Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
I27B — The dog-ferryman.
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 dog carries a person across a river to another world. See motif I27.
Berezkin category: Supernatural objects, objects and creatures
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.
I27 has 4 other sub-motifs
RelatedI27. 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).
I27a. The souls of dead dogs go to a special place in the afterlife and/or go to the afterlife along a special path.
I27b. A dog carries a person across a river to another world. See motif I27.
I27c. Dogs with two spots above their eyes stand out and are usually called two- or four-eyed.
I27d. There is a certain black or red dog that (is associated with objects in the night sky and) negatively affects people's lives.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| A22A | 99.79% | Two characters burn; one turns into the present sun, and the other into a less significant celestial object. See motif A22. |
| A13B | 99.67% | During an eclipse or at the first appearance of night, ants eclipse the sun. |
| A9 | 99.67% | The moon-woman does not allow her son or husband, the Sun, to destroy people. |
| L3A | 99.67% | Left alone, a woman carelessly calls for someone to help her with the housework; a demon comes and kills the woman or her child. |
| B62 | 99.54% | Man believes that vultures live better than humans, changes his appearance to that of a vulture. The former vulture lives with the man's wife, and the man usually does not like his new life. |
| B67 | 99.42% | A fallen tree and/or its stump turns into a mountain (mountain range) or rocks. (Usually, the branches of this tree bear the fruits and shoots of various cultivated plants, see motif G5). |
| B7D | 99.38% | Water pours from a broken bone, flooding the earth. |
| I129 | 99.38% | The rainy season is associated with the appearance of the Heron constellation in the sky. |
| L7B | 99.38% | While chasing a person, spirit, monster or beast, he mistakenly throws himself after a calabash floating down the river. |
| M47 | 99.35% | When punishing a person or animal or restoring a dismembered body, a character intentionally or accidentally puts his head to his ass. |
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
2 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 2 traditions: Crow, Aimara
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.