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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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| I110 | Heavenly farmers. | Constellations are associated with agricultural tools or with people engaged in agricultural work (most often ploughing and haymaking). See motifs I110A (plough), I110B (haymaking). | 61 | 119 |
| J32a In J32 family | At night by his father's grave, ATU 530. | When dying, a person orders that someone spend the night at his grave or bring something to the grave. | 61 | 89 |
| J32f In J32 family | Stolen apples. | While standing guard, the hero discovers who is stealing fruit (usually apples) from the garden. | 61 | 85 |
| K106 | Thrown to the cows. | The hero (a miraculous infant, a magical rooster) is thrown at the feet of animals, but they do not trample him. | 61 | 91 |
| K14c In K14 family | Son mistaken for lover, ATU 910B. | Returning after a long absence and seeing signs that there is another man in the house, a man thinks that his wife has a lover, but does not rush to act and convinces himself that it is his own son or his wife's relative. | 61 | 64 |
| K152 | The devil runs away in terror, ATU 1164. | A man saves a devil who is suffering from the proximity of a certain character or object. To reward his saviour, the devil promises to possess a princess and leave her when the man comes to treat her. The devil either breaks his promise or warns the man not to try to cure those whom the devil will possess later. The man informs the devil that the character or object he fears so much is approaching again. The devil flees and never returns. | 61 | 53 |
| K34 | Dangerous swings, K855. | The character puts others on the swing and, after swinging them, throws them (or threatens to throw them) into the water, onto rocks, etc. | 61 | 87 |
| L46 | Head down. | The character walks, climbs or descends upside down, or sees the world turned upside down. | 61 | 76 |
| L73 | Drink the river! G522 | Trying to drink a river, lake, or sea, the antagonist bursts. | 61 | 90 |
| L90 | Mouth to the sky. | One lip (one fang, horn, etc.) of the creature reaches the sky, while the other drags along the ground. | 61 | 103 |
| M159 | The Lion's Share, ATU 51. | The strongest character (usually a lion) offers to divide the spoils (harvest). The more cunning character refuses his share, but remains unharmed. Usually a wolf (hyena, jackal) divides the spoils, giving the lion the larger share, but the lion beats him. The third character gives the lion everything. The lion asks who taught him to divide so well and receives the answer: the one whom the lion mauled. | 61 | 64 |
| M18 | Stolen tackle, D657.1. | The character turns into an object of fishing or hunting and presents himself as a target. The fisherman or hunter does not harm them, but they take away what they use: arrows, darts, harpoons, hooks, bait; or they catch fish, having turned themselves into hooks; or they are caught but escape death by taking on human form again. | 61 | 78 |
| B41 | The talking dog. | Because the dog spread certain information, argued with its owners, and spoke at inappropriate times, it lost the gift of speech. | 62 | 61 |
| C20 | The drunken cannibal. | A dangerous character is killed, neutralised, and deprived of his (her) values after being cheered up at a party, lured into a trap with music, promises of alcohol, women, etc.; the same method is used to enlist the favour of a powerful helper. | 62 | 75 |
| C9 | Warning of the flood. | God, an animal, or a certain character warns one of the people about an impending catastrophe (usually a flood) in which most people will perish. | 62 | 112 |
| D4l In D4 family | Fire from the sky. | The first fire is brought down to earth from the sky; the first ancestors go to the sky and bring back fire or warmth. See motif D4A. | 62 | 71 |
| F40b In F40 family | A man in a village of women. | A single man finds himself in a village of women. Usually, he is forced to satisfy a woman against his will, or each woman demands to have sex with him. | 62 | 78 |
| F9 | Dangerous woman. | For various reasons, sexual intercourse with a woman is deadly dangerous for a man, or so it seems to him: Teeth, blades or sharp stones in the vagina or on the inside of the thighs; the vagina is a toothy mouth. See motif F9A. | 62 | 66 |
| H54 | Veki Vija, F571.1. | In order for a character's eyes to be (wide) open, their eyelids (eyelashes, eyebrows) must be raised, propped up, spread apart (rarely: cut off). | 62 | 160 |
| I115 | Orion and the Pleiades. | Orion and the Pleiades appear in the same story. | 62 | 73 |
| K100a In K100 family | Tobiah, (ATU 505). | Setting off on a journey, a young man releases a caught fish or animal, or he or his father does someone a favour. As a reward for their help, a person or creature in the guise of a stranger or animal comes to the young man, becomes his companion and protector. | 62 | 94 |
| K108 | The revived wife cheats on her husband, ATU 612. | Wife dies, husband revives her, she leaves him for another man, punished. | 62 | 47 |
| K120a In K120 family | Prevented incest (sister and brother), (ATU 313E). | A man is going to marry his sister (often it turns out that she is the only one who meets the requirements for a bride). Usually, the girl manages to avoid such a marriage. | 62 | 67 |
| K27g In K27 family | To bathe in boiling water. | The character is ordered to bathe in (hot) milk, in boiling water, to jump into the fire; he remains unharmed, while his opponent usually perishes. | 62 | 87 |
| M152a In M152 family | Bound together, ATU 78 | A strong predator (a giant cannibal) and a weak predator are tied together with a rope to feel more confident. The strong one flees and drags the weak one behind him. | 62 | 98 |
| M77 | Soiled bed | The character stains another's clothes or bed with sewage or something that looks like sewage, threatens to ruin the air and accuse the other, etc.; taking advantage of the victim's confusion, achieves the goal. | 62 | 103 |
| I27 | The dog of the land of the dead. | The dog and/or (rarely) the domestic cat is the master, guardian of the land of the dead, guide on the way there; dogs live on the way to the land of the dead. (For indirect evidence and similar beliefs, see also Benson 1991). | 63 | 129 |
| I82c In I82 family | Wife of the Moon. | Venus or an unidentified star in the eastern and/or western sky – the wife of the Moon. See motif I82b. | 63 | 78 |
| J21 | Birth from eggs. | Gods, ancestors of humans, and founders of dynasties are born from eggs. | 63 | 110 |
| j4b In j4 family | Revenge within the family. | The children (son, sons, son and daughter) of the murdered person take revenge on characters who are related to the victim by marriage or close kinship. | 63 | 109 |
| J66 | The straps are bitten through. | The character cuts or bites through bowstrings and other straps in advance, punctures boats, preventing opponents from fighting or pursuing him. | 63 | 82 |
| K163 | Aladdin's Lamp, ATU 561. | A sorcerer orders a young man to retrieve a magical object (often a lamp) from a hard-to-reach place. The young man finds the object (but refuses to give it up), and the sorcerer grants his wishes. | 63 | 45 |
| K38d1 In K38 family | Girl sacrificed to the dragon. | Fearing a monster living in the water or wishing to end a flood or drought, a girl is sacrificed or voluntarily hides in the waters. | 63 | 90 |
| M196 | Who will speak first? ATU 1351. | A husband and wife agree to award a small prize to the one who remains silent the longest. Both or one of the spouses continue to remain silent even when others mistake them for dead or commit violence against them. | 63 | 64 |
| M29k1 In M29 family | Turtle, Toad, Frog are a loser trickster | A turtle (toad, frog) gets into unpleasant situations due to its own stupidity or carelessness. See the motives in square brackets. The character is named if it is a toad or frog; otherwise, a turtle. | 63 | 15 |
| M39d In M39 family | Shemyakin Court, ATU 1534 | A person consistently and unintentionally harms others. The victims take him to a judge. He saves a person from punishment by making a formally logical but clearly unacceptable decision in each case. | 63 | 47 |
| B45A In B45 family | Winter versus summer. | The alternation of seasons and/or differences between the climates of different localities are explained by the struggle between characters associated with warmth and those associated with cold. See motif B45. | 64 | 77 |
| C16 | Products of labour become animals, E161, E168. | Contrary to human desire, processed skins, tools, and (meat) food (again) turn into (those) animals (from whose body parts they were made). Cf. motif M84. | 64 | 83 |
| F63 | Man marries, K1321.1, ATU 1538*. | A male trickster transforms into a woman and gets married. In the end, he is exposed or runs away from his husband. | 64 | 74 |
| H41 | The dog betrays man. | Because of the dog, man is weak, mortal, and wicked. Usually, the antagonist bribes the dog with warm wool, and it betrays human figures to him for desecration. | 64 | 101 |
| I83 | The sky of birds. | Birds (especially vultures and eagles) lived or live in the sky, usually on one of several tiers of the upper world. | 64 | 107 |
| K120 | Prevented incest (daughter and father), (ATU 510B, 510B*), 706C. | The girl's father (rarely: stepfather) intends to marry her (since she is the only one who meets the requirements for a bride). Usually, the girl manages to avoid the marriage. | 64 | 98 |
| K132 | The Invincible Rooster, ATU 715, 715A. | A small character (usually a rooster) comes to a powerful enemy. Thanks to creatures and objects that he encounters along the way and hides in his body or bag, the character remains unharmed after all attempts to destroy him. Cf. motif L126. | 64 | 86 |
| K48 | The hero's singing bird, ATU 550. | The antagonist orders the wonderful bird captured by the hero to sing or talk, but it remains silent or cries out inappropriately. The bird begins to sing (talk) after the hero has triumphed over his opponents. | 64 | 80 |
| K88b In K88 family | Food in exchange for eyes. | The character suffers from thirst or hunger. His companion promises to share water or food with him (to make him rich) if he allows himself to be blinded. | 64 | 81 |
| 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 |
| M118a In M118 family | Forty Robbers and Jugs of Oil, ATU 954(2). | The chieftain (demon) brings robbers (other demons) to the courtyard of someone else's house, hiding them in empty jugs, barrels, etc. At night, they are supposed to attack the owners. A girl or young woman (less often, the owner of the house) learns of the danger and destroys the robbers (usually by pouring boiling water into each jug or barrel). | 64 | 36 |
| M143 | The fox in the well, ATU 31, 32. | Finding himself in a pit or well, one character persuades another to climb down to him, thanks to which he gets out, leaving the other at the bottom. | 64 | 46 |
| 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 |
| C34 | The Flood: the wounded creature. | The flood begins after people kill (harm, maim) some kind of creature (usually aquatic). | 65 | 91 |
Tradition and narrative counts are the stored catalogue totals for each entry.