Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif

M61A — Owners quarrel to get valuables

20 Myths, legends and folktales
20 Unique narratives for motif M61A
9 Cultures & traditions where M61A is told
5 Sub-motifs of motif M61A
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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

Overview

To get valuables, the character provokes a quarrel between their owners. When they start fighting each other, valuables fall out of their bodies and end up at the character's disposal.

Berezkin category: Adventures: Tricks and episodes

This is of motif type Adventures and tricks and is part of group 11, Tricks and competitions won thanks to deception, absurd and obscene behavior.

M61 has 5 other sub-motifs

Related

M61.  The character provokes a quarrel by telling each of his opponents how one of them allegedly used hostile or offensive language towards the other.
M61a.  To get valuables, the character provokes a quarrel between their owners. When they start fighting each other, valuables fall out of their bodies and end up at the character's disposal.
M61a1.  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.
M61a2.  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.
M61a3.  The character tells each of two different species of fish how the other allegedly used to be hostile or offensive towards the former. Fish kill each other and the character prepares them to eat.
M61a4.  character lies to each of the spouses as if the other had a misfortune. They run to each other in panic.

🌐 See a combined distribution map for all of M61’s motifs

Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns

Phylogeny
MotifSimilarityMotif summary
K52B99.83%The hero comes to capture the daughter of a supernatural creature. He sees a slave breaking an axe (adze, wedge). The hero repairs the axe, and the slave helps him in return. See motif K52.
K43A99.72%People leave a boy, a girl, a sister and brother, a young woman or young spouses alone and depart. Someone sympathises with those who have been abandoned and secretly hides fire for them.
B3599.65%The bear hastily puts his left moccasin on his right foot and vice versa, which is why he is club-footed.
K5299.65%A woman or young man who approaches the shore is carried away by predatory sea creatures to the bottom of the sea; a character descends to rescue the kidnapped person and brings him or her back with the help of cunning and shamanic powers.
L1F99.45%The sister, using magic or transforming herself into a monster, kills her brothers in revenge for the death of her lover or husband.
L5799.34%The character loses an internal organ or part of the body, which is taken away by others; he approaches unnoticed and takes back what was lost.
J6599.23%After the attack by enemies, a woman and her daughter remain. She rejects the marriage proposals of animal suitors and agrees to give her daughter to the heavenly deity (the Sun). The children from this marriage take revenge on their enemies.
M53A99.23%raven gathers seals or other marine mammals around and deceives them into killing them.
M53D98.77%The character pretends to be enemies coming; when people run away in fear, the character takes what the deceived people owned.
L6798.32%Having dug an underground passage to a lying monstrous hoofed animal, a small animal gnaws the wool from the place on the skin where the heart beats; the hero thrusts a spear or arrow into this place. See motif L66.

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Map of motif dispersal

Distribution

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Traditions

9 recorded

This motif has been recorded in 9 traditions: Inland Tlingit, Tahltan, Upper Kuskokwim (Kolchan), Tlingit, Shuswap, Thompson (Nlaka'pamux), Tillamook, Okanagon, Sanpoil, Kutenai

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