Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
L111 — Hook from the sky.
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
OverviewThe 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.
Berezkin category: Adventures: Monsters and evil spirits
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.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| I130 | 91.29% | One of the constellations – a hunting or fishing net, a seine, a trap, a snare. |
| F64B | 89.96% | A woman pretends to be someone else in order to seduce her son, brother, daughter or grandson. See motif F64. |
| I71 | 88.50% | Stars – roots of plants growing in the upper world. |
| B79A1 | 87.29% | At the beginning of time, a bird flies and drops pieces of solid ground onto the water, from which land or an island emerges. Sometimes the substrate onto which the piece of solid ground falls is not precisely defined. |
| D10 | 86.26% | A couple of people serve as the embodiment of a tool for obtaining fire. |
| L105 | 84.58% | A wounded animal, fish or anthropomorphic character runs or swims away – usually with a hook, harpoon, arrow or other hunting or fishing implement stuck in its body; local healers cannot cure the wounded creature (usually because they cannot see the object that caused the wound); a person comes to the wounded person's village and successfully treats them (usually by removing the object that caused the wound). Cf. motif M60A. |
| A21 | 84.13% | The sun and/or moon were objects that were thrown or placed into the sky. |
| E35 | 83.81% | The first humans or creatures created by the Creator's rival were incomplete, not fully anthropomorphic (they resembled larvae, had webbing on their fingers, etc.). |
| H28A | 82.38% | When a character is burned, the smoke and sparks turn into mosquitoes and other blood-sucking insects that scatter throughout the world. |
| B3A | 82.35% | The waters are primary. The earth is lowered onto the water, appears above the water, grows from a piece of solid substance placed on the surface of the water or liquid mud, from an island in the ocean, is exposed when the waters recede, etc. |
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
19 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 19 traditions: Tuamotu, incl Pukapuka (different from Pukapuka in Cook Islands), Vahitahi, Anaa, Hao, Fangatau, Marquesas, Kubu, Malay; Temuan (incl Mantra or Mentra), Jakun (Moken), Simeulue, Nias, Mentawai, Central islands and Bikol: Vizaya, Mansaká, Bikol, Mangyan, Panayan, Sulod, Cebuano (Cebu), Capiz, Romblomanon, Manuyu, Western Sami, Nenets, Kets, Udeghe, Nivkh, Chukchi, Inland Tlingit, Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, Bella Coola (Nuxalk), Barasana, Taibano, Macuna
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