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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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| J51a2 In J51 family | A severed finger instead of a chicken bone. | A girl must penetrate an inaccessible place with the help of chicken bones. She loses one or there are not enough bones. By cutting off her finger and using it as she would use the bones, the girl achieves her goal. | 5 | 7 |
| J59d In J59 family | Reviving the dead by stepping over their bones. | The character steps or jumps over the remains of the slain, and the latter comes back to life. | 5 | 6 |
| K113b In K113 family | The Frog Princess – Mistress of the Storm. | The younger prince marries a frog. She must first arrive at his parents' house. A thunderstorm begins. Rain, lightning, and thunder signify that the prince's wife is washing, dressing, travelling, etc. | 5 | 3 |
| K11b In K11 family | Reed made from bird bones. | The bones of a huge bird are turned into reeds or bamboo for making arrows or sarbacanes. | 5 | 6 |
| K11C In K11 family | Plants grow from feathers. | The plucked feathers of a huge bird turn into plants. | 5 | 5 |
| K14F In K14 family | Material evidence of the father's righteousness. | After his father's death, the son consistently violates his father's instructions. Having preserved material evidence of what happened, he presents it to those gathered, proving his father's rightness and/or his wife's wrongness. | 5 | 5 |
| K15c In K15 family | Substituted clothing. | The owner of stone (ice) clothing kills people. By hiding or replacing his clothing, the hero kills him. | 5 | 6 |
| K172 | The deaf bride without arms and legs. | A man describes his daughter to a potential groom as ugly and crippled. The groom agrees to the marriage, and the bride turns out to be beautiful. | 5 | 5 |
| K182 | The deceived protector. | A supernatural defender comes to the rescue upon hearing the alarm, but stops doing so after the alarm has been raised in vain. | 5 | 13 |
| K19f In K19 family | Working stars. | A star or many stars descend from the sky to work in the fields. See motif K19B. | 5 | 9 |
| K27q1 In K27 family | Lioness's milk in a lion cub's skin. | The hero is sent to bring lioness milk in a wineskin made from a lion skin (usually from a lion cub's skin). | 5 | 6 |
| K27v2 In K27 family | To hit a copper object with an arrow. | The character must hit an object or creature made of copper with an arrow. | 5 | 5 |
| k27x6b In k27 family | Greeting addressed to the wind, ATU 298A*. | Upon encountering the sun, moon (frost) and wind, a person greets only the latter. (In progress) | 5 | 4 |
| K27z2a1 In K27 family | An innocent woman is accused of promiscuity. | Noticing that a woman is pregnant, her relatives or in-laws accuse her of promiscuity, because, according to their calculations, she could not have conceived by her husband or fiancé. After severe trials, the woman meets again the father of the boy she gave birth to. | 5 | 6 |
| K32b In K32 family | Mother-in-law replaces daughter-in-law. | The man's mother takes on the appearance of his wife in order to take her place. | 5 | 6 |
| k33c5 In k33 family | Girl in an egg. | A young man obtains a girl who is inside an egg. | 5 | 5 |
| K37e In K37 family | Three-legged cast-iron bird. | The clairvoyant cannot identify the person who revealed the secret, because that person does so while hiding among objects that are never found together in everyday life. | 5 | 5 |
| K38b1 In K38 family | A bird steals foals, a hero kills a snake. | Every time a mare gives birth to a wonderful foal, a bird carries it away. Setting out in search of the foals, the hero kills the snake that was devouring the bird's chicks. The bird returns the foals. | 5 | 4 |
| K56a4d In K56 family | Ashes turn into flour. | A stepmother sends her stepdaughter to a house in the forest, giving her ashes, sand, etc. instead of food. The stepdaughter turns them into flour, groats, etc. | 5 | 9 |
| K56b2 In K56 family | Clenched jaws. | A supernatural creature (object) bestows wealth upon a modest person. A greedy person, trying to take more than their fair share, is caught and cannot free themselves (for a long time). Usually, the creature pinches the outstretched hand. | 5 | 6 |
| K61f In K61 family | The Living Doll, ATU 459. | Fearing her husband's wrath, a childless woman pretends to have given birth. Her husband believes that he has a daughter or son, and after some time marries her off (marries him off). During the wedding ceremony, a doll or animal is placed under the veil (in the palanquin), but at the last moment, a supernatural character transforms the supposed bride (groom) into a girl or boy. | 5 | 5 |
| K67g In K67 family | Smiling sheep. | Pretending to carry out his master's orders, the worker cuts off the animals' lips (to make them look like they are smiling). | 5 | 5 |
| K73b2 In K73 family | Boil the kettle with a story. | It is necessary to boil the pot by telling an incredible but nevertheless true story. | 5 | 5 |
| K77b3 In K77 family | The goat with three bellies. | Goats encounter a wolf. One goat has one stomach, the second has two, the third has three, and so on. The goat with the most stomachs kills or scares away the wolf. | 5 | 7 |
| L103b1 In L103 family | A stream of excrement in the face of the pursuer. 28.30.-.32. | The hero or heroine flees from a demon on the back of a domestic animal (often a bull). When the demon approaches, the animal releases a stream of manure or intestinal gas into its face, and it stops the chase. | 5 | 10 |
| L108b2 In L108 family | Ants make the voice thin. | To acquire a thin voice, the character allows ants to bite his tongue. | 5 | 7 |
| L110a In L110 family | Cut ear. | A character swallows a person or (usually) many people and animals, the hero kills the monster, and while cutting it open, accidentally wounds one of those who were swallowed. Usually, the wounded person is offended and when those who were swallowed come out, they harm or destroy the hero. | 5 | 8 |
| l118a1 In l118 family | Man deceives monkey. | A man deliberately performs certain actions in front of a monkey. The monkey imitates him, causing harm to itself. | 5 | 5 |
| L132 | Food theft: family conflict. | When one member of a small (family) group, left alone, secretly eats food, this leads to serious conflict, often resulting in the murder of the guilty party. | 5 | 5 |
| l15h4 In l15 family | The character's soul in a needle. | The object in which the character's life is concentrated is enclosed in another, which is enclosed in a third (and so on). The final container of the soul is a needle, which the hero breaks. | 5 | 6 |
| L26 | Death of initiates. | During the (first) initiation, supernatural beings teach boys rituals and kill them for violating rules related to the consumption and distribution of food. | 5 | 7 |
| L40a In L40 family | A woman mistakes a young man's reflection for her own. | An unattractive woman sees the reflection of a young man sitting in a tree in the water and thinks that she has become beautiful. | 5 | 10 |
| L5i In L5 family | A multitude of skulls. | A multitude of rolling heads or skulls try to take a woman away. | 5 | 4 |
| L81a1 In L81 family | Red bead in the hearth. | Noticing a red bead (pebble) that has fallen into the hearth, the character thinks it is a coal and does not understand that the fire in the hearth has gone out. | 5 | 5 |
| M100a In M100 family | Fire on the edge of a cliff. | One of the characters leads another to the edge of a cliff with the aim of lighting a fire, or lights a fire at the edge of the cliff. As a result, the other falls and is killed. | 5 | 7 |
| m105a1 In m105 family | Allegedly killed children: two birds. | One of two birds, both of which (rarely: only one) are flightless, suggests that the other break its eggs. The other agrees, but then sees that the first has kept its eggs. | 5 | 16 |
| M170b In M170 family | The rim of a vessel on the neck. | A zoomorphic character stuck its head into a vessel, which broke, leaving the rim on its neck. The character uses this as proof of its high status. | 5 | 5 |
| M173B In M173 family | Running ahead. | The character repeatedly runs ahead of another person on the road to obtain food from them, each time pretending to be a different person. | 5 | 4 |
| M175 | A lion carcass behind a hyena. | The hyena sees the carcass of a larger predator behind it, does not realise that it is dead, and runs away in terror. | 5 | 6 |
| M198b5 In M198 family | The imaginary fortune teller: an overheard conversation. | The fake fortune teller accidentally overhears someone's conversation, otherwise he would not have been able to give the correct answer. | 5 | 6 |
| m203b In m203 family | The cat is associated with spirits. | A person learns that a cat familiar to him and living in the human world also belongs to the world of spirits. | 5 | 8 |
| M39a3b In M39 family | A fool takes care of stumps | fool decides that stumps need hats, puts pots on the stumps. | 5 | 8 |
| M44a In M44 family | Food thieves are the first humans | The character discovers that someone is stealing game or fish from his trap, mountain, etc. or ravages his garden, field; he or his messengers wait and catch the thief [magical tales clearly of European origin (e.g. Chamacoco, Wilbert, Simoneau 1987a, No. 121) are not included]. The kidnappers are the first people to get out of the ground, the first men. | 5 | 14 |
| M55 | Dangerous overnight stay | A human or weaker animal character takes a stronger character to sleep in a supposedly dangerous place where hot coals, sticks, etc. can fall on those lying at night; when A strong character falls asleep, his companion burns or hits him, pretending that both of them have suffered equally. | 5 | 12 |
| M5c In M5 family | Hairy octopus | The octopus or star-fish was covered with hair but the rat had eaten it up | 5 | 5 |
| M5d In M5 family | Squirrel and fish | The squirrel and the creeping fish are smart and get medicines for each other | 5 | 3 |
| M61a1 In M61 family | The character quarrels birds | The character (always a raven) provokes a seagull to quarrel with another bird, telling each one that the other was hostile or offensive towards her. | 5 | 9 |
| M61a2 In M61 family | The character quarrels stones | The character provokes a quarrel between two stones of different breeds. To do this, he told everyone how the other supposedly spoke hostile or offensive towards the former. | 5 | 5 |
| M76 | A person climbing a tree has his leg cut off | A woman cuts off a man's leg when he climbs a tree; a man cuts off a woman's leg when she climbs a tree. See K13A motif. | 5 | 4 |
| M78e In M78 family | Baby ear | A tiny boy comes from an animal's ear, compared in size to an ear, his name is “ear”. | 5 | 9 |
Tradition and narrative counts are the stored catalogue totals for each entry.