Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
F40C — The patriarch kills the boys.
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
OverviewAn authoritative man systematically kills the boys born to his wives or his sister.
Berezkin category: Gender and sex
This is of motif type Adventures and tricks and is part of group 10, Adventures.
F40 has 2 other sub-motifs
RelatedF40a. A male character, androgynous, with a monstrous penis, single-handedly possesses all women, rules over them or leads away the first women.
F40b. A single man finds himself in a village of women. Usually, he is forced to satisfy a woman against his will, or each woman demands to have sex with him.
F40c. An authoritative man systematically kills the boys born to his wives or his sister.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| A7A | 91.67% | The light of the sun (moon, Venus) is a burning torch in the hand of a celestial body. |
| K1C | 90.87% | A man is abandoned on an island but survives. After some time, the person who abandoned him comes to look at his bones. The abandoned man sails away in his boat, leaving him to die. |
| K87A1 | 89.11% | A demonic woman asks the baby's mother to let her hold him or secretly replaces another person who was supposed to take the child. Once she has the baby, the demon takes him away. |
| M46C | 87.73% | The character turns into a needle, a garbage, a small insect. A woman swallows it and becomes pregnant. See M46B motif. |
| F49 | 87.69% | Women had their stomachs cut open to remove the baby. Someone explains how to give birth or makes childbirth possible. |
| K51B | 87.48% | The bodies of the slain are left in such a position that it seems as if they are rejoicing â smiling, laughing, dancing. |
| M68 | 87.44% | Because of his own stubbornness, the character suffers from an irrepressible gas eruption and scares away the game with a loud sound. Almost starves to death. |
| M16 | 87.01% | The wife or relatives (often the mother) of the sick person do not care for him. He recovers, and those who treated him badly are punished. Cf. motifs F62 and F96. |
| K111 | 86.72% | The girl's mother consistently rejects birds and animals that propose to her daughter, but accepts the proposal of a heavenly anthropomorphic character. |
| I133 | 86.69% | Star objects in different parts of the sky are associated with separate parts (as well as items of clothing, jewellery, etc.) of a single anthropomorphic or zoomorphic figure. |
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
15 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 15 traditions: Boa, Komo, (Ba)Nyanga, Mbole, Zulu, Swazi, Truk, Eastern Fayu, Losap, Pulap, Puluwat, Mortlock (incl. Satawan), Vepsians, Aleuts, Tagish, Inland Tlingit, Tahltan, Tlingit, Sarsee (Tsuu T'ina), Mono (Monache), Sicuani, Shuar, Achuar (Shiwiar), Manao, Katawishi (Teffe lake); groups of uncertain affiliation mostly from Rio Jamunda, Upper Chinook: Wasco, Wishram, Clackamas, Kathlamet
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