| Motif | Name | Description |
| a12 | Eclipses: monster’s attack | 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 |
| a12a | Eclipses: a predator animal | During an eclipse or at other circumstances the Sun or the Moon are attacked by a predator animal (a bear, a feline, a canine, a racoon) |
| 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 |
| a18 | The Sun boat | During the day and/or the night (in the underworld, beyond the horizon etc.) the Sun and/or the Moon regularly travel in a boat. |
| a27 | Crowns of the Sun and Moon | Light and/or heat of the Sun and/or Moon originate from their crowns, necklaces or clothes (of feathers, of animal teeth) |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| a5 | The Sun and the Moon are males | The Moon is male, the Sun is also male or (much more rare) asexual |
| b1f | Two brothers: a winner and a failure | Two brothers (companions) live In the epoch of the creation. One of them is smart and selfconfident, another is weak and makes mistakes. They are not enemies and demonstrate their qualities in two or more episodes |
| b26 | Man joins wild animals | Person who follows the wild animals turns into one of them or into their master |
| b42n | Orion is one person | Constellation of Orion or the Belt of Orion is identified with only one male person, usually with a warrior or hunter |
| b48 | Predators become herbivorous | Weak or herbivorous animals were dangerous predators but have been transformed |
| b73b | The cuckoo: in search of lost family member | Two teenagers or young people are in search of each other, call each other (or one of them call another): a girl in search of her lost (or dead) brother or brother’s wife, a boy in search of his brother or sister, young parents in seach their child. One or both of them turn into birds with specific cry |
| b77 | Primeval sky close to earth | Originally the sky was close to the earth, then it has risen up |
| b86 | Babylonian tower | To reach the sky (the Sun, Moon, particular star), people build a ladder or tower that consists of separate modules (bricks, logs, sticks, etc.). This construction collapses |
| b9 | Water in the tree trunk | There is enormous amount of water inside a trunk of a tree or a tree turns into water |
| c12a | The dog and the world cataclysm | A dog warns people about approaching flood or world conflagration, instructs them what should be done |
| c15 | The imprisoned feline | Monstrous puma or jaguar is imprisoned in a cave or tree trunk |
| c19 | Acquisition of the sun | The Sun (the day light) that was absent, stolen or hidden appears (again) |
| c23 | Tree eclipses sky-light | Growth and falling of giant tree defines the condition of the sky with luminaries on it (tree eclipses the light of the sun, can destroy the sky, tears the sun off the sky, etc.) |
| 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 |
| d11 | Food baked in armpits | Before fire became known, people prepared food using warmth of their bodies (usually putting food in their armpits); or a person keeps fire in his or her armpits |
| d12 | Food baked in the sun | First people or inhabitants of a distant country cook food in the sun; or fire owner lies that he or she cooks food in the sun |
| d13c | Trickster makes his brother’s wife laugh | Two companions or brothers live together. The elder conceals his wife from the younger. In his absence, the younger tries to make the woman laugh and this way to get know her hiding place |
| d13d | To make hidden woman laugh | To find a person who is hiding somewhere inside the house, another one tries to make her or him laugh |
| d13f | Laughter and fire | Laughter triggers emergence or spread of fire. Usually fire is obtained from a creature when it bursts out laughing |
| d4a | Theft of fire | Fire is stolen from its original owner or brought back to the people from somebody who had stolen it before |
| d5 | Woman as the owner of the fire | Female person is the owner or inventor (but not the personification) of the fire |
| 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) |
| e14a | Masks represent the killed demons | People prepare ritual costumes and masks coping the features from the real demons whom they have killed |
| e20 | Fish poison person | Entering water, certain person makes fish die. From parts of his body or from his grave grows plant used to prepare fish poison (timbo) |
| e26 | People (women) transformed into fish become humans again | People or only women disappear under the water and turn into fish. They are caught using fishing tools and become humans (women) again. (Narratives that tell about a man who caught only one fish who because his wife are not included; see motig F7) |
| 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 |
| e9g | Vulture-wife | Man marries vulture-woman |
| e9h | Dove-wife | A man marries dove-woman |
| 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 |
| f38 | Women and sacred knowledge | Women were possessors of the sacred knowledge, sanctuaries or ritual objects which are now taboo for them or they made attempts to acquire such a knowledge or objects |
| f39 | The time of women | The women dominated over the men in the past or in a far away land, were the active part in marriage relations, practiced activities which now are reserved of the men only. Or the women could obtained supremacy but failed to do it for some reason |
| f51 | The clandestine lover | Person who conceals his or her identity comes to his or her lover (at night). Next time, the lover puts a mark on the stranger's face, body or clothes doing this intentionally (to recognize him or her) or by chance (that leads to the identification) |
| f84 | Prolonged celibacy imitated | Person has sex with the wife of his host or brother. Trying to conceal his deed, he puts ashes or juice of a fruit on his glans that has to prove his long celibacy |
| f95 | Wife of one of two brothers | Two companions or brothers live together. One has a wife which he conceals. Another suspects her existence, destroys her or tries to get a wife also for himself |
| g10 | The hanging tree | A tree which trunk is cut through do not fall because it is hold from above |
| g11 | Squirrel the woodcutter | A squirrel plays crucial role in felling the gigantic tree |
| 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 |
| g5 | Food tree | Fruits and shoots of different cultivated plants grow on the branches of one tree (on one vine) or certain plant has a tree form that is alien to it in nature |
| g6 | Primeval tree | One of the trees is the principal, original one (emerged before all the other; ancestor of wild or cultivated plants; ocean or rivers inside it; world axis; higher than all the others; overshadows sky) |
| g8 | Restored tree | A deep notch in the tree (or in the sky support) is magically restored as soon as persons or creatures who cut or gnaw it stop working |
| g8c | Cutting tree to get valuables | (Animal-)people try to fell a tree that contains water and fish or has cultivated plants on its branches. The notch disappears and the tree becomes intact |
| h24 | Container opened too early | Container with valuables or with dangerous creatures is opened (before time). Its content goes out of control or disappear |
| 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 |
| h35 | Fragile teeth | Human teeth are made of material subject to easy damage (etiology of tooth ache in most cases) |
| h39 | Snakes become dangerous (the spilled poison) | Certain creatures (snakes, insects) get access to special substance that proved to be out of control and become poisonous or immortal; creatures obtain their characteristics (usually becomes poisonous) after drinking or licking a particular medicine |
| h4 | The shed skin | Those who change their skin become young again |
| h5 | People and snakes | Reptiles or invertebrates possess the medicine of immortality; are contrasted with men as immortal with mortals and/or are responsible for originating of death; or a snake's bite inflicts the first death |
| h8 | The failed test | People lose immortality because they do not dare to touch or drink something loathsome, poisonous, hot or otherwise dangerous |
| i100b | The Pleiades are a group of people | The Pleiades are any people (of any ages and sex, combined data of i99-i100a) |
| 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 |
| i18 | A spouse or husband without anus or mouth | Person visits people who have no anus or mouth. He or his sister marries or tries to marry a local dweller |
| 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 |
| i22 | Objects in permanent movement | There are objects which remaining on the same place are moving permanently or periodically (meet and part. rise and fall down, shut and open, rotate) |
| i22f | Clashing trees | Person must go beyond relatively small objects (trees, logs, blades) which are incessantly clashing and parting, rising and falling |
| i37g | Fungi are steps, platforms, obstacles | Tree fungi are steps, small platforms, umbrellas, obstacles that make moving easier or more difficult, provide a shelter or cover |
| 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 |
| i45b | Not to point at the rainbow | It to point at the rainbow, pointing finger or entire arm will rot, wither or become crooked |
| 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 |
| i83 | The sky of birds | Birds, first of all vultures and eagles, live in the sky, usually at one or more layers of the upper world |
| 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 |
| j28a | Truth about father | Hero asks how one of his parents died and receives a series of false answers. Usually he successively exposes himself to the same dangers, survives and thus demonstrates that truth is still concealed from him |
| j30 | Parents’ remains | Before the hero destroys the antagonists or escapes from them, he finds or receives the remains or possessions that belonged to the antagonists' victim |
| 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 |
| j44 | The broken bridge | Person or his helper draws his enemies on the unstable bridge and destroys it. The enemies fall into water, into a precipice |
| j46 | Enemy drowns | Antagonist perishes falling into the water or trying to cross a water body |
| j47 | Pursuer falls from height | Person ascends to the sky (rare: descends from the sky; ascends the cliff) by a rope, a ladder, etc. Another person tries to follow him or her but the rope (the ladder) is broken or severed |
| j4a | Revenge for the death of the mother | A woman is murdered. Her son or children (rare: grandchildren, nephews) revenge for her death |
| k10 | Fight with the monstrous bird | Monstrous bird (giant bat) predates on humans. Heroes fight with it |
| k13a | Person with cut off leg ascends to the sky | Person's leg (rare: both legs) is cut, torn, bitten off, injured. He (rare: she) ascends to the sky: to the Moon; turns into the Moon, Sun, star, constellation; blood from the injured leg makes the sky red |
| k1f | Conflict because of a woman | A man maroons another because of jealousy or because he plans to take hold of his wife |
| k2 | The destroyed ladder | 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) |
| k25 | Magic wife | A man consciously marries a woman related to the non-human world |
| k29a | Surviving in a fire | Hero demonstrates his supernatural abilities remaining alive in a burning hot chamber, stove, bonfire, among burning vegetation |
| 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 |
| 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. |
| k4 | The bird nester | Person climbs up a tree or rock or descends to a cave to get eggs or nestlings from the bird's nest. Another person remains on the ground. They get into conflict and/or the first person is unable to get back to the ground |
| k44 | False mother rejected | A demonic or animal person steals a boy and pretends to be his real mother or father. The boy gets to know the truth, leaves the false parent |
| k6 | Vine from body excretions | A vine grows from person's or animal's tears, mucus, urine, etc. |
| k86 | Weeping child stolen | Because a small child is ignored or punished by its parents (usually it cries late in the evening), bush spirit or animal carries it away |
| 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) |
| k8f | Deer in monster’s belly | A swallowed up person finds alive deer in the belly of the monster |
| l11 | Turtle-bench | In a non-human world objects of everyday life have appearance of animals and monsters, mainly fish, amphibians and reptiles |
| l118 | Caught in a split log | (Animal) person provokes another to put a part of his body into a split log (between two planks, etc.) and removes the wedge |
| l12 | Vultures and incomplete body | Vultures bring to the sky a being who has lost part of its body members or is reduced to the head or skull |
| l15b | To kill with a reed | Person can be killed only with a particular plant that normally is not used as a weapon |
| l20 | Eater of the raw meat | Two persons hunt or fish. One of them is or becomes a cannibal. He or she reveals his or her nature eating the quarry raw |
| l20a | Eater of parrots | A man climbs a tree, throws down bird nestlings to a woman. She eats them raw and then kills or tries to kill the man |
| l22 | The sound sleep | After breaking some taboo, coming across a strange object or person, people fall asleep. They do not feel when at night spirits come and injure or kill them |
| l24 | Monsters suffocated | Demons (or one of them) attack people and return to their den (usually a cave or tree hollow). People make suffocating fire around the den killing most or all of the demons |
| l34 | The burning hair | Person kills or injures his enemy putting fire on his or her straw costume, mask, headgear, hair or object on his or her back |
| l35 | Demon’s hand broken | At night, a shaman or a bush spirit comes and inserts his hand into the hut to steal food or to make this way love with a sleeping woman. A man who is in the hut cuts the hand off or breaks it |
| l38 | Demon’s trap | A demon puts a trap to catch people, hero gets into it |
| l46 | Head downward | Person ascends, descends, walks head downward or sees the world upside down |
| l49 | Body parts falling down | Body parts of a person or pieces of his flesh are thrown down one by one. (In American Indian versions those who are on the ground usually take them for game, honey, fish) |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| l57b | Demon comes to get his body part back | Person cuts off and uses for his own needs a part of the body of predator animal or demonic creature. The demon (the animal) comes after it and usually kills or maims the person |
| l5c | Rolling head is a dangerous monster | Rolling head is a dangerous mobster (pursues celestial bodies, people etc.) |
| l6 | Demon clings to person | A demonic being demands that a person would carry it permanently, clings to his shoulder or back |
| 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 |
| l9 | Sharp body members | Body members of a person has the form of cutting or piercing weapon |
| l9a | Sharp leg | Person's leg is injured intentionally or by chance. The loss of one leg does not bother him. He uses the sharpened bone as a thrust weapon |
| m18 | Stolen arrows and hooks | Person transforms himself into an object of hunting or fishing, provokes hunters of fishermen to catch or shoot him and carries way the tools that they use (arrows, darts, harpoons, hooks, baits). Or he fishes by turning himself into a hook. Or he is caught but escapes turning back into a person |
| m183 | A race: one against many | Many animals of one species that all look identical together fulfill the task that would be impossible for any of them if he were alone; the competitors believe that the task was fulfilled by only one animal. Usually a slow and a fast animals agree to race. The slow one puts other animals of his species at the finish or along the distance, each one answering the fast one that he is ahead of him. The fast one accepts his loss |
| m185 | On the tail of the fast one (animals) | A slow and a fast animals (or not flying bird) agree to race. The slow one imperceptibly sticks to the fast one’s body (or to a vehicle) and getting to the finish pretends to come there simultaneously with the fast one or before him |
| m185a | On the tail of the winner (all versions) | Birds, animals or fish compete as about who is the fastest or can fly higher than others. A weak one imperceptible sticks to the body of the fastest or strongest and wins |
| m18b | Getting fishing hook or harpoon | Person turns into a fish to steal fishing hook or harpoon or he turns into fishing hook to catch a fish |
| m42 | Eyes: taken out of orbits and lost | Person loses his eyes because of his playfulness or negligence. He makes new eyes of some substance or/and takes eyes of another person |
| m43 | Doll as a decoy | To kill or catch a monster, human figure of wood or clay or alive woman is exposed as a bait. Usually monster's claws or sharp leg get stuck in the wood |
| m6 | Night with a partridge | A young man or girl spends night in the forest. The forest partridge (Tinamus sp.) provides him or her a fire, a shelter and/or a hammock but takes them away and flies away itself when the person does something wrong |
| m7 | Hero waiting to be picked up | Getting into the lower or upper world, to an island, a country at the horizon, etc. a man is unable to move further and waits for somebody who could bring him to his destination. Some animals, birds or celestial bodies pass by, the last one (often the Sun or the Moon) picks him up and brings to the place he is eager to go |
| m70 | An elder person poisons a younger one with intestinal gas | Old person tricks a young man into smelling her or his intestinal gas |
| m75 | Valuables taken off the vultures | Person attracts and catches the carrion-eaters (usually some birds) and thanks to this obtains valuables retrieves valuables (fire, woman, animals, etc.) |
| m8 | Breaking the obstacle | Non-human persons work hard to destroy a strong and durable obstacle that blocks access to some place or object |
| m81 | Blind persons | A man travels and comes to two or several blind (usually old) persons |
| m84 | Revived from bones | Person, animal, fish or (rare) a fruit is eaten up and then revived, usually after all bones (all seeds) being put together |