-social behavior the protagonist is fox, jackal or coyote
Being smart and witty, the hedgehog overcomes overcomes strong adversaries
Fool follows instructions that were reasonable in every previous episode but become absurd in every next one
Fool puts a small sharp object (needle, pin, nail) in a place when it is impossible later to find it (a cart-load of hay, a bag of flour. etc.)
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 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)
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 must fulfill difficult tasks (to win competition) to receive the permission for a marriage
Person must guess which of two horses or cows is older. He does it considering peculiarities of the habits of these animals
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 girl poses as a man, her sex is magically transformed and the man is happily married
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
An old man needs a son to accomplish a man’s work or service. (Only the youngest) daughter sets to do it (successfully passing her father’s test and) guised as a man
Man sitting on branch of a tree cuts it off and similar variants (man climbs a rope and cuts it off; men cut a tree and climb on it to fell it; man climbs with difficulty on a dead branch of a tree, which breaks off)
Considering indirect signs or somebody’s word, a numskull thinks that he is dead and lies motionless
A man gets to see how two serpents of contrast color fight. He tries to hit one f them but injures another by mistake. The injured snake’s kinfolk come to punish the man but they give him presents after getting know that he regrets his mistake
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
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
Demon tears off or devours one by one legs of aт animal who helps the hero, usually of his riding horse
In exchange for temporal advantages, person agrees to be maimed or branded
Using a bell (drum, etc.) an animal (usually a mouse) produces sounds which the antagonist who is blind or is outdoors takes for the sounds produced by the hero (heroine). Thanks to this the hero escapes
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
Person tricks his enemies to leave their enclosure one by one and cuts off their head as soon as the next one appears before him. In rare cases the multi-headed enemy thrusts his heads on by one and the hero cuts them off
When an unusual fish (rare: bird or some water being) is caught, the (young) man lets it go. His father (the king) drives him away or the man goes away by his own initiative. The saved fish (bird) helps him
Several men take part in rescuing, creation or reanimation of a girl (rare: a bird) or several women take part in the reanimation of a dead man or they differetly express their grief. It is asked whose role was crucial (who behavior more noble) and/or who should be the spouse of the reanimated person. Or three men make something valuable and it is asked whose role in the corresponding enterprise was more important
Three (rare two or four) men take part in creation of a girl: one cuts her body of wood, another puts clothes on her, the third one makes her alive. To whom does she belong?
. The hero or his companion eliminate the source of danger
A girl who keeps silence is promised to one who would make her speak; a man with much difficulty makes his magic wife speak
A man saves a devil (snake, dangerous animal) who suffers from proximity of certain object or person. The grateful devil promises to enter a princess and abandon her as soon as the man comes to cure her. The man will get a reward but he should not try such a trick again. The man scares the devil forever telling him that the object or person of which the devil is afraid will be near soon
A girl, a young woman, or children who are associated with a hare or rabbit are heroines or successful tricksters
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)
Person in a desperate situation gets to see how a snake or other small animal uses remedy to revive or to cure itself or other animals. The person uses the remedy, succeeds
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
When her brother is killed, a girl puts on his clothes and in a guise of a man wins competitions and gets women who are able to revive the dead. She puts the clothes back on her brother and the women come and revive him taking him for their husband. Or a sister is killed and her brother after winning wives tricks them to revive her
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)
After eating a fruit (usually an apple, in Northern traditions also an egg), the sterile woman gives birth to a son or twins
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 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.
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
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
A man buries something half-liquid and soft (animal bowels, eggs, etc.). He stamps (shoots an arrow) at this place and claims that got to extract brains (bowels, etc.) from the earth
An ogre puts a man on his back to carry him across the river. Believing that the man is strong, the ogre is amazed why he is so light. The man answers that he keeps most of his weight off, otherwise the ogre would be crushed under it. The ogre wants to try if it is so. The man thrusts an awl (knife, nail) into the ogre’s neck and the ogre asks to keep his weight off again.
An ogre sends a man to bring water giving him an enormous skin. The man is unable to carry such an amount of water but does not reveal his weakness using a ruse (he is digging around the well and explains that he wants to carry all the water at once; or says that he brought the skin with the water but drank it already up, etc.)
Bird’s (hen’s) milk is mentioned in fairy tales, riddles and proverbs as something very rare and difficult to obtain
Roots (belt) of rocks (stones, mountains) are mentioned in myths, riddles, proverbs, charms and songs as something that does not exist
When a man or a woman promises to give his or her child to a demon, he or she does not try to save the child but help the demon to catch him or her. Despite all, the boy or girl escapes from the 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
A man saves (spares) a wounded bird. When the bird becomes strong again, it carries the man to a distant land (to the sky)
Because of its stupidity and unsocial behavior, the fox, jackal or coyote suffers a reverse, is injured or dies
To show their father that he must marry them, his daughters of different age send him fruits of the same kind but of different degree of ripeness (or bread that is differently baked)
Person removes a thorn from the paw (bone from the throat) of a strong and dangerous animal or a demon, the animal (demon) is grateful
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
Persons climbs a tree and thanks to this escapes from a demon (who usually tries to fell the tree)
Person extracts his or her tooth to use it as a weapon or a tool (often an axe)
A tree or a chain of reeds by which people have ascended to the sky is destroyed. On their way back they fall to the ground. Some of them remain in the sky for ever or longer than others
It is claimed that the bird has no milk and/or breasts
In a list of things that do not exist in the world, a gall of horse or ass is mentioned
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 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
A man receives a box or bag as a gift and is told that he should open it not before he comes to his place. The curious man opens it before time and everything that must make him rich (cattle, houses, etc.) falls out. A demon puts everything back but under certain condition. Usually the man does not understand that he promised to the demon his child
Person shoots off (injures) a finger of a demonic person and then sees that his baby-sister’s finger has a similar injury
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)
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
A young man is killed. His sister puts on his clothes and pretending she is a man gets a wife for him. This woman beliefs that the girl’s brother from the very beginning was a man whom she married
Person must shoot an arrow through a small ring or several rings
A youth studies magic but answers his master that he has learned nothing. Thank to this, the master lets him go
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