Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
I20B — Girding under the armpits.
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 in the upper world are different from those on earth and gird themselves below or above the waist.
Berezkin category: Supernatural objects, objects and creatures
This is of motif type Cosmology and etiology and is part of group 8, Queer and monstrous beings, creatures, objects and loci, folk beliefs related to particular phenomena and objects.
I20 has 5 other sub-motifs
RelatedI20. The inhabitants of the underworld or the land on the horizon where the sky meets the earth are dwarves. See motif I14A.
I20a. Anthropomorphic inhabitants of the upper world – giants.
I20b. People in the upper world are different from those on earth and gird themselves below or above the waist.
I20c. Dwarves live in an underground world that partly resembles the earthly world. If dwarves and humans meet, it happens underground.
I20c1. Dwarves do not live deep underground, but inside hills, in rocks, in mines, etc., and usually come out from there onto the ground.
I20c2. The inhabitants of the land on the horizon (where the sky meets the earth) are dwarves.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| M177A | 99.27% | One zoomorphic character teaches another to remain silent, to look at him or away when a third character asks who ate the best piece. It is a trap: the third character decides that the second is guilty. |
| N21 | 99.27% | The warrior-hero was made of dough and then became alive (his name is “The Dough”) |
| K137 | 99.01% | The brother is killed, the sister, dressed in her brother's clothes and disguised as a young man, finds women who are able to revive the dead, puts her brother's clothes back on his body, and the women who have come revive him. Or the sister is killed, the brother lures women capable of reviving the dead, puts his clothes on his dead sister, the women think it is their husband, and revive the girl. |
| K137A | 99.01% | The brother is killed. The sister, dressed in his clothes, finds a woman. The brother comes back to life, the sister puts on women's clothes again, and the woman believes that the girl's brother was the one who married her. |
| K27L1 | 98.50% | Voluntarily subjecting himself to trials, the character allows himself to be frozen in ice and cannot free himself. |
| M109A | 98.02% | One zoomorphic character advises another to sit on the ice for a long time – usually until food falls from the sky. The one who sits on the ice freezes to it. |
| L65B4 | 97.78% | The character pulls out his tooth to use it as a weapon or tool (often an axe). |
| K110 | 97.57% | The character is asked to retrieve treasure from the bottom of a pond. He does not understand that he is only seeing a reflection and that the treasure is located above. |
| K141 | 97.51% | Supernatural women harm people. The hero tames them and usually takes them as wives. |
| N28G | 97.42% | In a list of things that do not exist in the world, a gall of horse or ass is mentioned |
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
8 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 8 traditions: Bulgarians, Balkarians, Georgians, Kazakh, Mongols (Khalkha), Tuvinians of Tuva, Tuvans, Khakas, Tungus (Evenki): Baikal region, Evenks, Western Yakuts (Sakha): Olekma and Vilyuy Basins
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