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Berezkin/Duvakin Catalogue of Motifs

English translation, enhancements and additional metadata by Jonathan Fielder-White

Source: Berezkin and Duvakin's Analytical Catalogue · Original catalogue (Russian)

About the catalogue and its sources

Unless otherwise stated, narrative and tradition data comes from Berezkin and Duvakin's Thematic classification and distribution of folklore and mythological motifs by area (Analytical catalogue).

Original Berezkin/Duvakin catalogue (Russian)

The English translation uses AI assistance alongside manual verification. Errors may occur; consult the original source when in doubt.

I - Supernatural objects and creatures

Showing 151–200 of 317 · Page 4 of 7

Ref	Title ▲	Summary	Traditions	Narratives
I40	Rainbow bow.	The rainbow is a bow.	98	125
I39	Rainbow bridge, F152.	The rainbow is a bridge, a road, a staircase.	102	169
I41a In I41 family	Rainbow from an anthill.	A rainbow rises from an anthill or termite mound.	18	16
I97	Rainbow horse.	Rainbow – hoofed animal (horse, bull, goat, sheep).	24	24
I46d In I46 family	Rainbow loop.	Rainbow – a hunting loop, a trap.	7	7
I46c In I46 family	Rainbow rope.	The rainbow is a rope to which cattle are tied.	9	11
I41	Rainbow serpent, A791.2.	A rainbow is a reptile (usually a snake), less often a fish or snake-like, usually dangerous, object (snake tongue, scorpion tail).	152	363
I46e In I46 family	Rainbow sword.	Rainbow - sword, cutting weapon.	8	10
I42	Rainbow – a pair of creatures.	The rainbow is a pair of creatures, usually a man and a woman, male and female.	40	60
I47a In I47 family	Rainbow – fox wedding.	The rainbow is associated with the wedding of a fox or jackal.	10	16
I70	Reptile with trees on its back.	Trees or reeds grow on the back or head of a reptile.	6	9
I111	Reptilian Earth.	The earth as a whole or a mountain range is the body of a crocodile, dragon, or snake (eel).	11	16
I49	Runner-earthquake.	Earthquake – an anthropomorphic character (or category of characters) that moves around, shaking the earth.	14	15
I27a In I27 family	Settlements and dog trails.	The souls of dead dogs go to a special place in the afterlife and/or go to the afterlife along a special path.	26	24
I50a In I50 family	Severed legs of an animal helper.	A demon sequentially tears off the legs of an animal that helps the hero (usually the horse on which the hero rides).	34	49
I50c In I50 family	Sharabha (animal with legs on its back).	Describes a hoofed animal with a second set of legs on its back that runs either normally or upside down. This makes it tireless.	4	3
I87	Skull cave.	The characters use an object belonging to the world of giants (a skull, an animal shoulder blade, a mitten) as a shelter. Cf. I87C: animals use an object belonging to the world of humans (a skull, a mitten, a sieve, etc.) as a shelter.	19	29
I11b In I11 family	Sky supports made from animal legs.	The pillars of the sky are made from the legs of a four-legged animal (usually a turtle).	2	9
I23	Slamming door, K736.	The door of the house opens and slams shut by itself, crushing those entering or leaving. See motif I22.	20	26
I87a1 In I87 family	Small or large – dialogue.	Two people engage in a dialogue, contradicting each other in their descriptions of the sizes of creatures and objects.	19	27
I24	Snake bridge.	A snake (or fish) forms a bridge across a river.	32	33
I65	Souls of the dead on the Milky Way.	The Milky Way is a path to another world, followed by the souls of the dead and/or shamans, or it is the path of a funeral procession.	104	122
I56	Spirits cannot see the living.	Moving between worlds, the same living person is visible to some and invisible to others.	42	63
I78	Square Earth.	The earth is thought of as rectangular (usually square).	60	71
I37d1 In I37 family	St. Peter spits out mushrooms, ATU 774L.	St. Peter secretly eats bread, and when Christ asks him what he is doing, he chokes, spits out the crumbs, and they turn into mushrooms.	10	5
I110a In I110 family	Star Plough.	Orion (rarely - another constellation) - plough.	45	56
I104	Stars - fragments.	Stars are formed from particles of the body, fragments of a larger celestial body (usually the moon); stars (usually also the sun and moon) are formed from the body of a single being.	43	66
I72a In I72 family	Stars – children of the moon, A764.1.3.	Stars – children of the moon and/or sun.	66	79
I74a In I74 family	Stars – fireflies.	Stars – fireflies.	9	9
I55	Stars – holes.	Stars – holes in the sky; or holes in the canopy, in the roof of a dwelling, appear to be stars.	65	75
I100d In I100 family	Stars – kids.	Stars are associated with kids.	8	7
I55a In I55 family	Stars – lakes.	Stars – lakes on one of the heavenly tiers.	5	7
I107	Stars – nails.	Stars are nails or stakes driven into the sky, or stars are nailed down.	12	14
I72	Stars – people.	Stars – anthropomorphic beings. See motif K19 (marriage to a star). Cases where the Star is a unique object, e.g. Venus, rather than one of many Star-people, are not included.	239	278
I71	Stars – roots.	Stars – roots of plants growing in the upper world.	17	23
I73	Stars – sparks.	Stars (rarely suns and moons) – sparks, hot coals.	17	21
I74	Stars – stones.	Stars – (bright) stones, sequins, beads.	31	34
I87f In I87 family	Suicide of the Narts.	Before modern humans, there lived others who differed in strength, height, nobility, or other qualities. They disappeared after committing suicide.	9	7
I21	Sunburnt.	The inhabitants of the underworld or the land of the rising sun have red (yellow) hair and/or red or black skin and/or suffer from the heat of the sun, which passes them by at a short distance. See motif I20.	27	35
I8c In I8 family	Suspended Earth.	The earth is prevented from falling or swaying because it is tied with ropes.	33	39
I120b In I120 family	Taking something out of an animal's ear.	The character takes food, clothing, and other valuables from the ear of an animal (most often a horse or cow).	24	26
I22f In I22 family	Talking trees.	The character must pass small objects (trees, logs, blades) that constantly collide and diverge, fall and rise.	41	60
I117a In I117 family	The bat helps to descend.	The bat helps the hero descend to the ground from a high cliff.	11	13
I96	The bloody rainbow.	A rainbow consisting of blood either heralds war and death.	15	20
I87b In I87 family	The braggart meets the strongest, ATU 650B.	When a character boasts of his strength, his wife or mother says that there is someone stronger than him. He sets off in search and meets a character who is much stronger than him. {ATU gives a definition of the plot (or rather, the first half of it) similar to ours, but some of the references given refer to our motif i87a, not i87b}.	32	50
I126	The constellation of funeral bier.	The Great Bear or other constellation – a bier on which the dead or sick are carried, a body prepared for burial, a grave.	25	27
I133a In I133 family	The constellation of the great bird.	There is a constellation that represents a bird and corresponds to several large constellations in European traditions (mainly equatorial, rather than circumpolar).	8	10
I119	The dead shake the earth.	Earthquakes are caused by inhabitants of the underworld; during earthquakes, they try to get to the surface of the earth to check whether people are still alive.	23	31
I136	The demonic wheel.	The rolling wheel (and the character riding on it) is a creature or weapon hostile to the hero (people) that he uses.	13	18
I13e In I13 family	The devoted snake.	The snake agrees to let the man go on condition that he does not tell anyone about their meeting. Under threat of death, the man breaks his promise. The snake teaches him to drink a broth made from its flesh and takes revenge not on the man, but on those who forced him to break his word.	10	7

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Tradition and narrative counts are the stored catalogue totals for each entry.