I20C. Dwarves - inhabitants of the lower world. .14.17.19.21.-.27.29.31.32.32.50.-.52.55.-.57.59.60.62.65.67.
Dwarves live in an underground world that is somewhat reminiscent of the earthly world. If dwarves and humans meet, the meeting takes place underground.
Berbers of Morocco (Rif), Arameans, Bartle Bay, Nicobarese, Tibetans, Karen, Bondo, Saisya, Bunun, Maranao, Miao, Lisu, Greeks, Abkhaz, Ingush, Nogai, Scandinavians, Finns, Estonians, Lutsi, Udmurts, Zuñi, Tarahumara, Otomi, Highland Totonacs, Popoluca, Nahuatl of Veracruz, Mazatec, Tzotzil, Tzeltal, Tojolabal, mestizos of Soconusco, Nonama, Yupa, Guambia, Guayabero (?), Sanema, Yanomami, Locono, Colorado, Kayapa, Puinawe, Maku, Ticuna, Quechua (Cusco), Tacana, Guarazu.
North Africa. Berbers of Morocco (Rif) [underground live dwarfs the size of two-year-old children, old from birth, naked, hunchbacked; every day they dig an exit to the earth to destroy people and live on the earth in their place; every evening they say that there is little time left, they must rest; during the night the passage is covered with earth; this is because they do not say In sh'a Allah; if they guess to say it, they will finish the work, destroy people]: Coon 1931: 155-156
Western Asia. Arameans [a merchant returns from Baghdad with a caravan of loaded mules; the drivers take the animals out to pasture; suddenly the ground opens up and the mules fall into a hole; the merchant orders a rope to be made and begins to descend; the rope is not long enough, he orders it to be let go, falls and lies unconscious for a year; when he comes to, he sees dwarfs a cubit tall or less; an old man brings him to the city; shows him his mules but does not give them to him, but offers him nine years of service; in the world of dwarfs everything is different; they copulate standing up; they elect the last ragamuffin as ruler; after nine years the merchant is ordered to close his eyes and he and his mules find themselves on the ground]: Prym, Socin 1881, no. 44: 181-186.
Melanesia. Bartle Bay [Yoyo dwarfs support the earth; when they rest or shift their loads, seismic phenomena occur]: Seligmann 1910: 649.
Tibet – North-Eastern India. Tibetans [with Bon deities are associated ideas about dwarfs, guardians of the cardinal directions: iron in the south, copper in the west, turquoise in the north, a dwarf from a shell in the east]: Ogneva 1982b: 509-510.
Burma - Indochina. Karen [the son of the widow Cha Than Pho saw a mole the size of a buffalo eating rice in the field; he chased it with a stick, it disappeared into a hole, a whirlwind sucked Ch. into it; when he came to, he saw that he was tied with thin threads, around a little man the size of a finger; Ch. easily broke the threads; the local king said that the mole was in their service and only he could get out, overcoming the wind; the little men fed Ch., and he helped them in their work; they gave him a staff that revived the dead with one end and killed the other; thanks to the staff, the little men did not die, and the mole, after each revival, became larger and larger; the mole pushed Ch. to the ground, and so that he would not be sucked back, Ch. ordered his dog, who was waiting for him, to bring his flute; when Ch. began to play, the birds flew in to listen, sat on the bamboo stalks, they bent, Ch. grabbed them and climbed out; the king’s daughter died, Ch. revived her with his staff, received the princess and then the throne]: Kasevich, Osipov 1976, No. 171: 457-460.
South Asia. Bondo [Gulong Sisa fell ill; Jam Raja came to him in the guise of a simple old woman, invited him to visit the nether world where the dead were; if he did not like it, he could return; they went down, there were houses along the streets separately for Bondo, a house and a gadaba; all the people were only two feet tall; GS recognized his dead parents; the youth brought the head of a goat, on earth the goat was sacrificed; the boy was sitting apart from the others - he had died recently and was not yet accepted into society; (evidently GS had returned home)]: Elwin 1950: 204-205.
Malaysia - Indonesia. Nicobarese [people of Malacca found a hole in the ground, lit torches, went down, came to the village of underground dwarfs, found many eggs of the birds that the dwarfs bred, began to steal the eggs; the dwarfs discovered the thieves, began to resent; the Malaccans proposed a dancing competition, if they won, they would retain the right to take the eggs; they lost and returned to earth; the dwarfs planted a tree in front of the entrance to their world, blocked the entrance with stones, the Malaccans never found this entrance again]: Roy 2001, 8: 20-21.
Taiwan – Philippines. Saisha [ haven spirits live in the underworld, feed on toads; a hunter who came to the haven tasted wine, learned how to make it with the help of grass or ; unsuccessfully tries to carry it away in his ear, between his toes; when he hides it behind the outer cloth, the haven are not found or , give him food for the road, and let him go]: Riftin 1998: 54; Bunun [a man descended through a hole into the lower world; there are dwarfs 2-3 feet tall; they treated the man to boiled rice, millet and beans, refused to let him take them with him; he hid the bean in his penis, brought it to the ground]: Mabuchi 1969: 28; Maranao [there are six tiers of the earth, including our upper one; long-haired dwarfs live on the first one, they are usually invisible]: Eugenio 1994, no. 89.
China - Korea. Chuan Miao : Graham 1954: 166 [a man descended through a cave into the underworld; there is a different earth and a different sky; the houses of the natives are 1 foot high; the people are small, but there are many more of them than people on the earth; the man returned to the earth], 245-246 [a youth married the emperor's daughter; having stepped on a forbidden carpet, he fell into the nether world; there are dwarfs there as tall as a broom (2 feet); their vessels are the size of eggshells; they spend the whole day chopping grass stalks with axes the size of a fingernail; the youth helps them dig the earth, accidentally knocks down a boundary line, soldiers are sent against him, he easily kills them; after three years he comes out on the earth through a crack formed during a drought]; 1961 [underground live dwarfs, who are called broom people, because they are as tall as a Chinese broom (2 feet)]: 74; Schotter 1911 [the sky was low, they touched it with a load of brushwood, a rice husk pestle; the great-grandfather raised it, setting up supports of fragrant wood at the four corners; he stretched out colored canvases, from which multi-colored clouds and multi-colored stones were made; he made the sun of gold, the moon of silver, the stars of colored stones; underground live dwarfs, for whom eggshells serve as vessels; in the sky live giants]: 326; Miao (who claim that their ancestors lived in the province of Jiangxi) [at the very bottom underground is the country of dwarfs]: Truax 1991; Lisu [the astrologer helps everyone; his two sons want to kill him, i.e. they are of no help; the astrologer tells them to go at dawn to the crossroads; a yellow rider on a yellow horse galloped past, then a white one, then a black one; they killed the black one - he and the horse are made of iron; they realized that the others were made of gold and silver; became blacksmiths; the dragon was unhappy that they had set up a forge next to his lake; sent a fish (they grabbed it by the tail with pincers, since then the fish's tail has been flat), a frog (they tore off the tail); the dragon went himself, they grabbed him by the nostrils, began to beat him; he is forced to give up the knife that separates everything, and the crossbow, the arrow from which strikes everything; the younger one accidentally aimed the knife incorrectly, found himself separated from the older one; came to a country where huge snakes and a falcon destroyed everyone; killed one with a knife, the other with an arrow, took two girls; brought to his brother; smeared the face of the beautiful younger one with soot, the older brother chose the older one; realizing the deception, decided to get rid of the younger one; camouflaged the hole from which the wind blows, took his brother there to hunt; the brother fell into the lower world, where there are little dwarfs ("ant-people"); for them, a frog is an elephant, a marmot is a bear, a bamboo rat is a tiger; the younger brother easily kills such animals , gets a wife, but she is too small for him; the last rat asks her not to kill him, tells him to hold on to her tail and not to laugh, then he will lead her to the ground; seeing the rat's rear, the younger brother laughs, the end of the tail comes off, they fall; this happens 8 times; on the ninth time they reach the ground; the younger brother gives the rat sharp teeth (a cutter) and a flute; the dove borrowed it and did not return it, now plays it; the younger brother looked at the girl, realized that she was his daughter and that the elder brother had taken his wife; he cut the elder brother down, told his daughter and the women the whole story]: Dessaint, Ngwâma 1994: 329-346.
Balkans. Greeks : El-Shamy 1980 (from a 20-year-old student in Egypt who heard it from his Greek mother on Leros; no such story in Egypt) [the earth rests on a huge tree trunk; small malicious creatures, the Kalikanzaroi, try to cut it down all year round in order to laugh at how the earth will fall; but every year before Christmas they come out to have fun on the earth, at which time the clearing is overgrown]: 273; Krappe 1938 [callicantzari demons gnaw at a pole or tree; by the end of the year the pole is almost ready to fall, but the demons are summoned to the earth for 12 days (from Christmas to King's Day); during this time the trunk is restored]: 267.
Caucasus - Asia Minor. Abkhazians [the dwarfs called Atsans were smarter than God; they urinated towards the sky; they farted in sour milk, wiped themselves with cheese; they imitated thunder by beating on dried cowhide; in order to find out their weak spot, he lowered a child from the sky in a golden cradle; the Atsans raised him; they answered him that they would die if the cotton snow caught fire; the old man noticed that the goat's beard began to shake; the cotton snow fell, caught fire from lightning, the Atsans died; those who threw themselves into the water turned into lizards and frogs; those who hid in caves and tree hollows - into devils and snakes; (var.: the Atsans died from frost, from a flood); having found themselves in the underground world, the Atsans drill into the ground to get back out, but whatever they drill into during the day collapses again]: Inal-ipa 1977: 164-169 (retold in Stahl 1989: 204-207); the Ingush [on the outskirts of the earth, the black people of Adjudji and Madjudji live underground; they are so short that they milk cows standing up; they strive to get to the surface and dig the ground with their long claws from morning until evening; when there is very little left, they go to sleep and the earth is restored; if they pronounced the name of God, they would finish digging right away; one day they will guess to pronounce it, they will fill the universe, drink all the water and eat every living thing to the last blade of grass]: Dakhkilgov 2006: 315-32; Nogays [in the lower world were the dwellings of the Yeslmauyz, Dauys and the country of dwarfs (ergezheyli)]: Kapayev 2012: 32.
Baltoscandia. Scandinavians [From Ymir's body the sons of Bor made the earth, from blood the sea and waters; the earth - flesh, the mountains - bones, boulders - teeth and bone fragments; the ocean encircles the earth in a ring; from Ymir's skull the sky was made, his brain - clouds. Under each corner of the sky they placed a dwarf (East, West, North, South)]: Younger Edda 1970: 18; Finns [the little underground people (maahiset) are the children of Adam and Eve, whom Eve hid from God]: Jauhiainen 1998, № M301: 271; Estonians [in the lower world live little people, in the middle - medium-sized (that is, us), in the upper - big ones like our shadow at sunset]: Estonian Literary Museum, archive, ERA H I7, 497(73), <Helme; Lutsey (Zap. 1893) [in the forest a man bent down to drink water; the water spirit grabbed him by the beard: give him what you don’t know at home; a son was born at home; he grew up, went into the forest, his mother gave him 9 flatbreads made with her milk; the devil tagged along; the boy successively throws flatbreads over his left shoulder; they block the devil’s path, and each time he runs to the spring to drink; the blacksmith hid the boy; the devil demands to open the door; the blacksmith: lick it with your tongue; he grabbed the tongue with hot tongs, the devil ran away; the blacksmith gave him a horse, orders him not to look at what was coming his way; the young man didn’t look at the underground dwarfs , at the naked old women, but glanced at the girls out of the corner of his eye; the horse disappeared; the devil orders him to get him a princess; he gives duckling, piglet and veal – these gifts will be enough; he gave it to the wolf, the bear and the swan; On the stone there is a man the size of a thumb, advises to take it with him; the young man comes to the king; the king: 9 years ago in the forest I lost 30 stallions; bring them and you will get the princess; the bear brought; 30 oxen: the wolf brought; the princess lost a ring in the sea: get it; the swan dives, got it on the third try; the king orders to go to a hot iron bath; the first man the size of a finger enters, the bath becomes cold, teeth chatter; so three times; bathe in boiling water; the first man the size of a finger, the water is warm, wash well; recognize the princess among many girls; she warned: she will stand on her left heel; next time: I will stand on tiptoe; the third time: I will not be among the others, I will carry a bowl across the meadow; the king sends the young, having given money and gold; here is the devil, a grave with burning resin, a rope through it: go through - I will return the horse; the young man: show me how; the devil walked along the rope, the young man cut it with his sword, the devil fell into the resin, only smoke remained; they rode home on horseback; wedding; he ate and drank, it flowed down his lips, but did not get into his mouth]: Annom et al. 2018: 215-220.
Volga – Perm. Udmurts [in the center of the earth there are people like us, but as tall as children; there are also roosters – kylchin atas ; when the kylchin atas crows, then our roosters will crow; giants live in the sky]: Vladykin 1994: 75.
Great Southwest. Zuni [twin brothers descend into the underworld; dwarfs live there, feeding on the smell of food; they are attacked first by jays, then by pots of soup; many dwarfs perish; the brothers easily catch birds in snares, break the pots, eat the soup; pierce the anuses of the dwarfs; children come to us from that world, so they live only on air until the umbilical cord is cut; old people return there, they often have indigestion]: Cushing 1901: 400-410.
NW Mexico. Tarahumara [the Ro'lichi dwarves steal people's souls, take them underground; they live underground in their populous villages; an informant tells how he fell ill as a child, the dwarves took his soul, he visited their world but returned]: Olmos Aguilara 2005: 260-261.
Mesoamerica. Otomi [underground (?) dwarfs hide people in caves]: Manrique 1969: 716; mountain Totonacs [in the east and west of the world; hide underground from the heat of the passing sun]: Harvey, Kelly 1969: 671; Kelly 1966: 399; mountain Popoluca [masters of animals inside the mountain]: Foster 1945a, no. 8: 200-201; Nahuatl of Veracruz, Popoluca [Chaneque dwarfs live underground; the Chane(co) have a hammock of snakes, crocodiles are boats, a jaguar is a bed, armadillos and turtles are benches, deer are cattle]: Münch 1983a: 173-177; Mazatec [small, dark, curly-haired people live in the underworld at sunrise; their skin is darkened by the heat because the Sun passes close to them at night; they wear no clothes and are rich because the Sun gives them gold]: Incháustegui 1977: 34, 39; Tzotzil : Guiteras-Holmes 1961 (San Pedro Chenalho) [dwarfs live underground; if a dwarf is born on the ground, it is God's way of showing what the underground people are like]: 153; Köhler 1977b (San Pablo) [underground dwarfs are too weak to work; they feed on the smell of food; to protect themselves from the heat of the Sun passing close to them, they cover their heads and necks with clay]: 17; Laughlin 1977 (Chamula), no. 24 [the dwarfs load a rabbit with their luggage like a mule, and it slides off its back; if it stays on its back, the world will turn upside down; when the sun passes by the dwarfs, they put on clay hats; they want to go out into our world], 80 [in the lower world, the sun is very hot; when it passes there, the dwarfs put on clay hats to save themselves]: 151, 254; Vogt 1969 [underground live dwarfs, former inhabitants of the earth who perished during the flood; the sun passes close to them and they protect their heads from the heat with clay hats]: 298; 1970 [at noon, the sun stops to see how things are in Zinacantan; at sunset it passes close to the sea and the water in it boils; at night it passes between our world and the lower world; the dwarves are hot there, they cover their heads with clay hats]: 4; Tzeltal : Hermitte 1970 [dark-skinned dwarves live on the other side of the earth; wear clay hats to protect themselves from the heat of the sun passing close to them]: 32; Ventur 1982 [drag the chariot of the sun]: xvi; Tojolabal ["mother earth" is square, supported at the corners by four lightning-bolts; above is a hemispherical sky; on the lower surface of the earth live dwarves; when the earth turns over, we will change places with them]: Ruz 1982: 55 (=1983: 426); mestizos of Soconusco[a man wants to see the Sun, flies to the sunrise in the form of an eagle; there the dwarfs invite him to their cave in the center of the earth; they help him collect the gold of the Sun on the seashore; a greedy man coughs on them, they fall, he carries away all the gold alone; the load is too heavy, he turns into a vulture; the dwarfs bring part of the gold to his poor wife and children; underground they place part in the roots of the corn; that is why the ears are golden]: Navarrete 1966, no. 5: 426-427.
Northern Andes. Nonama : Lotero Villa sa [a man gave birth to two sons from his leg, died; they ask who killed the father; Snake ; killed the snakes; Jaguar ; etc.; finally, the Moon ; wanted to get to her, a woodpecker cut the vine; one brother was eaten by a snake, the other continues to ask about his father; killed the Sun ; where the Sun sets, people without anuses]: 22-23; Raul González in Pinto García 1978 [without mouth or anus; bodies filled with sand]: 123; Wassen 1935, no. 8 [two people were born from the leg of a woman; at night they turned into waura ("wooden dolls"), retaining human appearance, killed people, drank blood; asked the mother who killed their father; Snake ; killed all the snakes in the forest; El Sierpe (the giant snake); they sailed on a raft to Sierpe, but the guacamayo warned her, she crawled away; the brothers put firewood on the raft, the snake swallowed it; they put a pole between the jaws, made a fire in the belly; the snake was half dead, one came out through the anus, ended up in the lower world, nothing is known about him; the other through the mouth, continued to suck blood; the sky was close to the earth; the man made clothes from plant fluff, flew up; at sunrise a woodpecker flew out, hit him in the face; the man fell, but managed to scar the face of the moon; fell where the sun sets; a boy was playing on the beach, gave him fruits from the caimito tree, said that his father owned them, he would be there today; this is the Sun; a white man came, in a gold hat; promised to take the man home; the boy throws fruits into the water, the fish ate them; so distracted the fish so that they did not eat the Sun; The Sun and the man dived into the underworld; the Sun left him at the huts, promised to pick him up on the way back; the sinculos (people without anus) said that the kuna wanted to kill them; the man began to make a bow and arrows; the kuna turned out to be shrimp; now "Englishmen"; these are crayfish; the man explained that in his world these enemies are eaten; he went to relieve himself, two boys asked him to make anuses for them, they died; the Sun brought the man to earth; the man questioned his dead brother-in-law, who answered that he could not be cured; the people decided to kill the newcomer so that he would not drink more blood; they pounded corn, mixed it with water, doused it at night, the man turned into a stone; they smashed him, the fragments turned into mosquitoes, those that fell into the water - into leeches]: 133-137; Pinto García 1978: 119–120, 124 [according to Cadavid Gutierrez: these people live on the moon]; Chaves 1945 (chami), no. 2 [a man marries the ant-woman Arrumia, she takes him to the lower world; there he comes to the land of the Arremucos, people without anuses; he has many women there; his mother comes to him, marries him there]: 145–146; Zuluaga Gomez 1991 (chami): 98; yupa: Villamañán 1982, no. 6 [Pépento live underground; they do not eat or relieve themselves, but drink a decoction; they marry, have children, and die]: 21; Wilbert 1974, no. 8 [the dwarfs place food on the back of their heads, letting it slide down their spines; this is how they eat; the hero marries a local girl]: 87-88; guambia [the hero descends into the underworld; dwarfs without anuses live there; he pierces their anuses, they die]: Rowe 1954-1955: 154.
Llanos. Guayabero [dwarfs(?) in the underworld; no details]: Schindler 1977a: 220.
Southern Venezuela. Sanema [Oineitib dwarfs without anuses or intestines live in the underworld; are constantly hungry; eat raw meat without chewing and women who hide their periods]: Wilbert, Simoneau 1990b, no. 275: 500; Yanomami (Waika) [when a girl had her first period, a piece of the sky fell; its inhabitants (of this place on earth or the sky?) found themselves in the underworld; they are yellow-haired Amahini dwarfs, a few centimeters tall; they eat only pijiguao fruits]: Zerries 1958: 282.
Guiana. Lokono [man enters the nether world through an armadillo hole; red-haired dwarfs live there; their pregnant women have their bellies ripped open during childbirth and then sewn up; man teaches them how to give birth; returns to earth]: Goeje 1943, no. d40: 128-129; (cf. waiwai [cicada people live in the nether world; they look like waiwai, the same height, but their skin is light red]: Fock 1963: 101).
Ecuador. Colorado : Calazacon, Orazona 1982 [the underground inhabitants feed on the steam from the food they cook; two people fall into the underworld, eat, relieve themselves; they are given wives to conceive children with anuses; one is given an old woman, his penis is pinched by her vagina, he dies; the other is given a young woman; he returns to earth]: 274-276; Wavrin 1937 [in the lower world, where the Sun is at night, live dwarfs, everything is small there; in the sky live giants, everything is huge there]: 515-516; Kayapa [dwarfs without anuses live in the underworld; capable of sex only by moonlight]: Barrett 1925(2): 376.
NW Amazonia. Puinawe [the ancestors live in the sky; a monkey provokes a quarrel, the ancestors kill each other; the surviving woman places the bones of the dead on the roof to dry; from them arise Tupana , his brother Kaitari , their sisters Maunuddua and Amarrundua ; T. kills his foster mother, from her flesh creates dwarfs - inhabitants of the underworld; they feed on manioc, there are no fish in their rivers; when it is night on earth, it is day for them; T. places some of the dwarfs on the earth, blows through a tobacco leaf, they turn into men; some plot to kill T.; he sends a flood, allows the good to escape]: Waldegg 1942 in Wilbert 1963: 110; maku [the umari fruit people live underground, are yellow, their skin is covered with fat, at night they emerge from underground through holes in the rivers to ensure the ripening of the umari fruit; in their world the Sun and the rivers move from west to east; large animals on earth are small in the umari world and vice versa; when people eat umari fruit, the penises of those people itch as if from red pepper; the bird Kuya and Idn Kamni descended through a hollow in a tree into the umari world; there is a lizard the size of a caiman; Kuya became an evil spirit, IK climbed a tree, K left; IK married an Umari girl; on earth his mother thinks he is dead; two umari fruits fell from the tree, became IK and his wife]: Silverwood-Cope 1972: 258-260; tikuna [the hunter Choe loses his prey; he lies in wait, cuts off the jaguar's paw reaching for the meat; brings it to the village, shows it to everyone; among those gathered is the Royal Vulture, who was the thief; taking the paw, he applies it to the body, flies away, tearing out Ch.'s eyes; in his house in the sky, he hangs the bundle with the eyes from the ceiling beam; a grasshopper and one kind of termite cannot gnaw through the vine; other termites gnaw through it, the bundle with the eyes falls to the ground, Ch. puts the eyes back; the old woman-Vulture gives a boat to escape from the Royal Vulture; Ch. pushes off so hard that he falls underground; there he meets strange creatures; the Blind have a lot of food; Ch. steals it, the Blind cannot catch him; the dwarfs are incredibly strong, they toss Ch. like a ball; people without anuses feed on the steam from the food they cook; Ch. gets married, his wife eats with him, he cuts her anus, she dies; Ch. returns to earth]: Nimuendaju 1952: 118-119.
Central Andes. Province of Paucartambo ( Cusco Department ) [in the lower world of Ukhupacja live small people of frail constitution; they are harmed by thunderstorms and earthquakes caused by the violation of the rituals of offering coca and llipta (ashes of quinoa stalks, eaten together with coca)]: Núñez del Prado 1974: 239.
Bolivia – Guaporé. Tacana (west 1952-1954) [four red-haired dwarfs Idsettii Deha hold the earth in the south and 4 in the north; from time to time they ask if they are gray; they pull out their gray hairs; when they turn gray, the earth will fall; var. in San Jose: one man holds the earth underground; four old men hold the earth at the corners; when the Sun and Moon pass by, they ask if they are gray, whether it is time for the young to replace them; the Sun and Moon pull out their gray hairs, saying that it is not yet time; when the young take up the burden, the earth will shake]: Hissink, Hahn 1961: 87-89; guarazu [dwarfs live underground]: Riester 1970: 472.