Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
L65B5 — The hero's dogs at the princess's wedding.
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
OverviewDespite 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.
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 β 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 β 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 |
|---|---|---|
| A32M | 100.00% | The moon is called the "Gypsy sun". |
| A35B | 100.00% | The character tries to cover the moon with resin (so that it shines less brightly). |
| B123 | 100.00% | A fly lands on the chest of the crucified Jesus. His persecutors, who intended to drive a nail into his heart, do not do so, believing that the nail has already been driven in. |
| B124 | 100.00% | Ever since a piece of flesh was torn from a person's foot, a hollow has formed between the toe and the heel. |
| B49B | 100.00% | In the past, cows had more teats on their udders than they do now. |
| C32 | 100.00% | Demonic characters will make a ship out of nail clippings. |
| F101 | 100.00% | With the help of magic, a rival or the spouse's mother tries to prevent a woman from giving birth. |
| F57 | 100.00% | A girl or her father (rarely: mother) picks a plant (usually a flower) and as a result encounters a character with a non-human appearance and/or inhabiting the underworld. The girl becomes the character's wife. In some cases, the picked plant is the character's hair, but more often there is no direct association of this kind. |
| F87B | 100.00% | A snake crawls onto the clothes of a bathing girl, climbs down in exchange for a promise to marry him, and takes her to the underwater world. She is happy there and gives birth to children. Together with them, she visits her relatives. They call the snake out of the water and kill it. After that, the wife transforms her children and/or herself into plants. |
| H52A | 100.00% | Returning from the land of immortality, a person must not touch the ground. However, he dismounts from his horse to help an old man (old woman). Death, who has taken the form of an old man, immediately kills him. Rarely: at the last moment, the hero decides not to perform actions that are fatal for him. |
See the 100 most similar distributions →
Map of motif dispersal
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Traditions
8 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 8 traditions: France, Dutch, Flemish, Germans: North (Low- and Central German dialects): Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg, Pommern, Niedersachsen (Lower Saxony, incl East Frisia and Oldenburg), Nordrhein-Westfalen, Hessen, Rheinland-Pfalz, ThΓΌringen, Saxony-Anhalt, Sachsen, Brandenburg, RΓΌgen, Croatians, Croats; Italians of Dalmatia (if the motif is absent among other Italians), Italians: Central (Toscana, Umbria, Marche, Lazio), Frisians, Transylvanian Saksons, Russian Federation