The Mythology and Folklore Database
K138 - Body swap (king and vizier), ATU 678.
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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
A person gains the ability to revive the dead by incarnating in their body. While they remain in it, their own body is dead. Another person takes the body of the first, leaving them with the body of an animal.Berezkin category: Adventures: Acts of heroes
This is of motif type Adventures and tricks and is part group 10, Adventures
K13 has 3 other sub-motifsK13a. The character's leg (rarely: both legs) is cut off, bitten off, torn off, or damaged. The character ascends to the sky: to the moon; becomes the moon; turns into a star or constellation; becomes the sun; blood flowing from the leg colours the sky. K13b. A man crosses a body of water on the back of a caiman. The caiman bites off his leg. The cripple undergoes a metamorphosis, turning into a constellation or an animal. K13c. The cannibal's daughter takes revenge on her husband for her mother's death and manages to cut off his leg. See motif K13A. K13d. A group of boys reaches the sky, the last one's leg is cut off or torn off. Click here if would you like to see a distrbution map combining all of K13's motifs? |
Top 10 Motifs with similar dispersal patterns
| Motif | Similarity | Motif Summary |
|---|---|---|
| F100B | 100.00% | Thanks to her virtue, a woman is capable of doing what others cannot, but she succeeds only after she remembers a minor transgression she committed in her youth. |
| I27D | 100.00% | There is a certain black or red dog that (is associated with objects in the night sky and) negatively affects people's lives. |
| K155C | 100.00% | The father regularly weighs his daughter and learns of her pregnancy when she becomes heavier. |
| M188A | 99.70% | The character demands to be addressed as a ruler (usually sits on a pile of rubbish and demands to be recognised as king). One of the animals exposes him. |
| K109 | 99.65% | The hero is advised to ask supernatural characters for something insignificant (a puppy, a cup) in return for his service. What he receives turns out to be the daughter of a deity. Another character unsuccessfully tries to take the hero's wife away from him. |
| K12A | 99.45% | An unrecognised hero arrives at a place where his bride or wife is to be given to another man or turned into a servant. Contrary to expectations, he manages to draw a tight bow (raise a spear), with which he kills his rivals. |
| N1 | 99.38% | The fabulous and epic texts start from the beginning, which states that today's huge objects were tiny at the time. |
| M91B | 99.27% | A person manages to fraudulently sell or exchange ash for gold and money. Others are unsuccessfully offering ash for sale. |
| B47A | 99.23% | A cow steps on the Pleiades stars lying on the ground, which were demonic creatures. Some of the stars slipped through her split hoof. |
| K38B1 | 99.00% | Every time a mare gives birth to a wonderful foal, a bird carries it away. Setting out in search of the foals, the hero kills the snake that was devouring the bird's chicks. The bird returns the foals. |
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Map of Motif Dispersal
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This motif has been recorded in 12 traditions: Indian literary tradition (Vedic, Brahman, Purana, Indian Buddhism, Hinduism, Ramayana, Mahabharata, Panchtantra, Jatakas); iconography of Hindu temples, Punjabi, Seraiki (Multani), Kashmiri, Marathi (incl. Bhamta; incl. Mumbai area), Hindi-speaking peoples and casts (incl. Teli, Parahiya; incl. Chhattisgarhi) of Northern and West-Central India, Tajik, Persians, Anatolia Turks, Turkmen, Mongols (Khalkha), Central Tibetans (Yu Tsang, incl. Sikkim Tibetans, Tichurong of NW Nepal), Kumaoni (Central Pahari), incl. Garhwali