Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
D7A — Spider and fire.
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 spider possesses the first fire or steals it from its original owner (texts in which the spider acts together with other animals and does not play the main role are not included).
Berezkin category: Fire and Laughter
This is of motif type Cosmology and etiology and is part of group 7, Etiology of plants and animals and of their peculiar features, particular animals as protagonists of cosmological stories, metamorphoses, weather and calendar.
D7 has 1 other sub-motifs
RelatedD7. The frog or toad possesses the first fire, steals it from its original owner, and tries to extinguish it or save it from dying out. See motif D4.
D7a. The spider possesses the first fire or steals it from its original owner (texts in which the spider acts together with other animals and does not play the main role are not included).
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| K93B5 | 95.11% | The character infiltrates the enemy camp disguised as a kitten or puppy. Usually, one of the enemies suspects deception, but the others believe that the cute animal is harmless. |
| L131A | 94.82% | To get rid of a demonic character (usually a woman), they inform her that the place where her home and/or children are located is engulfed in flames. |
| L118 | 94.51% | One character provokes another to stick a part of their body into a split log (between two boards, etc.) and knocks out the wedge. |
| L49 | 91.81% | Individual parts or pieces of a character's body are successively thrown down. (In American variants, those below usually mistake them for game, honey, or fish). |
| L131 | 90.97% | To get rid of a demonic creature or make a bird or ladybird fly away, they are told that the place where their home and/or children are located is engulfed in fire. |
| B91A | 89.44% | A blind character asks another to lend him his eyes or to swap eyes, keeping his own eyes. |
| I100A | 89.34% | The Pleiades – a woman or man with children, members of the same family. |
| J69 | 89.10% | A person is killed (with a cold weapon, dead water) and then revived. Another person asks for the same thing to be done to him, but is not revived. |
| M7C | 88.07% | zoomorphic character is waiting to be transported across the water. Animals or fish consistently offer help. The character only accepts the latter's help - he was waiting for him to eat. |
| K12B | 87.81% | The hero enters a world beyond the human world and marries there. His wife allows him to visit his former world, but on certain conditions. The hero breaks these conditions, which leads to (irreparable) misfortune. Cf. motif F94 (the hero betrays his fairy wife in her world); K25a6 (the hero visits his world together with his fairy wife). |
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
10 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 10 traditions: Latvians, Livonians, Estonians, Western Sami, Yuchi, Wailaki, Mattole, Lassik, Sinkyone, Cahto, Yuki (Yuki proper, Coastal Yuki, Huchnob), Yokuts, Cahuilla, Cupeño, Choco: Embera, Nonama (Waunana), XVI century Dabaiba, pre-Columbian iconography of Sinu
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