| 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 |
| a17 | The Sun’s relax at the midday | After passing half of the its way across the sky (in the day time) or in the underworld (in the night time), the Sun stops to have a rest |
| a20 | Childhood and youth of the Sun and Moon | The Sun and the Moon (rare: the Sun and a star, the Moon and a star) are two siblings who live on earth and then ascend to the sky being still young persons |
| a22 | To the sky from a bonfire | After getting into the fire or boiling water, one or two persons ascend to the sky and turn into the Sun and/or Moon |
| a22a | The hot Sun and its cold companion | After two persons burn up, one turns into the present Sun and another into a less important sky object |
| a22b | Hot fire and cold ashes | Person who becomes the Sun burned up in a hot fire while his companion burned up in the less hot fire or threw himself into the ashes. He (she) turns into the Moon or a star which gives no warmth |
| a22c | Person sacrificed to the Sun | To make the Sun rise above the horizon, to send him to the right distance from the earth, to make him move across the sky, etc. a person has to be sacrificed |
| a23 | Elections of the Sun to be | The primeval ancestors come together to choose the best candidate to become the Sun and/or to send the Sun to the sky or to see how the Sun rises to the sky for the first time |
| 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 |
| a31 | The incestuous Moon | As a result of some intimate contacts and/or love affair, the Moon acquires its present appearance (often, the stains on his face) and/or ascends to the sky |
| 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 |
| a35 | Spots on the lunar disc | 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 |
| a47 | The Sun is born from an egg | The Sun is born or created from an egg |
| a5 | The Sun and the Moon are males | The Moon is male, the Sun is also male or (much more rare) asexual |
| a8b | The Sun in the land of the dead | When the Sun descends below the horizon, it shines to the anthropomorphic denizens of the netherworld (the dead, dwarfs, etc.) |
| 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 |
| b2e | The male earth | The earth or the world as a whole is a male person (alone or together with a female person) |
| 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 |
| b41 | The talking dog | Because the dog was spreading some information, altercated with its masters, was talking in a wrong time, etc. it lost the ability to speak |
| b56 | Fire tongue of the crocodile | After the crocodile or caiman swallows or loses fire (that he possessed before), he remains without his tongue; or the crocodile's tongue is cut off to make something related to celestial fire (thunderbolt, sun beams, etc. |
| 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 |
| c12b | People descend from a dog | In the beginning of time or after the flood man marries a bitch. Present people descend from them. |
| 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 |
| c18 | Luring out the hidden Sun | Person who incarnates or owns the sun hides himself or herself or is hidden. To return or to get heath and light, his or her interest is attracted or diverted by way of singing, dancing, playing music, provocative behavior, offering of unusual gifts, sex or alcohol |
| c19 | Acquisition of the sun | The Sun (the day light) that was absent, stolen or hidden appears (again) |
| c38 | People are coming soon | Those who inhabited the world in the time of creation were saying that real people were to come and so they had to do this and that |
| c5a | Bird-scouts | Birds or humans later changed to birds are sent to explore the earth (is it dry, are any survivals, to investigate why smoke rises to the sky, etc.) or to bring some soil to make the land that would be good for living |
| c9 | Warning about the coming flood | God, animal, some person warns one of the people about the catastrophy (usuallly the flood) that will become soon and in which most of the people must perish |
| d1b | Male spirit of fire | The fire is personified as an elder man (alone or with his wife, mistress of fire) |
| d4a | Theft of fire | Fire is stolen from its original owner or brought back to the people from somebody who had stolen it before |
| d4d | Opossum steals fire | Opossum steals fire for people |
| d5 | Woman as the owner of the fire | Female person is the owner or inventor (but not the personification) of the fire |
| d6a | Fire and crocodile | Crocodile or cayman is an original or temporary owner of fire or lighting |
| 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 |
| f40a | Husband of the first women | An anthropomorphic male or an androgyne is the only possessor or leader of women |
| f85 | The Moon: contra men and pro women | The Moon (female or male) is the leader of women in their struggle against the men or leads the women away from the men |
| 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 |
| g24 | Food from the sky | First seeds (sprouts, tubors) of cultivated plants or of important edible wild plants are brought from the sky (received from the sky-dwellers) |
| 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 |
| g9b | Abandon your work, flood is coming | A man fells trees to clear ground for a garden or breaks ground. Certain person or animal revives vegetation, makes the soil virgin again. He or she explains that the flood is coming, there is no sense to work and advices to prepare a floating device |
| h12 | The alive person comes to the land of the dead after somebody’s death | The alive person comes to the land of the dead to bring back somebody who has recently died (besides stories about shamans who journey to the other world to bring back the soul of a sick person) or, having no particular aim, goes there in company of somebody who had recently died or following his or her tracks |
| h12c | Orpheus: to return the dead wife | Husband follows his dead wife to the other world but is unable to bring her back or succeeds to do it but loses her once again |
| h18 | Hoarded game released | Game animals were concentrated in one single place. Certain person lets them disperse in the world |
| h2 | The selfish animal | Animals ask God to make people mortal because people would be too numerous and step on the animals, deprive them of their food and habitat, or because the animals want to feast on the human corpses |
| h20 | Fish disperse in the world | All the fish or (rare) shellfish) was concentrated in one place. Certain person lets it lose or puts it into the rivers or sea |
| h24 | Container opened too early | Container with valuables or with dangerous creatures is opened (before time). Its content goes out of control or disappear |
| h26 | Mosquitoes had to be drowned | The right way to dispose of container with stinging insects would be to throw it into the river or sea or bury in a far away place, but it was not done |
| h27 | Mosquitoes let lose | 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 |
| h28 | Plagues from the body of a person or creature | Killed and destroyed (often burned) person or creature (usually ogre, fierce animal, powerful shaman) turns into a multitude of biting insects or into other small molesting creatures |
| h28a | Mosquitoes from sparks and smoke | A burned person or creature immediately turns into a multitude of mosquitoes or biting flies |
| h34g | One grain porridge | One cereal grain (cob, etc.) is enough to prepare a meal |
| h34h | Firewoods come by themselves | Firewood, brushwood arrived to the house themselves, no work was needed to cut and carry them |
| h36 | The muddled message | Person is sent by god to bring instructions or certain objects but distorts, forgets or replaces them. This has fatal consequences for humans or for a certain species of animals. (Lithuanian case can be a mistification) |
| h36c | Death and the lizard | Lizard is responsible for introduction of permanent death. (Lithuanian case can be a mistification) |
| i11 | Cosmic turtle or toad | A turtle, toad, or frog supports the earth (sky) or is its embodiment |
| 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 |
| i17a | Dwarfs without body openings | Beings without anus or mouth are dwarfs |
| i19 | People inhale the odor of food | Anthropomorphic beings satisfy their hunger cooking food and inhaling the odor |
| i20 | The undeground dwarfs | Race of dwarfs lives under the ground (deep under the earth or in hills and rocks) or at the horizon where the earth and the sky meet |
| i20c | Dwarfs live in the underworld | Dwarfs live in the underworld that somewhat reminds the world of humans. If the dwarfs and the humans meet, it is deep under the earther |
| i20c2 | Dwarfs live at the horizon | The denizens of the country at the horizon (where the sky and the earth meet) are dwarfs |
| i21 | Red-haired people scorched by the sun | People who live in the underworld, at the sunrise or sunset (often dwarfs) are scorched by the Sun which moves by at a short distance from them. They are red-haired, dark-skinned, etc. |
| i27 | Chthonic canine | A dog is the lord, guard or guide of/to the land of the dead; or dogs live on the way to the land of the dead |
| i28 | Animals in the underworld | Game animals live inside a mountain, in a cave or in the underworld where they often look like humans and have a master |
| i3 | Weapon of Thunder | The lightning (and thunder) is (produced with) an object (axe, sword, mirror, belt, stones, skin, etc.) in hands of anthropomorphic being |
| i39 | Rainbow road or bridge | Rainbow is a road, a bridge or a ladder |
| 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 |
| i42 | Rainbow is a pair of creatures | Rainbow is two creatures or persons, usually a male and a female |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| i55 | Stars are openings | Stars are openings in the firmament; holes in dwelling's covering are thought to be stars |
| i7 | The cloud serpent | A flying reptile produces rain, thunderstorm |
| i72 | Stars are people | Stars are people, ghosts, anthropomorphic beings (interpretations of unique star objects like Venus or Polaris as persons not considered) |
| i78 | The square earth | The earth is square, the sky is usually round |
| i82a | Venus is male | Morning and/or Evening Star is a male personage |
| i8e | Four men at the cardinal points | Four (or eight) anthropomorphic male persons support the earth or the sky or are placed at the four cardinal points |
| i8e1 | Four supports of the world | The sky or the earth rests upon four or five (cardinal points and the center) supports of any kind (poles, mountains, giants) |
| i8g | Atlas | One giant supports the earth or the sky |
| i9 | Colors of the cardinal directions | Four cardinal directions and/or some objects associated with them are associated with different colors |
| j1 | The vengeful heroes | Persons avenge the death of their father, mother or other relatives who are one (rare two) generations older than they |
| j21 | Birth from eggs | Gods, first people or founders of the royal lineages are born from eggs |
| j24 | Grounded to powder | Hero is grounded to powder but resuscitates |
| j26 | Babies come out of the water | Baby heroes, embryos or objects from which they emerge are found in a river or lake or come to people out of the water |
| 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 |
| j40 | Enemy from the sky | Beings who live in the sky descend to kill people. Usually such a being carries away to its world a person or many people (or person's cut off head or limb). The hero (usually a relation of the perished one) revenges on the dangerous being and/or brings back the victim or victims (his or her head, etc.) |
| j50 | An attempt to revive the victim | Twin heroes' parent dies or is killed, an attempt to revive him or her fails |
| k10 | Fight with the monstrous bird | Monstrous bird (giant bat) predates on humans. Heroes fight with it |
| k10b | Cage carried away | A giant bird carries away to its nest a cage or bag with people inside |
| k10g | The man uses a fledgeling to descend to the earth | A man gets into the nest of a giant bird on a high rock or tree. He descends to the earth killing the bird and fixing its feathers or wings to his body or (more often) using the bird’s nestling (riding on its back, holding its feet, fixing its feathers or wings) |
| 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) |
| k17 | The ornitomorphic suitor | An ornitomorphic hero impregnates a girl magically or imperceptibly for her |
| k25 | Magic wife | A man consciously marries a woman related to the non-human world |
| k25e | Magic wife is an ancestor | All humans, members of a particular ethnic or social group or a ruling dynasty are believed to descend from a mortal man and a woman of supernatural origin |
| 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 |
| k27e | Eating or drinking contest | Person or animal must eat (drink) enormous quantity of food (beverage) or eat or drink poisonous beverage or food |
| k27o | Ball game | A contest: ball game |
| k27o2 | To play with a dangerous ball | To kill the hero, his enemies involve him into a game with a dangerous ball (or ice, stone, bone, iron, a walrus head, a biting skull, etc.) |
| k27s | Contest: a race | Contest: a race |
| k29a | Surviving in a fire | Hero demonstrates his supernatural abilities remaining alive in a burning hot chamber, stove, bonfire, among burning vegetation |
| 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.) |
| l11 | Turtle-bench | In a non-human world objects of everyday life have appearance of animals and monsters, mainly fish, amphibians and reptiles |
| l18 | Multi-headed bird | A bird with two or more heads on top of one body is described in tales or represented in art |
| l53 | Stones into the maw | A monstrous being is killed or neutralized by (burning hot) stones (pieces of metal, heavy fruits, etc.) thrown into its maw or anus or the being retreats when they menace to throw a stone into its maw |
| l64 | Removable head | Person removes part of his or her body (head, scalp, lungs) and then puts it back |
| m11 | The unclean food | Person feeds others a food that is extracted from his, hers or somebody else’ body or is polluted by body extractions not informing about the source of the food |
| m11d | Salt extracted from body | Adding salt, person makes food delicious. Another person gets to know that this salt is extracted from the cook’s body (it is contained in his body extractions) |
| m29g | Trickster-hare or rabbit | In episodes related to deception, absurd, obscene or anti-social behavior the protagonist is hare or rabbit |
| m47 | Head put to bottoms | Punishing a person or animal or restoring his or its body after its disintegration, a powerful being intentionally or by chance puts head to bottoms |
| m8 | Breaking the obstacle | Non-human persons work hard to destroy a strong and durable obstacle that blocks access to some place or object |
| m8a | Birds peck a rock to release prisoners | Birds and sometimes also animals work hard to break from the outside or from the inside a rock, a tree truck, bonds, etc. to release some beings or themselves from confinement in a small enclosure or trap |