The Mythology and Folklore Database
J62C - A sister asks her brother to obtain the impossible.




89 Myths, Legends and Folktales
89 Unique Narratives for Motif J62C
44 Cultures & Traditions where J62C is told
147 Mythemes Indexed
4 Sub-Motifs of Motif J62C


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 Motif Summary  -   Motifs with Simlar Dispersals  -    Map of Myth Distribution   -   List of Traditions  -   Myths



Source Data from Berezkin's Analytics Catalogue, if using this data please acknowledge and link to it here:
Ю.Е. Березкин, Е.Н. Дувакин. Тематическая классификация и распределение фольклорно-мифологических мотивов по ареалам. Аналитический каталог.



Summary of Motif

In order to destroy the young man, the antagonist arouses in his sister (rarely: in him himself) a desire to possess wonderful objects, the attempt to obtain which is deadly dangerous. The young man sets off to obtain the objects.

Berezkin category: Avenger heroes: The amerinday cycle

This is of motif type Adventures and tricks and is part group 10, Adventures


J62 has 4 other sub-motifs


J62.  The character turns those who come to him into inanimate objects (usually stones). (In variants of the ATU 303 plot, the motif is often absent; original texts are needed).
J62a.  The character turns those who come to him into plants (trees, flowers). The hero (heroine) remains alive and breaks the spell on those who have been transformed.
J62b.  The character turns those who come to him into animals. Thanks to the hero, they are disenchanted.
J62b1.  A sorceress living on an island turns men into animals.
J62c.  In order to destroy the young man, the antagonist arouses in his sister (rarely: in him himself) a desire to possess wonderful objects, the attempt to obtain which is deadly dangerous. The young man sets off to obtain the objects.

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Top 10 Motifs with similar dispersal patterns

MotifSimilarityMotif Summary
K27R299.83%Task: bring objects (fruit, wood, water, etc.) that perform actions characteristic of humans (sing, dance, yawn, laugh, etc.).
K15799.78%The character lures his opponents out one by one and cuts off each one's head as soon as they appear. Less commonly, a multi-headed opponent sticks out its heads one by one, and the hero cuts them off.
M91C599.64%The person himself or his little son goes to the bazaar to sell a cow (or another large pet). The crook convinces him that it is a sheep (or another animal that is smaller and cheaper). Each of the crook's friends confirms the score or gives an even lower grade. A man at a loss sells a cow for the price of a sheep.
M15399.55%A hoofed animal asks a predator to examine its hoof under various pretexts, and then kills or maims it with a kick.
K33A99.55%Young siblings (most often a brother and sister) leave home. One of them (rarely: several brothers) accidentally breaks a taboo and is transformed into an animal (usually a hoofed animal) or (rarely) a bird; later, the spell is usually broken.
K14799.54%The enemy dismembers the hero's body. The remains are tied to the horse's saddle, or the horse itself picks them up and brings them to friendly characters. They revive the hero.
C30A99.54%A man borrows money on the condition that if he fails to repay it by a certain date, he will have to give the lender a certain amount of his own flesh. The lender cannot cut off the flesh, because he is unable to fulfil the formally logical but essentially absurd demand made of him.
K27G99.51%The character is ordered to bathe in (hot) milk, in boiling water, to jump into the fire; he remains unharmed, while his opponent usually perishes.
K64A99.50%A man blinds a sleeping or immobile giant-cannibal and escapes from him.
J3299.48%Someone regularly steals livestock (horses, sheep, etc.) or crops (apples, hay, peas, flowers, etc.). Those who undertake to guard them (usually the older brothers) fail to catch the thief, and only the hero (usually the younger brother) discovers him.

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Map of Motif Dispersal

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This motif has been recorded in 44 traditions: Ancient Egypt, Egyptian, Aramaic (Syrians), Algeria Arabs, Shan, Ahom, Khampti, Bhuiya (now Aryans, originally Munda; Rahman 1955: 203), Baiga, Bhaina, Bhumia (subgroup of Baiga, incl Bharia, formerly Munda, now speak Indo-Aryan languages of neighboring groups), Bengali, Kashmiri, Hindi-speaking peoples and casts (incl. Teli, Parahiya; incl. Chhattisgarhi) of Northern and West-Central India, England, British, Bretons, Spain, Spaniards, Portuguese, Portugal, Basques, Aragon, Sicily, Sicilians, Sardinia, Corsica, Sardinians, Corsicans, France, Germans: North (Low- and Central German dialects): Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg, Pommern, Niedersachsen (Lower Saxony, incl East Frisia and Oldenburg), Nordrhein-Westfalen, Hessen, Rheinland-Pfalz, Thüringen, Saxony-Anhalt, Sachsen, Brandenburg, Rügen, Czech, Czechs, Hungarians, Greeks (modern), Balkarians, Bulgarians, Balkarians, Romanians, Moldavians, Aromanians, Moldovans, Albanians, Balkarians, Lithuanians, Karelians, Byelarusians, Belarusians, Russians: Central part of ethnic territory as in A.D. 1500 (Tver, Yaroslavl, Moscow, Kostroma, Vladimir, Ivanovo, Nizhny Novgorod, Ryazan, Tula, Kaluga, Smolensk provinces; in case of absence in other areas also Russians in Vyatka, Perm, Kazan provinces), Uzbek, Tajik, Abaza (Abazins), Abkhaz, Abkhazians, Ossetians, Udin, Armenians, Crimean Tatars, Karaims, Gagauz, Anatolia Turks, Azeris (Azerbaijanis), Kurds, Hui (Dungan) of Xinjiang, Gansu, Shaanxi, Shanxi, Inner Mongolia, Qinghai, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan (Dungan texts from Southern and Eastern China are clustered with the Chinese ones), Oirats (incl Torgouts, Derbets, Oilots), Parya of Gissar (Hisor) Valley (Tajikistan), Italians: Central (Toscana, Umbria, Marche, Lazio), Tunisia


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