Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
F53 — The ugly husband.
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 unattractive man marries, but hides his face. When he is seen, the marriage is dissolved.
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.
F53 has 1 other sub-motifs
RelatedF53. An unattractive man marries, but hides his face. When he is seen, the marriage is dissolved.
F53a. The husband hides his face from his wife because she does not know that he is a bat or an owl.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| B29 | 98.53% | People turn into animals, birds or stones, living beings acquire their current characteristics at a general meeting, festival, after a festival, after performing a ritual or after defeating a common enemy. |
| K10 | 97.94% | A monstrous bird (bat) attacks people, heroes engage in battle with it. See motifs K10A – K10G. |
| M8A | 97.91% | Animals, and more often birds, find it difficult to break through a rock from the outside or inside, make a hole in the tree, in the body of an absorber creature, tear fetters, etc., to help a character or get out of the confined space by yourself. The list <b><i>includes</i></b> groups whose texts deal with the exit of the first ancestors to earth from a confined space. |
| F33 | 97.21% | A woman or group of women take a water animal or water monster as their lover. The husband(s), brother(s) or (adopted) children of the woman(s) kill or maim the lover and (in some cases) the woman(s). |
| J59 | 96.55% | To reach the sky, one must shoot an arrow that will pierce the vault of heaven. See motif J58; see motif J59A: a man flies after or on an arrow (without the motif of an arrow piercing the vault of heaven). |
| C34 | 96.45% | The flood begins after people kill (harm, maim) some kind of creature (usually aquatic). |
| F51 | 96.42% | Someone under cover of night/incognito approaches a person of the opposite sex. The marriage partner deliberately (to determine who it is) or accidentally (thereby exposing the visitor) makes a mark on his/her body (clothing). See motif A31. |
| M11 | 96.26% | The character gives others food extracted from his or someone else's body or contaminated with bodily secretions, without revealing the source of the food. |
| B27 | 96.24% | The characters ponder what object or creature they should transform into, and once they have made their choice, they undergo metamorphosis. |
| L46 | 96.14% | The character walks, climbs or descends upside down, or sees the world turned upside down. |
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
25 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 25 traditions: Maka (Makaa), Baya, Kaka, Southern Solomons: southern part of Santa Ysabel (Bughotu), Guadalcanal, San Cristobal, Malaita, Ulawa, Samoa, Tuvalu (Ellice), Batak (Toba, Dairi), Aleuts, Iglulik, Polar Inuit, Klamath, Modoc, Cherokee, Chumash, Northern Shoshone, Western Shoshone, Gosiute, Eastern Shoshone, Upland Yuma: Walapai, Havasupai, Yavapai, Ute, Chemehuevi, Kekchi; Mopan, Guajiro, Kofan, Shipibo, Conibo, Setebo, Kayabi, Makka, Mocovi; Kechua of Santiago del Estero with probable Guaikuruan substratum; Abipon, Toba (incl Pilagá)
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