Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
C33A1 — Bird pecking at the liver.
Source data for narratives and traditions is drawn from Berezkin’s Analytical Catalogue. If you use this data, please acknowledge and link to it: Ю.Е. Березкин, Е.Н. Дувакин. Тематическая классификация и распределение фольклорно-мифологических мотивов по ареалам. Аналитический каталог.
Summary of motif
OverviewA bird of prey flies to the chained character every day and pecks at his internal organs. The character recovers overnight, and the cycle repeats itself.
Berezkin category: Disasters
This is of motif type Cosmology and etiology and is part of group 8, Queer and monstrous beings, creatures, objects and loci, folk beliefs related to particular phenomena and objects.
C33 has 3 other sub-motifs
RelatedC33. A strongman-god-fighter is chained to a rock or a pillar for centuries.
C33a. Throughout the year, someone tries to saw through or break the chain or rope that holds him or another character. On a certain day of the year, when the chain has become completely thin, it is restored to its former state, or the pole to which the chain is attached is reinserted into the ground. Cf. motif G8d.
C33a1. A bird of prey flies to the chained character every day and pecks at his internal organs. The character recovers overnight, and the cycle repeats itself.
C33b. The demise of the first race is associated with the appearance of wind.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| B105 | 99.79% | The father-in-law or mother-in-law catches the daughter-in-law in a situation she is ashamed of (with her hair down, bathing, etc.). Out of shame, she turns into a bird (usually a hoopoe) or a turtle. |
| M197B | 99.78% | The owner claims that other mares foaled or aborted because his stallions, which were far away from the mares, whinnied, that any foal born was from his mare, etc. The young man begins to kill the owner's dogs: they did not chase away the wolves (they scared away the game, etc.), although they were far from the scene. The owner acknowledges the absurdity of his claim. |
| N7 | 99.67% | fairy-tale text ends with a formula that says that three apples fell from the sky or tree, at least one of which went to the narrator. Or it is said that someone give/should give the narrator one or three apples. |
| B73A | 99.41% | A girl (a young man, a girl with her brother; two little brothers) searches for a lost horse, cow, sheep and, as a result (alone or with her brother; both brothers), turns into a bird (usually a cuckoo) with a characteristic call. |
| K95A | 99.31% | The lovers are buried in the same grave or nearby. Two plants grow in this place, reaching towards each other, and between them is a thorny bush, embodying the character who separated the lovers. |
| M114A | 99.31% | The character is offered to sew clothes or shoes from stone or iron, or to remove the skin from the stone. |
| K133 | 99.25% | A man notices that his horse (donkey) looks tired and learns that an animal or demonic creature is riding it. Cf. motif M182a. |
| K27Z7 | 99.10% | The character promises to fulfil a request if the other person reveals the secret behind someone's strange behaviour. |
| J32C | 99.01% | At night, a demonic character comes to the grave of the deceased, intending to harm him. |
| K38A | 98.94% | Upon arriving in the underworld, the hero sees white and black horses, rams, etc. The white ones will take him to the upper world, while the black ones will take him even lower. Usually, the hero accidentally touches the black one. Sometimes a third ram or horse is mentioned, red or grey. Or the hero grabs the left horn of the animal instead of the right, and as a result ends up not where he wants to be. |
See the 100 most similar distributions →
Map of motif dispersal
DistributionDrag the map to pan, use the scroll wheel to zoom — choose a texture or projection below
Traditions
4 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 4 traditions: Ancient Greece, Cherkassians, Adyghe, Kabardin, Ingush, Avar, Andi, Akhvakh
If you wish to get access to data for projects and research, then please contact us, we do our best to help
How to cite: Fielder-White, J. (2026). The Folklore Database. https://folkloredatabase.com
0009-0006-1672-4451
Where applicable, users should also cite the relevant original sources, catalogues, and classification systems, including Berezkin, ATU, Thompson, and other cited authorities, alongside the page accessed and the last time accessed.
Editorial annotations and database enhancements Š Jonathan Fielder-White licensed under CC BY 4.0. Berezkin-derived narrative and metadata licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. Full rights information can be found here.
All rights are reserved in the database structure, selection, arrangement, metadata, classifications, software, interface design, and original editorial content.
Important: The Folklore Database expressly reserves all rights in relation to text and data mining, automated extraction, scraping, machine learning, dataset creation, and the training, development, validation, or improvement of artificial intelligence technologies or systems. No part of this website or database may be scraped, copied, reproduced, harvested, downloaded in bulk, or otherwise used for AI training or commercial data extraction without prior written permission.
Designed and Developed by Jon Fielder-White.
Š 2024â2026 Crecganford / Jonathan Fielder-White. All rights reserved.