| Motif | Name | Description |
| a14 | Eclipses: relations between the Sun and the Moon | Coming together of the Sun and the Moon is the reason of their eclipses |
| a14a | The conflict between the Sun and the Moon | The Sun and the Moon are or were enemies, either permanently or in particular situations |
| a19b | By snail in summer, by bird in winter | For its sky voyage, the Sun chooses draught animals according to the season, riding a slow one in the summer time and a quick one in the winter time. Or a young man carries the Sun in the winter time and the old man in the summer time |
| a1a | Parrot was the sun before the Sun | A big bird with bright feathers (parrot, tucan) had been the source of light before the real Sun appeared |
| a24 | The first sunrise | In the beginning it is dark. When the Sun first appears on the sky, primeval beings or part of them perish or turn into animals, spirits, stones |
| a3 | Male sun and female moon | The Moon is female or bisexual, the Sun is male |
| 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) |
| a32a | The Moon rabbit | Rabbit or hare are seen in the moon |
| a5 | The Sun and the Moon are males | The Moon is male, the Sun is also male or (much more rare) asexual |
| b125 | Animals exchange their organs | During the time of creation particular species of animals (rare: plants) exchanged certain organs or traits or one animal borrowed an organ from another one but never brought it back. Thence the characteristics of these animals now. In rare cases the back exchange and restoring of the initial situation or the passing of certain organ from one animal to another without compensation are described |
| 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 |
| b2b | The earth eats the dead | The earth devours bodies of the people when they die and are buried |
| b39 | Narrow waist of an insect | Insect-person knows the source of food (cultivated plants) and water but does not share his knowledge. To make him speak, ancestors tie a rope around his waist and pull it till the waist becomes narrow (origin of narrow place between breast and belly of insects) |
| b3a | Primeval waters | Water is the original element, the dry earth appears later |
| b40 | Rabbit as deer’s proxy | Hare or rabbit is a false deer or it was deer in the past or a close kin of the deer or had horns or antlers or missed opportunity to get them, its ears are the false horns |
| b40a | Missed opportunity to have horns | Animal who has no horns now had them before or missed opportunity to get them |
| b62 | Buzzard husband | Man thinks that buzzard or hawk has better life than he. They exchange clothes. The bird lives with the man's wife as her husband, the man usually does not enjoy his bird life |
| b80 | Measuring of the world | The process of world creation includes the measuring of its size |
| c13 | The objects’ revolt | During or before the world cataclysm (deluge, darkness) or (Suruí) in particular place at night, household objects and/or stones, trees, domestic animals turn into wild beasts and monsters |
| c14 | Monsters destroy people | During or before the world catastrophe (deluge, darkness) wild beasts and monsters attack and destroy people |
| d4a | Theft of fire | Fire is stolen from its original owner or brought back to the people from somebody who had stolen it before |
| d4g | Hummingbird discovers where the fire is (and brings it to people) | Hummingbird discovers where the fire is (and brings it to people) |
| e1a | First people of unstable materials | First human beings are made of unstable materials (mud, wax, fire, honey, etc.) and unviable |
| e2 | People made for a test | Making people, creator does not reach perfection immediately. First variants of creation are rejected, then proper form and material found |
| e33 | People from seeds | People emerge from grains, seeds |
| f35 | Feeding with the paramour’s meat | Person feeds another with the meat of his or her sexual partner who cooks or eats it without knowing whose meat it is |
| g1 | A kidnapped child | Valuables (earth, soil, sun, crops, fire, sacred knowledge, hunting luck) are got or returned when son or daughter is stolen from his or her parent |
| g15 | Plant maidens | In the other world or in the time of the ancestors food products or materials used by people looked as persons |
| g16 | Ants find cultivated plants | Ants are the first who find cultivated plants (corn or manioc) which are concealed from the others in particular place |
| g3 | A rock of crops | Cultivated plants or fertile soil to plant them are hidden inside a rock. Birds or Thunders get them destroying the rock |
| g4 | A food mountain | Cultivated plants are found above or inside a mountain |
| g9 | Restored forest | People fell trees to make a garden. In the morning, the forest is intact again |
| h16 | Rivers of tears | Rivers of tears exist in the other world. Tears shed on earth fill there big containers |
| h16a | Rivers of blood | Rivers (lakes) of blood (also of puss, bones, sweat or water used for washing of corpses) are mentioned in narratives (in different context) |
| h35 | Fragile teeth | Human teeth are made of material subject to easy damage (etiology of tooth ache in most cases) |
| i100b | The Pleiades are a group of people | The Pleiades are any people (of any ages and sex, combined data of i99-i100a) |
| i106 | Ursa major is a person | Ursa major is only one anthropomorphic being, not several persons |
| i121 | Twin constellations | Two constellations (usually Ursa major and Ursa minor) are interpreted as twin objects of the same type (two animals, two carts, etc.) |
| 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 |
| i37f | Fungi are ears | Fungi or mushrooms are named “ears” |
| i41 | Rainbow serpent | Rainbow is a reptile (usually a snake) or (more rare) a fish, or it is related to snake, to its tongue, breath, or to scorpion's tail |
| i43a | The celestial monster | Giant reptilian monster (serpent, more rare fish, chain of fish) extends in the sky and/or supports the sky being associated with Milky Way or the rainbow |
| i43b | Milky Way is a serpent or fish | Milky Way is a reptile, fish, or chain of fish |
| i45b | Not to point at the rainbow | It to point at the rainbow, pointing finger or entire arm will rot, wither or become crooked |
| i47 | Rainbow is filth | Rainbow is a flatulence of a demon, a spray of a skunk, is associated with spit, urine, feces, genitals, etc., causes skin diseases, is associated with death |
| i48 | Confined to the underworld | Certain person loses his or her freedom, is confined to a far away place (often, to the underworld) and acquires cosmic dimensions: supports the earth or the sky and/or his or her movements produce earthquakes or (rare) storms |
| i62 | Milky Way is a river | Milky Way is a sky river, water body, chain of beings that swim |
| i65 | Milky Way of the dead | Milky Way is the path over which souls travel to the beyond or a path of the funeral procession |
| i69 | Star dung | Shining sky objects or atmospheric phenomena are excrements of sky dwellers |
| i75 | World ages | Before present world, several (two or more) other worlds or races of people existed |
| i77 | The lame thunder | Powerful person connected with thunder and rain is lame (usually after falling down from the sky) |
| i80 | Thunder’s apprentice | Person who got into the place of a deity responsible for atmospheric phenomena breaks certain taboo or instructions producing excessive thunderstorm, rain, snowfall or wind |
| i82a | Venus is male | Morning and/or Evening Star is a male personage |
| i9 | Colors of the cardinal directions | Four cardinal directions and/or some objects associated with them are associated with different colors |
| i99 | The Pleiades are boys or men | The Pleiades are a group of boys or men, or a group of different people but predominantly males |
| j1 | The vengeful heroes | Persons avenge the death of their father, mother or other relatives who are one (rare two) generations older than they |
| j24 | Grounded to powder | Hero is grounded to powder but resuscitates |
| j31 | Father’s weapon | A young hero obtains and uses weapons or other powerful objects which belonged to his murdered father |
| 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 |
| j5 | Brothers as victims | Two or several brothers or friends are killed by antagonists. One of them is the father of the young hero who avenges their death or all of them are his uncles |
| j50 | An attempt to revive the victim | Twin heroes' parent dies or is killed, an attempt to revive him or her fails |
| j69 | The mock and the real beheading | Person is killed (with the cold weapon, with water of death) and then revived. Another person asks to be exposed to the same procedure but is not revived |
| k10 | Fight with the monstrous bird | Monstrous bird (giant bat) predates on humans. Heroes fight with it |
| k16 | To get access to a girl in guise of a bird or an animal | Disguised as a bird, small animal or insect, a man penetrates into the place of a girl (into her father’s house) |
| k16a | Slips and drops dummy | Being eager to show that he is a successful hunter, a man walks in front of a girl carrying a game (deer, birds). The girl makes him slip, he drops the false game that proves to be a dummy stuffed with ashes or a termite nest |
| k17 | The ornitomorphic suitor | An ornitomorphic hero impregnates a girl magically or imperceptibly for her |
| 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 |
| k27a | Ordeal: survive cold | An ordeal: to survive cold (frosty night outdoors, chamber with ice, cold water and snow) |
| k27c | Ordeal: knives and thorns | An ordeal: to remain alive after contact with sharp points or blades |
| k27d | Ordeal: chamber with dangerous beings | An ordeal: to remain alive in a closed room full of beasts of prey, poisonous or other dangerous creatures |
| k27n | Difficult tasks of the in-laws | A man must fulfill difficult tasks (to win competition) to receive the permission for a marriage |
| k27o | Ball game | A contest: ball game |
| k29a | Surviving in a fire | Hero demonstrates his supernatural abilities remaining alive in a burning hot chamber, stove, bonfire, among burning vegetation |
| k29b | Posthole murder | Hero is asked to climb into a hole or pit. When he does it, they fill it with soil or throw down a post, a stone, etc. The hero demonstrates his magic capacities coming back uninjured |
| k3 | Tree or rock grows taller | Hero climbs up a tree or rock to get eggs, nestlings, fruits, honey, etc. Another person makes the tree (rock) grow higher or thicker and the hero is unable to descend back |
| k61b | To get know names | To get know names of strangers, person finds or creates situations when the strangers call each other by name |
| k8a | Jonah: swallowed by monster | Person gets into the belly of water being or into the belly of giant creature which appearance and living place remain vague. He kills the monster from the inside and/or returns to earth by himself (i.e. not extracted by other people) |
| l11 | Turtle-bench | In a non-human world objects of everyday life have appearance of animals and monsters, mainly fish, amphibians and reptiles |
| l17b | Two faces | Person or creature has another face (another mouth) on the back of his (her, its) head |
| l18 | Multi-headed bird | A bird with two or more heads on top of one body is described in tales or represented in art |
| l57 | Person gets his body part back | Person loses his organ or body part, it is carried away. He finds its new owner, gets his property back |
| l58 | Avaricious man | A man does not share food with his wife or kinsfolk. He or his food is transformed (turns into a bird, into worms, etc.) in punishment |
| l7 | Chasing an animal by mistake | Instead of chasing a person, a bush spirit, a monster or a dangerous animal follows by mistake an object or animal that moves nearby |
| l70 | Fruit falls and kills | Person or animal is killed or injured with a heavy object dropped from a tree (or rock, etc.). The person or the animal knows that the objects will fall but has falls ideas about its character and weight |
| l74 | The returned hand | A bear or other dangerous being tears off and carries away a hand of a person and holds it at his sleeping place. Another person steals the hand, gives it back to the owner |
| l74a | Hung over fire | An antagonist carries away the hero or rips off and carries away his limb and hangs the prisoner or the limb (usually over the fire). The hero is suffering from pain. Another personage saves the hero or brings his limb back |
| m25 | Banquet in the sky | To take part in a feast or to visit God or celestial object, person ascends to the sky. To return, he either uses a rope but falls before reaching ground or jumps (falls) down from the sky and is badly hurt, dead, and/or transformed |
| m29g | Trickster-hare or rabbit | In episodes related to deception, absurd, obscene or anti-social behavior the protagonist is hare or rabbit |
| m29k1 Not used in statistics | The turtle (toad, frog) is a tricky failure | A turtle (tortoise, toad, frog) behaves foolishly creating serious problems for himself |
| m30 | Trickster falls down | Person or creature who has no wings or is unable to fly on a long distance attempts to ascend to the sky or to fly far away but falls down or, deprived of his wings, remains in a place from which he is unable to return |
| m5 | Provoked insult | Being in a situation when his life depends on a good will of a demon or animal, person either resists or does not resist the temptation to insult or to beat, bite, etc. the latter |
| m56a | Alligator’s secret | A man or an animal beats alligator but it remains unharmed and says that he would be killed if stricken in one special place on his body. The next time the same person strikes alligator this way and kills it |
| m60 | Sham doctor: finished off enemy | Hero wounds dangerous enemy (a monster, a robber) and then, in guise of a doctor, comes to him and kills his patient instead of curing him |
| m8 | Breaking the obstacle | Non-human persons work hard to destroy a strong and durable obstacle that blocks access to some place or object |