Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
K63 — Fish babies and deer people.
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
OverviewA man comes to people who hunt humans or catch fish-people. For them, these are wild animals or fish.
Berezkin category: Adventures: Acts of heroes
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.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| K56A3 | 98.37% | A wandering girl or young girl should not tie her shoelaces or the laces on her shoes or clothing. If she does so, she will get into trouble. |
| N10C | 98.37% | A girl is described, through whose body you can see her internal organs or the food she has swallowed. This is a sign of beauty. |
| B64D | 98.33% | Certain bones in the bodies of living creatures (usually birds and fish) are arrows shot into them. |
| M74AB | 98.28% | Travelling in a boat or on a sledge, animal person (always the fox) steals food supplies or ruins objects and accordingly to his deeds, names different places. These names seem strange to the person’s companions (“River of broken arrows” and the like) |
| K25A5 | 98.20% | The older brother is a hunter, the younger brother (rarely a sister) is a housekeeper. Learning that bird maidens come down to the younger brother, the older brother teaches the younger brother what he must do so that the older brother can catch one of them and make her his wife. The wife finds feather clothing and flies away (often the younger brother, out of simplicity, gives it to her), and the husband sets off in search of her. |
| L65C | 98.20% | The eldest of three or more sisters turns out to be a cannibal, devouring her younger sisters and other people. |
| L42K | 98.08% | A demonic character regurgitates an axe (adze) to cut down a tree. |
| K89 | 97.83% | After getting married, the heroine and her rival (witch, frog) must bring gifts from their relatives. The heroine finds her brother, brothers or sister who went missing at the beginning of the story and receives rich gifts from them, while the gifts brought by her rival are worthless. |
| M162A | 97.76% | The character pretends to eat his own genitals. Another believes him and castrates himself. |
| K56A8A | 97.61% | A girl goes to another world, behaves correctly, returns with an animal or an object, inside which her groom is found. Usually, another girl behaves incorrectly and suffers damage. |
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
18 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 18 traditions: Papua-NewGuinea Highland Papuans:Trans New Guinea & unclassified:Chimbu,Gimi,KaugelHuli,Gadsup,Kuman,Kutubu,Foi (Foe),Kyaka,Kamano (Kafe),Mawatta,Kukukuku (=Anga,=Sambia;Manki,Nauti,Ejuti),Baruya,Kewa,Tembregak,Menya,Melpa,Wiru,Pondoma, Stieng, Chrau, Sre (Koho), Maa, Mnong, Koreans, Eastern Khanty (Ostyaks), Tofa (Karagas), Nenets, Nganasans, Southern Selkups, Northern Selkups, Dolgans, Tungus (Evenki): Baikal region, Evenks, Tungus (Evenki) of China (Solon, Birar, Oroqen, Manegir), Evenks, Tungus (Evenki): Russian Far East, Evenks, Nivkh, Copper, Cashibo, Arabs (literary tradition; incl. One Thousand and One Nights), Early Russian written sources
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