Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
F76 — Animals teach love.
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
OverviewPeople learn how to make love by watching birds, fish or animals mating; animals teach people how to make love or arouse desire in them.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| H4 | 97.38% | Those who change their skin (bark, clothing) are immortal (forever young). (Cf. motif K56a5a: Skinning oneself to become young: To become a young beauty, an old or ugly woman asks to have her skin skinned off). |
| J58C | 94.11% | A chain of arrows forms a bridge across a water barrier. |
| H5 | 93.65% | Reptiles or invertebrates possess a life-giving agent; they are contrasted with humans as immortal mortals and/or responsible for the fact that humans die and are not reborn; the dead turn into snakes. See motif H4. (The first death comes from a snake bite (centipede), but snakes are not opposed to humans as immortals to mortals.) |
| I14A | 91.96% | People without anuses regurgitate what they have eaten through their mouths or other (marked) orifices. See motif I14. |
| F45 | 91.91% | There are or were settlements where only women lived or live (cf. motifs F8, F45C). |
| J47 | 91.14% | A character climbs up to the sky using a rope, ladder, etc., or climbs a tree or rock, or descends from the sky to the ground, or rises to the ground from the underworld. Another character climbs after them, but the rope or ladder breaks or is cut, and the character falls. |
| I4A | 91.12% | Thunder falls to earth and cannot rise. Usually, a person helps it return to the sky. |
| I115A | 90.07% | In the same narrative or ritual context, Orion and the Pleiades are contrasted with each other as a man or men and a woman or women. (Orion is usually associated with the masculine principle, and the Pleiades with the feminine; among the Mentawai, d'Antracast, and Toba peoples, the opposite is true (due to regional influences? In Indonesia and eastern South America, the Pleiades are usually a group of young men). |
| E5D | 90.06% | The first people to arrive on earth and settle within a limited space are threatened by a predator or monster. |
| I5 | 89.32% | Thunder (lightning, rain) has the appearance of a four-legged mammal - a pig, buffalo, camel, anteater, tapir, dog, cat, leopard, monkey, etc. |
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: Old and New Testament, Luba (Baluba, Luba-Katanga, Shaba), (Ba)Holoholo, Tumbwe, Bena-Piana, Tabwa, Benabena-Mitumba, Zela, Bene-Marungu, Fang (Pangwe), Eton, Bafia, Batanga, Benga, Bube (Bubi), Buheba, Yaunde (Ewondo), Yebekolo, Koko, Bulu, Beti (Beti-Bulu), Sekiani, Eghap, Northern Gur (Oti-Volta): Mamprussi, Dagomba, Dagari (Dagara; incl Lodaga), Bassari, Mosi, Nankanse, Konkomba, Moba; Ditammari, Nyende, Bulsa (pl Builsa, Bulo), Akan, Ashanti, Akwapim; Ga (Accra), Kra, Twi (Chwi, Chi), Alor, Solor, Wetar, Atauru, Flores, incl Mangarai (Western Flores), Nage, Keo, Riung, Ngada or Nad'a (Central Flores), Sika (Eastern Flores), Dusun, Murut, Kelabit, Tombonuwo, Bajau, Tidong, Southern Taiwan: Rukai, Paiwan, Puyuma, Saaroa, Ketangalan, Northern Taiwan: Atayal (Tayal; Taruko (Toda, Taokas, Torok, Taroko), Pazeh, Sedeq (Sediq, Seedeq, Sazek), Saisiyat (Saixia), Wa (incl Kawa), Bulang, Palaung (De Ang, Deang), Semang, Senoi, SW Arunachal Pradesh: Sherdukpen, Tawang (Monpas), Aka (Hrusso), Miji, Kumyk, Terekemen, Arikara, Tzotzil, Chayahuita , Tariana, Kechua-speaking communities of Apurimac, Cuzco, Arequipa, Puno departments; Spanish sources of XVI-XVII centuries; Callawaya (Kechua with Pukina substratum), Amahuaca, Cashinahua, Sharanahua, Yaminahua, Yawanahua, Capanahua), Yuracare, Bolivian Guarani: Chiriguano (including assimilated Chane Arawaks), Pauserna (=Guarasu), Guarayu, Tapiete, Chacobo, China
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