| Motif | Name | Description |
| a2e | The Sun and the Moon are cut off heads | The Sun and/or the Moon are cut off heads of anthropomorphic beings |
| 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) |
| 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 |
| a4 | Female sun | The Sun is female, the Moon is male or (more rare) also female |
| a5 | The Sun and the Moon are males | The Moon is male, the Sun is also male or (much more rare) asexual |
| b114 | Old person turns into anteater | Old man or old woman turns into anteater (origin of anteaters) |
| b17 | Night in container | Darkness is a particular object that can be carried (usually brought from its original owner in a container) |
| b18 | Light in container | Day light (also warmth, the sun, the moon) is kept as a particular object in a container, under a cover, etc. |
| b19 | The night and the married life | People had trouble making love before night came into being |
| b26 | Man joins wild animals | Person who follows the wild animals turns into one of them or into their master |
| b27 | Variants of transformations | Persons ponders over what object, feature, or creature it would be appropriate for him or her to turn into. When the choice is made, the persons transforms himself or herself |
| b37 | Creatures are made appear as they are now | Person decorates different birds (rare: fish), share fat between anomals. Since then, the corresponding species acquire present characteristics |
| b53 | Creatures or objects from cut off genitals | Supernaturally big genitals are cut off and turn into snakes or other creatures and objects |
| b7d | Water flows from broken bone | Water flows from a broken bone (of a bird) producing a flood |
| c1 | The collapse of the sky | Catastropic displacement of layers of the univers in the past or in the future is mentioned. Among variants (sometimes combined):
the sky fell on the earth; the earth (the underworld) and the sky interchanged their positions; the earth turned upside down; the layers of the universe collapsed in one after another; they will change their place during the future cataclysm
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| c10 | The flood: the wet tails | During the flood birds or animals escape to some place (mountain, tree, boat, sky). Tips of their tails or other body parts get covered with water or foam and acquire their present color and form |
| 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 |
| c19 | Acquisition of the sun | The Sun (the day light) that was absent, stolen or hidden appears (again) |
| c24 | The world in danger of falling down | A tree or pillar supports the sky or the earth. If it collapses, people perish |
| 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 |
| d4a | Theft of fire | Fire is stolen from its original owner or brought back to the people from somebody who had stolen it before |
| d4p | Parrot or parakeet obtains fire | Parrot or parakeet steals fire for people. (Australian data not computed because historically definitely unrelated to the Tropical American data) |
| d5 | Woman as the owner of the fire | Female person is the owner or inventor (but not the personification) of the fire |
| d9 | Fire and vulture | Raven or other big dark-feathered bird scavenger is the owner, personification, spouse, obtainer or stealer of fire, daylight, or the Sun |
| e13a | Sacred knowledge from under the water | Sacred knowledge, objects and rituals are initially obtained from the denizens of the underwater world |
| e1b | Person of unfit materials | Certain person is made of improper material and proves to be short-lived or unfit for fulfilling his functions |
| e25 | Arachne (the spider-weaver) | The art of weaving people get from a spider or from a person who turns into spider afterwards; a spider is weaving for people |
| f18a | The long penis | Penis is so long that he can turn it round his waist or send into a woman who is at a long distance from him. (Only texts considered to describe real events and beings and not anecdotes are included) |
| f22 | Study of partner’s body | Person asks another person of the opposite sex about destination or place of her or his genitals. Usually it is made after putting questions about function of other body parts; or person tries to use for sex different parts of the partner's body or tests them before reaching the best place where the genitals should be put |
| f23 | Origin of menses: sexual act | Women menstruate because they bled in primeval time after the first defloration |
| f29 | Girl sits on the ground | A girl or young woman who is usually occupied with domestic work (is cooking, weaving, etc.) sits on the ground and copulates with a penis-like creature that crawls from below into her vagina |
| f29a | Worm killed with boiling water | To kill snake or worm paramour of a woman or girl, person pours on it boiling water, resin or spills live coals |
| f30 | Snake paramour | A woman or a girl takes a snake, an eel (i.e. Pacific snake-eel), a lizard, or a worm for husband or paramour. People kill or badly injure him, the woman and/or her progeny or the woman herself is transformed into snake. Cf. motif k76b: the snake-husband becomes and remains a handsome man |
| f34b | The paramour is not a human being | A girl (a woman, a group of women) intentionally takes a penis-being, a snake, an eel, a lizard, a worm, a big water animal or water monster or a big terrestrial mammal for paramour. People kill or maim the paramour, the woman and/or her progeny or she is transformed herself into an animal. She is blamed for her behavior |
| 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 |
| f4 | Child born in jug | In the beginning of times, a particular person or children in general was or were conceived and grown up in pots, heaps of mud, etc. and not in a womb |
| f49 | The abnormal birth | Cesarean operation upon a woman at childbirth as a custom |
| f49a | Animal explains how to give birth | A small animal (mouse, rat, rabbit, opossum, a bird) explains a woman how she can deliver her child in a natural way |
| 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) |
| f58 | Trickster and women | A man cohabits with a group of women (or with several women in succession) concealing his identity and/or intentions. He is either eventually exposed and punished by women or escapes to continue his tricks |
| f7 | The underwater-maiden | Man takes or attempts to take a wife who is connected with the underwater world (fish, crab, snake, water animal and the like) |
| f75 | A siren and a tapir | A hunter watches tapir who calls a water woman from the river or lake and copulates with her. Hunter does the same, becomes the woman's lover |
| f76 | Animals teach to make love | People learn to copulate after they see birds, fish or animals doing it |
| f86 | Conditional signal | Person summons with a certain signal a non-human being (usually his or her sexual partner or his or her protégé). Another person spies, uses the same signal or pronounces the same words and kills the being who comes to him (or uses this being sexually himself) |
| f88 | Odor of women | Initially women's genitals were fragrant or had no smell. Because of a bad chance they acquire unpleasant odor or do not acquire fragrant odor |
| f9 | A dangerous woman | For different reasons, sexual contact with a woman is deadly dangerous for a man |
| f9a | Vagina dentata | There are teeth, blades or sharp stones in woman’s genitals, vagina is the biting mouth. (Only texts that are believed to correspond to reality are considered but not anecdotes and jokes) |
| g13a | People ate dirt | Before acquisition of cultivated plants (fire, hunting skills) people ate dirt, mud or stones |
| g13c | Bad food of the pre-agricultural epoch | Before the cultivated plants or edible wild plants become known, people ate (decomposed) wood, bark, mud, stones, fungi |
| g23 | Alive being turns into many objects | Person or creature is transformed. Separate parts of its (his, her) body give origin to different objects or creatures (only etiological narratives are considered) |
| 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 |
| g8d | Falling or growing up of a tree is dangerous to the world | To save the world (gods, king, etc.) certain persons or creatures try to cut or gnaw a tree (post, mountain) or do not permit the others to do. The notch disappears and the tree (post, etc.) becomes intact |
| h11 | The call of God | People become mortal because they do not hear or answer a call of a being who promises them immortality (or do not pronounce his name) or answer a call (pronouns the name) of a being who brings death |
| 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 |
| h24 | Container opened too early | Container with valuables or with dangerous creatures is opened (before time). Its content goes out of control or disappear |
| h24f | Meat in a package | Person can magically put a lot of meat or fish into a small package or vessel which is easy to carry |
| 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 |
| h34f | Walking baskets | Baskets carried loads by themselves |
| h37 | Magic device lost by a failure | Magic object, device that makes hunting or fishing easy gets into possession of a person who is unable to operate it or abuses it. The device kills or injures the failure himself, other people and/or disappears |
| 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 |
| h6a | People and plants | Mortal humans are contrasted with (almost) immortal trees that shed their bark, become green again after winter sleep or propagate by sprouts |
| h7g1 | Death is more fair and rich than God | Person (who is usually in search of the godgather for the newborn child) rejects God (saints) and devil but accepts Death who is more fair (or rich) |
| i1 | The thunderbirds | Creatures that produce rain and/or thunderstorms are birds or anthropomorphic beings with wings; or (rare) some or all birds are connected with thunder, lightning or rain though Thunder is not a bird |
| i104 | Stars are fragments | Stars are fragments of a bigger luminary (usually the Moon); or stars, the sun and the moon are formed from one and the same primeval person or creature |
| i16 | Body anomalies of the first people | First human beings have no mouth, anus or genitals, their women do not know how to give birth |
| i29 | Animal’s hole leads to the underworld | Person follows an animala through its hole or digs a hole himself and gets into the lower world where the animals who dig holes live |
| 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 |
| i45b | Not to point at the rainbow | It to point at the rainbow, pointing finger or entire arm will rot, wither or become crooked |
| i54 | Water creature full of fish | Anaconda or a water monster has live fish or animals inside; is father of the fish; all fish emerge from its body |
| i8f | One support of the world | Only one pole or mountain supports the earth or the sky |
| i96 | Bloody rainbow | Rainbow is blood, associated with war and death |
| j1 | The vengeful heroes | Persons avenge the death of their father, mother or other relatives who are one (rare two) generations older than they |
| j18 | Woman falls from the sky | A woman who is pregnant or has a small child falls from the sky. She or a daughter born by her dies but her (grand)son is grown up |
| j25 | Babies escape and return | Heroes (usually one or two), being still babies or embryos, escape or are thrown away, often into the water. To bring them back into the human world, they are lured (persuaded) to come out or caught with difficulty |
| 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 |
| j4a | Revenge for the death of the mother | A woman is murdered. Her son or children (rare: grandchildren, nephews) revenge for her death |
| j58 | The arrow ladder | Persons shoot arrows (darts) which hit each other’s end forming a chain (rope, ladder). Persons climb by this chain to the sky or (rare) across an obstacle |
| j59 | Following arrow to get to the sky | To climb to the sky, person must first to shoot an arrow that reaches the sky and sticks to it |
| k12 | Woman is lost and returned | By trick or by force, a rival or adversary kidnaps hero's wife or bride. The man gets her back |
| 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 |
| k13b | Leg bitten off by caiman | A caiman ferries a man across water body, bites his leg off. The maimed man is transformed into a constellation or into an animal |
| k176 | A man in search of the woman | A (young) man sets off to find or to return his bride or his wife |
| 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 |
| k28 | Father or uncle is rival and enemy | Maternal uncle or father (or grandfather if he replaces father who is not mentioned) of the young man is his rival or enemy and tries to kill him |
| k34 | Fatal swing | Person kills others inviting them to sit on a swing and launching them into water, on rocks, 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 |
| 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 |
| k87 | Marriage with an animal creates problems | A woman becomes the wife of an animal (rare: other non-human being). Her husband cares for her but ultimately the animal, the woman, her children or her relations are killed, she turns into an animal herself, animals and humans become enemies, etc. |
| l11 | Turtle-bench | In a non-human world objects of everyday life have appearance of animals and monsters, mainly fish, amphibians and reptiles |
| l135 | The Traveller | Male person leaves his home and gets to unfamiliar places. On his way, he comes across different strange creatures. After all, he returns home or leaves the earth for the other world. (Rather often a long string of episodes breaks off or the story lacks the beginning and does not explain why the hero is travelling) |
| l23 | Proteus | Person gets hold of another. Trying to free himself, the latter turns into different materials, elements, animals or (Urarina and Setebo) orders different dangerous creature to attack the person |
| l23d | Metamorphosis of the caught female person | Being seized by a person, a female person turns into different materials, elements or animals (Urarina and Setebo: sends different dangerous creature to attack the one who caught her) |
| 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 |
| l38 | Demon’s trap | A demon puts a trap to catch people, hero gets into it |
| l42 | Hero carried to ogre’s home | An ogre or ogress catches a person and brings him to his or her home where he or she plans to cook and eat him. The hero escapes |
| l42b | Credulous children of the ogre | An ogre's child or (rare) wife believes in what hero tells him (or her) and releases him. Usually the hero kills the child and puts its meat to cook in the very pot where the ogre planned to cook the hero |
| l46 | Head downward | Person ascends, descends, walks head downward or sees the world upside down |
| l47 | Enemy moves backward and dies | Hero's enemy ascends a tree or rock head downward or walks backward letting the hero better possibility to kill him or to escape |
| l48 | Demons devour their comrades | A man kills (usually in a tree, on a rock, at the edge of a well, of a precipice) and/or throws down one of his enemies. The other enemies do not recognize their comrade and think that their prey is falling down |
| l59 | Avaricious woman: metamorphosis | Man's wife, sister or mother eats all the nest food alone, she is transformed in punishment |
| l5c | Rolling head is a dangerous monster | Rolling head is a dangerous mobster (pursues celestial bodies, people etc.) |
| l61 | Endocannibal | Person devours his or her own flesh or disembowels himself or herself |
| l63 | Person eats with vagina or anus | Person eats food with her toothed vagina or with her or his anus |
| 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 |
| l84 | Unfit axes | Bush spirits and the like try to cut down a tree. The attempt fails because their axes are good for nothing being made of turtle shells, clay, etc.
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| m107 | Turtle bites penis off | A smaller animal kills or maims a big mammal (jaguar, tapir) biting his penis |
| m202 | Thorn removed from lion’s paw | 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 |
| m21 | A protector hides fugitives | The protagonist pursued by an enemy comes across a person, an animal or an object to help him and receives help |
| m29g | Trickster-hare or rabbit | In episodes related to deception, absurd, obscene or anti-social behavior the protagonist is hare or rabbit |
| m29k | The turtle (tortoise, toad, frog) wins thanks to his smartness | Being smart and persistent, the turtle (toad, frog) overcomes strong adversaries |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| m63 | Body parts enumerated | Before finding a part of the body that is the best for some particular function, other parts are proven or enumerated |
| m6a | Overnight with the fire in the forest | A person spends a night in the forest. One of the forest dwellers has fire. After the person does something wrong, this fire is lost |
| m73 | Exchanged excrements or vomits: who is stronger | Two (animal) persons compare their feces or vomits to know about the diet and habits of each other (who is the strongest). The weaker one gets to exchange the feces (vomits) |
| m73a | Exchanged excrements | Two (animal) persons compare their feces (with different purpose). One of them gets to exchange them |
| m9 | Stuck in a tree hollow | Person who puts her or his head or hand into a tree hollow or (rare) other hole is stuck fast in it or falls into the hollow and dies or undergoes a metamorphosis |