Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
L65A2 — Shot finger.
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 shoots off (damages) the finger of a demonic creature, and then sees that his sister, lying in her cradle, has lost her finger.
Berezkin category: Adventures: Monsters and evil spirits
This is of motif type Adventures and tricks and is part of group 10, Adventures.
L65 has 12 other sub-motifs
RelatedL65. An infant or small child turns out to be a demon and kills people.
L65a. A daughter is born, or people find a girl; she is a monster or turns into a monster and devours everyone. Her brother escapes (usually leaves, marries, returns), and she pursues him unsuccessfully.
L65a1. A demonic character successively devours parts of the horse on which the hero arrived, each time returning to the hero and then leaving to devour another part. (Often asks whether the hero arrived on a three-legged, two-legged or one-legged horse).
L65a2. A man shoots off (damages) the finger of a demonic creature, and then sees that his sister, lying in her cradle, has lost her finger.
L65b. A demonic woman, less often her lover or another monster, is ready to kill or kills the hero. Dogs (or animals and birds that replace them – lions, bears, eagles, etc.) come running (flying), rescue the hero and kill the demon.
L65b1. A man exchanges sheep (goats) for dogs. The exchange seems unequal, but the dogs help him achieve success.
L65b2. The hero's dogs have names that speak of their strength and agility (Wind, Ironbreaker, etc.).
L65b3. A character who climbs a tree manages to escape from a demon (who usually tries to knock the tree down).
L65b4. The character pulls out his tooth to use it as a weapon or tool (often an axe).
L65b5. Despite obstacles, the young man's dogs or other animals serving him get to the princess just as she is about to be given away to a deceiver.
L65c. The eldest of three or more sisters turns out to be a cannibal, devouring her younger sisters and other people.
L65c1. Three or more sisters have the ability to fly and fly away from the cannibal – their older sister or mother. Only the youngest is saved.
L65d. When the older sister becomes a cannibal, the younger sister (temporarily) escapes. Cf. motifs L1B, L65C.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| A32I | 100.00% | A shepherd (shepherd and girl, shepherd and his flock, dogs) can be seen on the lunar disc. |
| B108 | 100.00% | An anthropomorphic character that has fallen apart into pieces turns into snow. |
| K156 | 100.00% | A girl pretends to be a man. To determine who it really is, flowers are placed under the pillow or mattress. If a man is sleeping, they will remain fresh, but if a woman is sleeping, they will wilt by morning (or if a woman is sleeping, the milk left under the bed will sour). |
| K77B3 | 100.00% | Goats encounter a wolf. One goat has one stomach, the second has two, the third has three, and so on. The goat with the most stomachs kills or scares away the wolf. |
| L85D | 100.00% | The hero encounters a giant and a strongman (usually a ploughman) with one arm, one leg, or one eye. He was crippled by a character who turned out to be much bigger and stronger than him. |
| M199M | 100.00% | A man explains to a demon that the heavy objects lying by the roadside, such as a harrow or a millstone, are just things used by his grandmother or mother, such as a spindle or a comb. |
| M39A2E | 100.00% | Forgetting his name, a fool remembers it when he accidentally hears a word. |
| I87AB | 99.65% | Strong men or a crowd of people cannot move the body of a dead animal or the leg of a motionless person, but a child or a woman can do it easily. Cf. motif B83. |
| L15A2 | 99.65% | The human body is tempered (in a furnace, etc.) to make it invulnerable, but one place remains unprotected. |
| M141A | 99.65% | In a gathering of various animals, one of the participants refers to the weakest as insignificant to the others and bearing an ugly name. That one is eaten. This is repeated several times, each time the weakest of the remaining animals is eaten. |
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
11 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 11 traditions: Greeks (modern), Balkarians, Bulgarians, Balkarians, Romanians, Moldavians, Aromanians, Moldovans, Uzbek, Abkhaz, Abkhazians, Ingush, Lezgians, Archin, Kürin; Khinalug, Mingrelians (Megrelians), Laz, Armenians, Turkmen, Bashkirs
If you wish to get access to data for projects and research, then please contact us, we do our best to help
How to cite: Fielder-White, J. (2026). The Folklore Database. https://folkloredatabase.com
0009-0006-1672-4451
Where applicable, users should also cite the relevant original sources, catalogues, and classification systems, including Berezkin, ATU, Thompson, and other cited authorities, alongside the page accessed and the last time accessed.
Editorial annotations and database enhancements © Jonathan Fielder-White licensed under CC BY 4.0. Berezkin-derived narrative and metadata licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. Full rights information can be found here.
All rights are reserved in the database structure, selection, arrangement, metadata, classifications, software, interface design, and original editorial content.
Important: The Folklore Database expressly reserves all rights in relation to text and data mining, automated extraction, scraping, machine learning, dataset creation, and the training, development, validation, or improvement of artificial intelligence technologies or systems. No part of this website or database may be scraped, copied, reproduced, harvested, downloaded in bulk, or otherwise used for AI training or commercial data extraction without prior written permission.
Designed and Developed by Jon Fielder-White.
© 2024–2026 Crecganford / Jonathan Fielder-White. All rights reserved.