Folklore Database · Browse
Stith Thompson Motif Index
About this index and how to read it
Stith Thompson's Motif-Index of Folk-Literature classifies recurring narrative elements in folktales, myths, legends, ballads and related traditional narratives. Each entry below gives Thompson's motif reference and the description recorded in the index.
The index is large, so this browser displays 250 entries per page. You can search by motif reference or by words in the description, restrict the results to one of Thompson's main letter categories, and click motif references mentioned inside descriptions to follow cross-references. Individual motif pages also show any ATU tale types whose concordance explicitly cites that Thompson reference.
All
A
Mythological Motifs
B
Animal Motifs
C
Motifs of Tabu
D
Magic
E
The Dead
F
Marvels
G
Ogres
H
Tests
J
The Wise and the Foolish
K
Deceptions
L
Reversals of Fortune
M
Ordaining the Future
N
Chance and Fate
P
Society
Q
Rewards and Punishments
R
Captives and Fugitives
S
Unnatural Cruelty
T
Sex
U
The Nature of Life
V
Religion
W
Traits of Character
X
Humor
Z
Miscellaneous Groups of Motifs
| Thompson reference ▲ | Description |
|---|---|
| J2671.2 | Fool keeps repeating his instructions so as to remember them. (He usually forgets them.) *Clouston Noodles 133. |
| J2671.2.1 | Fool's talking to himself thought to be inappropriate greetings. He keeps repeating a word to remember it but changes it so that it seems to refer unfavorably to people whom he meets. India: Thompson-Balys. |
| J2671.3 | Bungling fool forgets what elephant is called. Says it is an "earth egg" (confused with name for potatoes). India: Thompson-Balys. |
| J2671.4 | Foolish messenger muddles message. India: Thompson-Balys. |
| J2672 | The stolen bedcover. A man hears a noise outside the house at night. He wraps a bed cover about him and goes to investigate. The robbers take the bed cover and flee. The wife asks what the debate was about. "About the bed cover. When they got it, the quarrel was over." Wesselski Hodscha Nasreddin I 230 No. 77. |
| J2675 | Bungling rescuer caught by crab. He tries to rescue woman caught by crab. Is caught himself and found in embarrassing position. Wesselski Hodscha Nasreddin I 178 No. 313; Indonesia: Coster-Wijsman 43 No. 44. |
| J2685 | Buyer draws picture of grindstone on his order list. The grocer sends him a cheese. The buyer has forgotten to draw the hole. U.S.: *Baughman. |
| J2700 | The easy problem made hard. |
| J2711 | How the tower was built. Fool gives three explanations: (1) It was formerly a deep well; dug up and set out; (2) it was built by a very tall man; (3) it was built flat on the ground and then set up. *Wesselski Hodscha Nasreddin I 243 No. 27. |
| J2712 | "What do I hold in my hand?" (Ring). "In its first state it was in the mountains; it is round and flat." Fool: "A millstone." Chauvin VIII 170 No. 188. |
| J2712.1 | Guess what I have in my hand and I will give it to you to make egg-cake with. What does it look like? What outside and yellow inside. It is a hollowed turnip filled with carrots. Wesselski Hodscha Nasreddin I 209 No. 15. |
| J2712.2 | Guess how many eggs I have and you shall get all seven. Christensen DF XLVII 214 No. 73. |
| J2713 | The father of Noah's sons. The fool seeks advice as to how to answer this question: Who is the father of Stoffer's three sons? Stoffer, of course. Then who was the father of Noah's three sons? Stoffer. Danish: MS (SK 41 in Dansk Folkemindesamling). |
| J2716 | How to find if it is raining. (Cf. W111.2.4.) |
| J2716.1 | Men must go to look in the pool to see if rain is falling. England: Baughman. |
| J2716.2 | Man put out tubs to see if rain is still falling. England: Baughman. |
| J2721 | Why he couldn't see. One fool to another: "What would happen if you cut off your nose?" "I couldn't smell." "What would happen if you cut off your ears?" "I couldn't see." "Why couldn't you see?" "My hat would fall down over my eyes." U.S.: *Baughman. |
| J2722 | Telling their horses apart. One fool docks the tail of his horse; the horse of the second gets tail caught in gate, is docked too. One notches ear of his horse; the second horse notches its ear on the fence. Finally they measure heights of their horses. The black horse is two inches taller than the white. U.S.: *Baughman. |
| J2751 | Trickster's greed while hunting causes him to be deserted. Jamaica: Beckwith MAFLS XVII 237 No. 7. |
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, Jonathan (2026). The Folklore Database. https://folkloredatabase.com
0009-0006-1672-4451
Please cite the relevant sources, catalogues, and classification systems, including the Folklore Database, Berezkin-Duvakin Catalogue, ATU, Thompson, alongside the page accessed and the last time accessed. Please respect copyright and licenses.
Editorial annotations and database enhancements © Jonathan Fielder-White licensed under CC BY 4.0. Berezkin-Duvakin 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 Jonathan Fielder-White.
© 2024–2026 Crecganford / Jonathan Fielder-White. All rights reserved.