Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
M42C — When it falls off a cliff, it eats its bone marrow
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
OverviewFalling off a cliff and breaking his leg, the character eats his bone marrow.
Berezkin category: Adventures: Tricks and episodes
This is of motif type Adventures and tricks and is part of group 11, Tricks and competitions won thanks to deception, absurd and obscene behavior.
M42 has 3 other sub-motifs
RelatedM42. The character takes his eyes out of his orbits and loses them. He usually regains his eyes later, makes new ones, takes away from another character, etc. See the M41 motif.
M42a. The character (usually after losing his own eyes) inserts seeds or berries into his eye sockets and sees again.
M42b. After losing his eyes, the character makes new ones out of resin or wax, sees again (often this is an episode on the way to finding good eyes, while tar eyes do not see well).
M42c. Falling off a cliff and breaking his leg, the character eats his bone marrow.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| M46A | 99.02% | The character turns into a baby, is picked up by the owners of valuables, and then steals valuables or converges with a woman. The baby is not a demonic creature and does not intend to kill those who pick it up (cf. Motive L60). |
| J53C | 98.80% | Two women live together, both have children. One of them leaves the house with the other, kills her and (later) eats her. The children of the murdered woman escape. See motif J52. |
| J52A | 98.47% | A she-bear or bear treacherously kills his companion, neighbour, etc., who is associated with a herbivorous animal or a weaker predator. The victim's children take revenge by killing the murderer's children or flee. See motifs J52, J54. |
| K8C4 | 97.94% | A small animal (bird, mouse, porcupine, fox) or (rarely) a tiny human being allows itself to be swallowed by a large ungulate (elk, deer, bison, tapir) in order to rip open its belly (and eat it). |
| K8C3 | 97.61% | One (zoomorphic) character refuses to use any part of another's body except the one he uses to kill him. |
| H22 | 97.54% | Large game animals did not have a sense of smell. They acquired it and began to flee from hunters after someone created olfactory organs for them or gave them a strong smell to smell. Cf. motif H22A. |
| J53A | 97.45% | A character invites another to play. The latter follows the rules, but the initiator of the game does not and kills the other. |
| K23A | 97.18% | Birds use their feathers as arrows, or falling feathers cover the mouths of their victims. |
| I93 | 97.03% | The Milky Way â the backbone, support, pillar of the sky or world. |
| A5A | 97.01% | The younger brother (usually the Sun) is made from the urine and swaddling clothes of his older brother (usually the Moon), who was kidnapped as a baby. See motif A5. |
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
13 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 13 traditions: Tungus (Evenki): Baikal region, Evenks, Tungus (Evenki) of China (Solon, Birar, Oroqen, Manegir), Evenks, Tungus (Evenki): Russian Far East, Evenks, Western Tungus (Evenki), Western Siberia Tungus (Evenki): Sym River, Ket River, Tillamook, Northern Shoshone, Western Shoshone, Gosiute, Eastern Shoshone, Ute, Ilimpii Tungus/Evenki, Yerbogachen Tungus/Evenki, Tungus/Evenki of Nercha - Chita area
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 Š 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.
Š 2024â2026 Crecganford / Jonathan Fielder-White. All rights reserved.