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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.
All motif categories
| Ref | Title | Summary | Traditions | Narratives ▲ |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| L10a In L10 family | A demon approaches a hunter's campfire. | A demonic character approaches a man's campfire. The man leaves a log in his place and hides. The character throws himself on the log, mistaking it for a sleeping man; usually, the hunter kills or wounds the demon. | 32 | 53 |
| L45 | The fooled watchman. | A strong character traps a weak one and leaves someone to guard the prey. The guard fails to fulfil his duties (usually tricked by the weak one), and the weak one escapes. {African borrowings in America are difficult to distinguish from possible local cases} | 54 | 53 |
| L64 | Removable head. | A certain character removes, takes out a part of his body (head, scalp, lungs), takes it in his hands, puts it back. | 46 | 53 |
| L93b In L93 family | The hare as helper. | The hare or rabbit, resorting to cunning, helps the hero or heroine, saving them. | 30 | 53 |
| M187 | Race: snail – participant. | Participating in a race, a snail (mollusc, sea cucumber, etc.) defeats a faster opponent. | 32 | 53 |
| m195c In m195 family | The clever or lucky person solves riddles. | People of high status cannot determine the hidden difference between two or more outwardly similar objects or beings, or between two sides of the same object or being. Thanks to their own intelligence or chance, a person of low status does so. | 39 | 53 |
| M46a In M46 family | A picked up baby | The character turns into a baby, is picked up by the owners of valuables, and then steals valuables or converges with a woman. The baby is not a demonic creature and does not intend to kill those who pick it up (cf. Motive L60). | 42 | 53 |
| M60a In M60 family | The hunter comes to the one he wounded | The creature/character runs away or swims away with a hook, harpoon, arrow, or other object thrown by the hero in his body. Local shamans can't heal an existence/character. The hero or his friend comes to the wounded man's village, takes out the object that caused the injury, or drives him even deeper into the body. The patient recovers or dies accordingly. See L105 and M60 motifs. | 53 | 53 |
| M62c In M62 family | Tug of war, ATU 291 | A weak character takes turns negotiating with two strong ones to compete in a tug of war. They don't know they're pulling each other's rope or that they're tied to a tree. | 34 | 53 |
| M94a1 In M94 family | Mountain riding: trickster animals | By stupidity or negligence, a zoomorphic character rolls down a mountain and as a result dies or suffers damage (attacks the edge, falls into the water, etc.). | 31 | 53 |
| A23c In A23 family | Who will fly higher? ATU 221A | Birds argue about which of them will fly higher or arrive first. The winner is the one whose victory seemed unlikely (he hides in the feathers of a strong bird and flies away with it). | 39 | 54 |
| A35a In A35 family | Mud thrown in the face. | Moon spots - mud (manure, clay, ash, dough, dirty rag) thrown in the face of the Moon/Moon as a result of a family or love conflict - often by a brother/sister or mother. | 33 | 54 |
| B77b1 In B77 family | The sky was struck with a pestle. | The sky receded and/or the connection between humans and the deity ceased after the sky or the heavenly deity was touched or struck during work with a pestle used to pound in a mortar or with a spoon used to stir porridge (Ewe, Nubians, Nyiman). | 29 | 54 |
| C18a In C18 family | The sun lures out the rooster. | The hidden sun is lured out by the rooster, or people believe that without the rooster's crow, the sun will not rise. | 36 | 54 |
| F40a In F40 family | The common husband of the first women. | A male character, androgynous, with a monstrous penis, single-handedly possesses all women, rules over them or leads away the first women. | 40 | 54 |
| F47 | People made of pieces of flesh. | Pieces of a creature cut into many parts or a lump of living flesh are scattered or dispersed. After that, people emerge from them. Cf. motifs E38A and K98. | 22 | 54 |
| G13c In G13 family | What to eat before the advent of agriculture. | Before the advent of cultivated or edible wild plants, people ate what is now considered unfit for consumption: (rotten) wood, bark, earth, stones, mushrooms. | 30 | 54 |
| K100d In K100 family | The helper turns out to be a prince, ATU 314. | At the end of the story, the animal helper (horse, lion, etc.) turns into a prince (princess) itself. | 26 | 54 |
| K65a In K65 family | Spirits fall from the sky. | After being thrown from a height or expelled, various creatures end up in different locations, acquiring corresponding functions and names. | 36 | 54 |
| L43 | Dangerous characters devour refuse. | Characters dangerous to the hero (demons, robbers, merchants) mistake excrement, insects, snakes and other disgusting things (not intended for food) for something pleasant (edible). | 49 | 54 |
| L7 | Mistakenly chases after an animal. | While chasing a person, spirit, monster or beast, mistakenly chases after a large two-legged object passing by, usually an animal. | 35 | 54 |
| M109b In M109 family | The beaten one carries the unbeaten one, ATU 4. | A weaker character convinces a stronger one that he feels even worse than he does. Usually, the stronger one agrees to carry him on his back. | 52 | 54 |
| N22 | Alive if they didn't die | fairy-tale text ends with a formula that says that if the characters are not dead, they are still alive. {Motive at work, more data}. | 30 | 54 |
| B31 | Women turn into aquatic mammals. | A woman (usually after coming into conflict with a man or being left alone), or a man and a woman (spouses, lovers, brother and sister) turn into aquatic mammals. | 42 | 55 |
| J13 | Two sisters. | Not one woman or girl, but two sisters (or more than two, but only two play an important role in the narrative) wander and meet an unwanted deceiver instead of a desired husband or fiancé, or encounter dangerous creatures. See motif J12. | 58 | 55 |
| K27x6 In K27 family | The stars and the wind guide the hero. | Setting out in search of a marriage partner, the hero or heroine successively encounters the embodiments (masters) of celestial bodies and atmospheric phenomena (the sun, moon, stars, wind). | 27 | 55 |
| K35a1 In K35 family | Do not pick up the feather of the firebird. | Setting off on a journey, a person (often against the advice of their horse) picks up a precious feather. Upon learning of this, an authoritative character gives them difficult tasks. | 38 | 55 |
| K80a1 In K80 family | The bird tells of the crime. | A bird (usually arising from the remains of the murdered person or embodying their soul) tells of the crime committed or takes revenge on the murderer itself. | 45 | 55 |
| L38a In L38 family | Sticky trap – resin stump. | The character sticks to an object, usually by successively sticking individual parts of their body to it. The object is either a trap for a demonic creature or is itself a creature of a non-human nature. Cf. motif M182 (tar doll), probably brought to the New World after Columbus from Africa. | 34 | 55 |
| L41a In L41 family | Stone in a basket. | The character runs away from his captor, leaving a stone (or a log, sand) in his place. See motif L41. | 57 | 55 |
| L48 | Demons devour their own kind. | The hero (usually somewhere on high ground - on a tree, rock, at the edge of a precipice or well) kills and/or throws one of his opponents down from there. The other opponents do not recognise their comrade and believe that the slain man is the hero they are pursuing. | 42 | 55 |
| M114i In M114 family | What do your relatives do? ATU 875(4), 921. | When asked where her father, mother, brother, etc. are, the girl or boy answers in such a way that only an intelligent person can guess what is meant (father went to make an enemy out of a friend, mother went to make one out of two, etc.); or the girl explains the meaning of similar phrases uttered by others. | 64 | 55 |
| M136d In M136 family | Shattered dreams, ATU 1430. | A person dreams of gradually becoming rich and forgets that this has not yet happened. As a result, he loses the initial source of future prosperity (breaks a jug, scares away a hare he was about to shoot, etc.) or senselessly causes harm to himself or others. | 74 | 55 |
| M50 | Next to the stars | The character tries to join a group of stars (usually the Pleiades) or catch up with characters who run away from him and turn into stars; the goal of the persecution is sexual contact or the desire to be reunited with family. | 41 | 55 |
| M91c3 In M91 family | The postman hare | A person releases an animal or a bird - supposedly with his wife instructing his wife to cook food, etc. Another does not understand deception and buys an animal. | 48 | 55 |
| A24 | First sunrise. | The first ancestors live in twilight. When they first find themselves in the rays of the sun, they (spontaneously or by someone's will) perish, turning into animals, spirits, or stones. | 38 | 56 |
| A32b In A32 family | Moon toad, A751.3. | The figure or imprint of a toad or frog is visible on the lunar disc; the moon is associated with this animal. | 45 | 56 |
| C12b In C12 family | People – descendants of dogs. | All people or individual ethnic groups, lineages, families are considered descendants of dogs (with which a man mated). | 29 | 56 |
| C3 | The snake plugged the hole in the ark, A1853.1, (ATU 825). | The snake (eel, frog) saved the ship (or the whole world) by plugging the hole from which water was pouring with its body. | 44 | 56 |
| G18 | A person wishes to be sacrificed. | A boy, woman, or, less commonly, a man asks others to leave him/her in the forest, burn him/her, scatter his/her remains, or drag his/her body to the site of a future vegetable garden. Cultivated plants grow in this place. | 35 | 56 |
| H7b In H7 family | Death sticks to a tree or a bench, ATU 330. | A person asks Death (a spirit) to climb a tree or sit on a bench, to which they stick and can only be freed with his permission. | 52 | 56 |
| I110a In I110 family | Star Plough. | Orion (rarely - another constellation) - plough. | 45 | 56 |
| I19 | They feed on the smell of food. | Anthropomorphic creatures satisfy their hunger with the vapours of food being prepared. See motifs I14 (people without anuses), I15 (people without mouths). | 57 | 56 |
| I92 | The rainbow changes gender. | A person who has come into contact with a rainbow in a certain way (walked under it, drunk water where the rainbow drinks, etc.) changes their gender. | 41 | 56 |
| J55 | The unrecognised hero encounters enemies. | The hero encounters characters who, not recognising him, say that they are waiting for so-and-so (naming him) to kill him. He easily kills them or turns them into animals. | 43 | 56 |
| K130 | Who is the sweetest in the world? | A woman (rarely: a man) asks who is the most beautiful of all and receives the answer that she (he) is. One day she (he) is told that someone else is more beautiful. | 46 | 56 |
| K33b In K33 family | Friends abandon a beautiful woman. | A girl goes with her friends to the forest, to the river; everyone returns home, but she is forced to stay or return. She escapes from a dangerous creature, becomes the wife of a supernatural character, a leader, etc., or dies, but is avenged. | 36 | 56 |
| K38f7 In K38 family | Wild animals serve the hero. | The character acquires wild animals (at least two different species) that serve him like dogs. | 35 | 56 |
| K74a In K74 family | Only the hero defeats the demon and follows in his footsteps. | A demonic character arrives and mocks one of the men remaining in the house. When the hero remains, he defeats the demon and follows in his footsteps to where he dwells. Cf. motif K74 (an unassuming and weak-looking man approaches a warrior preparing dinner; he eats everything, ties up, beats or kills the cook. When the hero remains to cook, he defeats the demon). | 80 | 56 |
| L50 | Cannibal by the trail, G321. | The character kills travellers passing by. Usually, he does not attack them unexpectedly, but distracts their attention first. Often, he pushes his victims down somewhere. | 37 | 56 |
Tradition and narrative counts are the stored catalogue totals for each entry.