Berezkin Analytical Catalogue · Motif
M81A — Vivid female ducks
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
OverviewThe hero meets two blind women and makes them sighted. These women are birds (geese, ducks, hazel grouses, partridges).
Berezkin category: Adventures: Tricks and episodes
This is of motif type Cosmology and etiology and is part of group 7, Etiology of plants and animals and of their peculiar features, particular animals as protagonists of cosmological stories, metamorphoses, weather and calendar.
M81 has 8 other sub-motifs
RelatedM81. Wandering, the hero finds himself in a place where blind or blind (two or more) live.
M81a. The hero meets two blind women and makes them sighted. These women are birds (geese, ducks, hazel grouses, partridges).
M81b. The character is warned not to try to reach an arrow if it gets stuck in a tree. He breaks the ban and gets into trouble.
M81c. A person goes to heaven or (rarely) to the lower world, where he meets blind people (one or two), usually makes them sighted, and returns to earth himself.
M81d. A person meets (most often in the sky) one or two blind people and restores their sight.
M81e. young man undertakes to herd cattle and is warned not to cross the borders of a giant, dragon, witch, etc. The young man violates the ban and kills a giant.
M81e1. A young man lives with an old man whose eyes or eyes were carried away by a giant. The young man goes to the giant, kills him, brings his eyes, the old man sees the light.
M81e2. By playing an instrument or otherwise, a character is able to attract an animal or person far away from him.
M81f. blind beggar robs an honest man. He watches him and, when he enters the house, takes everything the blind man has accumulated. He often takes money accumulated by other blind people as well.
Top 10 motifs with similar dispersal patterns
Phylogeny| Motif | Similarity | Motif summary |
|---|---|---|
| M122 | 100.00% | In a difficult situation, the character asks for advice from his tail, penis, or some creatures in his stomach (these are excrement, intestinal parasites, his "sisters," etc.). |
| K25C | 99.98% | While digging roots, gathering shellfish, etc., a woman finds a baby. He grows up and enters into a struggle with dangerous characters. |
| D4K | 99.87% | The deer obtains fire for humans. See motif D4A. |
| M29R | 99.77% | See the motives in square brackets. |
| M59A | 99.75% | After asking a large animal to transport it across the river, a porcupine kills or damages it. See M59 motif. |
| J23A | 99.72% | A woman cries, and the discharge from her nose (her tears) turns into a boy, who grows up and defeats strong opponents. |
| K50 | 99.63% | A man approaches the enemy disguised as a woman and kills him at night (usually cutting off his head and taking it with him). |
| A5A | 99.59% | 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. |
| B107 | 99.59% | During the (world) fire, the oyster burns, which is why oyster shells are black. |
| B28B | 99.59% | The inhabitants of the area where the hero finds himself are afraid of creatures that are tools, utensils, and plants that are now harmless. The hero easily defeats these creatures and usually transforms them into what they are now. |
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
12 recordedThis motif has been recorded in 12 traditions: Inland Tlingit, Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, Heiltsuk (Bellabella), Oowekeeno, Kwakiutl (Kwakwaka'wakw), Nootka (Nu-chah-nulth), Makah, Carrier, Thompson (Nlaka'pamux), Lillooet, Comox, Pentlatch, Oregon Athabaskans: Lower Umpqua, Tututni (incl Joshua), Upper Coquille, Galice, Tolowa
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