Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
F4 — Child in a vessel, T561.
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
OverviewIn the days of the first ancestors, children were conceived not through sexual intercourse, but in vessels, piles of earth, lumps of clay, etc.
Berezkin category: Gender and sex
This is of motif type Cosmology and etiology and is part of group 5, Origin of human beings, ethnic groups, etiology of human anatomy, strange body configuration, ways of behavior, marriages before the establishment of the present norms.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| E25 | 97.12% | People learn the art of weaving from a spider or from a person who later becomes a spider; the spider makes fabrics for humans. |
| L7A | 97.08% | A character who sticks to another creature and refuses to let go, first sticking to a human, then to an animal, or first sticking to an animal, then to a bird. |
| M72 | 96.62% | The character puts his hand into the anus of a tapir or other large herbivore and is unable to pull it out. The animal rushes to run and drags a person with it for a long time. |
| J56A | 95.88% | Heroic brothers are transformed into pots or frying pans, but only the elder is able to sit in the fire long enough. |
| M11A | 95.74% | The character gives others the fish extracted from his body. |
| J6 | 95.66% | A pregnant woman is killed (and eaten). Twins are taken from her womb, who are usually also destined to be eaten, but they escape, live (secretly) in the house of their antagonists, and take revenge on them. |
| H8 | 95.55% | Unable to bring themselves to touch something unclean, poisonous, dangerous or hot, people lost their immortality (var.: did not receive the blessings that came to Europeans). |
| K27I | 95.49% | Task: to drain a large body of water. |
| G28 | 95.39% | The tree contains a fish in its trunk. |
| F50 | 95.23% | Children have the ability to leave their mother's womb and return to it again. |
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
22 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 22 traditions: Dinka, Atuot, Nuer, Rwanda (incl Hutu, Tutsi, Kiga), Rundi, (Ma)Shi, Banyabungu; Rega, Zulu, Swazi, Maka (Makaa), Baya, Kaka, Batak (Toba, Dairi), Andamanese, Indian literary tradition (Vedic, Brahman, Purana, Indian Buddhism, Hinduism, Ramayana, Mahabharata, Panchtantra, Jatakas); iconography of Hindu temples, Kazakh, Yana, Hopi, Sicuani, Akawai, Wayapi, Emerillon, Mai Huna (Coto, Orejon), Urubu (Urubu-Kaapor), Shipibo, Conibo, Setebo, Amahuaca, Cashinahua, Sharanahua, Yaminahua, Yawanahua, Capanahua), Chacobo, Makka, Mocovi; Kechua of Santiago del Estero with probable Guaikuruan substratum; Abipon, Toba (incl Pilagá), Papua-New Guinea Northern Lowland Papuan groups (Trans New Guinea and unclassified): Komba, Gimi, Susure, Orokaiva, Bogadjim, Ngain, Sentani, Bargam, Imonda, Nankina, Yupta Valley, Urawa Valley, Warupu (Barupu), Pondoma (Anam)
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