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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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| K89d In K89 family | Hides, turning into a needle. | Left alone in the house or finding herself in a stranger's house, a girl (less often a male character) hides by turning into a needle (a pin) or another tool for sewing or spinning. | 33 | 38 |
| L1c2 In L1 family | Hiding under the hearth. | Fleeing from a demonic creature, the characters hide their children (younger brother or sister) in a camouflaged pit, usually under the hearth. See motif L1C. | 11 | 11 |
| M199g1 In M199 family | Hold on to the handle, ATU 1052. | A human (a weaker animal) deceives a strong giant (a demon, a stronger animal). One of the episodes: both carry a tree, the strong man takes hold of the top (by the crown), the man supposedly takes hold of the crown (by the top), but instead sits on the tree carried by the strong man or walks along pretending to support the branches. | 30 | 24 |
| A32g In A32 family | Holding on to a bush. | On the lunar disc, a character can be seen holding onto a tree or bush and ending up on the moon with them. See motif A32D. | 27 | 32 |
| M30d In M30 family | Holds to a stick carried by birds, ATU 225A | To get into the air, a character without wings (usually a turtle or a frog) grabs a stick with the ends held in their beaks by two birds. | 27 | 33 |
| F6 | Hollowed-out vagina. | (The first) woman does not have a vagina at first. Usually, it is made for her by a bird, animal, fish, etc. | 23 | 32 |
| N34 | Honey and oil | Streams (jets) that consist not of water but of honey (honey and butter, butter and milk, milk and blood) are mentioned as signs of generosity and abundance. Cf. H16 motives - H16B, K33F. | 24 | 31 |
| J12b In J12 family | Honey groom. | A honey groom or a skilled honey gatherer is attractive to a girl. | 7 | 18 |
| L111 | Hook from the sky. | The inhabitants of the sky or shamans catch or want to catch earthly people with a hook, net, noose, etc., dragging them up into the sky (somewhere above) like fishermen pull fish out of the water; the inhabitants of the earth fish with hooks for fish, which in their own world are people or domestic animals. | 20 | 23 |
| M89a In M89 family | Horned hyena | Only horned animals are allowed to attend the festival. The hyena makes fake horns for itself, exposed. | 5 | 4 |
| I13a In I13 family | Horned serpent, B91.3. | A huge aquatic or celestial serpent, dragon, or snake-like creature with horns on its head. | 124 | 222 |
| I13b In I13 family | Horned snake, B91.3. | A small snake, the snake has horns on its head. | 41 | 50 |
| L90c In L90 family | Horns reaching the sky and the earth. | One horn of an animal (deer, ram, bull, goat, wolverine) touches the ground, while the other is raised to the sky or reaches the sky. | 8 | 8 |
| M199e In M199 family | Horse between the legs, ATU 1082. | A man and his opponent compete to see who can carry a horse. The opponent struggles to lift the horse, while the man rides it, saying that he easily carried it between his legs. | 29 | 17 |
| K85 | Horse brothers. | The antagonist owns the fastest horse. The hero obtains an even faster horse (usually the brother or sister of this horse), which is the only one that surpasses the antagonist's horse and usually orders the antagonist to throw off his rider. | 29 | 51 |
| M39c In M39 family | Horse egg, ATU 1319 | A fool is told that a round fruit is a mare's egg (donkeys, elephants, etc.). A fool buys fruit for a lot of money. When he throws it or drops it, a small animal (usually a hare) jumps out of the thickets. A person believes that this is a foal (donkey, etc.) that has hatched. | 64 | 58 |
| K32l In K32 family | Horses are given for fattening. | The ruler distributes horses (cows) to his subjects for fattening. Only the heroine returns hers well-fed. | 12 | 14 |
| A22b In A22 family | Hot fire and cold embers. | The sun and its companion burn up. The companion burns in a less intense fire (is thrown into the ashes, etc.); therefore, the moon (or star) is cold. See motif A22. | 6 | 1 |
| J28b In J28 family | Hot flatbread. | Upon learning that a woman (usually the hero's mother) is hiding the truth about his father, mother, brothers, or bride, a young man (rarely a young woman) causes her pain, forcing her to tell the truth (usually by pressing hot bread into her palm or sticking her fingers into hot food). | 44 | 69 |
| K27d In K27 family | House with dangerous creatures. | The test: to stay alive in a room full of predatory, poisonous and other dangerous creatures. See motif K27. | 13 | 11 |
| B49a In B49 family | How many offspring per year. | Powerful animals could have many cubs, but now they give birth to only one every few years. | 6 | 7 |
| M114b2 In M114 family | How many steps did your horse take? | A man (an authoritative character) asks a girl (a subordinate) a question about the number of routine actions she has performed (or small items she has), which no one counts. She asks a counter-question about the number of similar actions performed by the questioner. | 9 | 11 |
| M181b In M181 family | How the spider came to live under the roof. | The story of the trickster Spider ends with his transformation into a spider that lives under the roof, in dark corners, etc. | 8 | 12 |
| E41a In E41 family | How ticks were invented. | The first ticks were made as a result of observing animals (a dog's crossed paws, two snakes, snake jaws, etc.). | 8 | 10 |
| M3 | Human chain | The character crosses a water or air barrier on the backs of chained animals, birds, or fish. | 39 | 69 |
| N3 | Hungry fingers | One finger says he's hungry and/or offers to steal something. The rest of the fingers express their opinion on this matter. | 27 | 32 |
| D13e In D13 family | Hunters laugh at the carcass of an animal. | Hunters perish because they laughed at the killed (and revived) animal. | 3 | 3 |
| B42b In B42 family | Hunting hoofed animals. | In the cosmic hunting plot, the objects of pursuit are hoofed animals (elk, deer, mountain sheep). See motif B42. | 47 | 58 |
| B42e In B42 family | Hunting the rhea. | In the cosmic hunting plot, the object of pursuit is the rhea (Rhea americana, a large flightless bird). See motif B42. | 7 | 3 |
| B42d In B42 family | Hunting the tapir. | In the cosmic hunting plot, the object of pursuit is a bear. See motif B42. | 4 | 1 |
| M154b In M154 family | Husband performs his wife's work, ATU 1408. | The husband (rarely: son) stays at home instead of his wife (mother), but does everything poorly and ineptly. | 56 | 40 |
| M39h In M39 family | Husband pretended to be blind, ATU 1380 | The wife wants to get rid of her husband and usually asks the spirit to blind him. The husband hides in a hollow, behind an altar, etc., and answers on behalf of the spirit (usually advises to kill her husband with good food), or the husband tells his wife that delicious food can make you blind. Pretending to be blind, the husband kills his lover (and wife). | 58 | 41 |
| H49A In H49 family | Husband, wife and innocently killed dog. | A man does not understand that a dog or cat wanted to save his wife or preserve her honour and kills the animal. | 2 | 2 |
| E9k In E9 family | Husband-honey (bee). | The husband or wife is the embodiment of honey or a human bee. | 10 | 15 |
| F41 | Husbands kill wives. | Ancestral men kill women who behave contrary to social norms. | 14 | 24 |
| F43c In F43 family | Husbands of women - animals. | The husbands of the first women, Amazons or single women are small animals - usually flying foxes. | 8 | 12 |
| I125 | Hyades – animal jaw. | Hyades (sometimes, possibly, Pleiades or Orion) – jaw or severed head of a large animal or anthropomorphic creature. | 17 | 29 |
| M116a In M116 family | I also rested here, ATU 980. | A man drags his father, intending to leave him to die in a deserted place, give him to an almshouse, throw him into a precipice, etc. He stops on the way. The father says that he also stopped at this place when he was dragging his father. Or the boy asks to keep the sledge, the skin, etc., on which his father is dragging his grandfather (or takes half of the cloak with which his father covered the old man): it will come in handy when he drags his father himself. Or the old man is given a wooden (broken, etc.) plate to eat from, and the boy says that he will give his father the same one when he grows old. The man brings his father home (begins to take care of him). | 53 | 67 |
| K92b In K92 family | I love you like salt, ATU 923. | A daughter tells her father (rarely her brother) that she loves him like salt (or that salt is more important than him, etc.). He sends his daughter away (gets angry with his sister), but then realises she is right. | 49 | 44 |
| M28 | Icarus(failed flight on artificial wings), K1041.1. | When able to take off, the character takes off but falls or stays in a remote place from where he can no longer take off. | 47 | 82 |
| N16 | Ice horse | fairy-tale text ends with a formula stating that the narrator had a horse and/or harness made of wax, ice, linen, vegetables, etc. In most cases, the narrator loses them (they melt, they are taken away, eaten, etc.). | 13 | 17 |
| I35b1 In I35 family | Icy sky. | The sky is made of ice. | 5 | 3 |
| K37c In K37 family | Identifying an animal or object. | The character must identify an animal or object among several identical ones. See motif K37. | 7 | 7 |
| B33e In B33 family | If February were like January. | The last cold month regrets that it did not come earlier or that it is too short. In that case, it would have frozen everyone. | 7 | 6 |
| L15d1 In L15 family | Imaginary container of the soul. | When a character is asked to reveal the location of his soul (death, power), he first gives an incorrect answer, and the questioner usually begins to show signs of attention to the corresponding locus or object. | 43 | 52 |
| K14d In K14 family | Imaginary crime, (ATU 910A). | Testing his wife (household member, acquaintance), a man pretends to have committed a crime or performs incomprehensible actions that could be interpreted as a crime. Usually, his wife (friend) betrays him, and he presents evidence of his innocence. | 37 | 34 |
| M60b In M60 family | Imaginary doctor: finishing off the victim | The deceiver, promising to cure a wounded or sick person, finishes him off and eats him or offers a remedy that is only worse for him. | 48 | 92 |
| M53d In M53 family | Imaginary enemies | The character pretends to be enemies coming; when people run away in fear, the character takes what the deceived people owned. | 19 | 23 |
| K102a1 In K102 family | Imaginary grave. | To hide the truth, a person buries an animal or an inanimate object and says that the grave supposedly contains the remains of another person's wife (bride, mother, daughter, sister, children). | 18 | 19 |
| M96 | Imaginary guests | In order not to share with family members, the character pretends to have guests and eats everything himself. | 12 | 12 |
Tradition and narrative counts are the stored catalogue totals for each entry.