The Mythology and Folklore Database
B36 - Living beings acquire their appearance.
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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
Birds, fish, and four-legged animals deliberately or accidentally smear themselves with colouring substances or divide parts of another's body among themselves, thereby acquiring their current appearance.Berezkin category: The Origins of the Characteristics of the environment
This is of motif type Cosmology and etiology and is part group 7, Etiology of plants and animals and of their peculiar features, particular animals as protagonists of cosmological stories, metamorphoses, weather and calendar
B36 has 3 other sub-motifsB36. Birds, fish, and four-legged animals deliberately or accidentally smear themselves with colouring substances or divide parts of another's body among themselves, thereby acquiring their current appearance. B36a. Two zoomorphic characters adorn each other, after which one is satisfied with the result and the other is not. B36b. Birds find their voices by pecking at a large reptile and smearing themselves with the fluids that flow out of its body. B36c. Animals receive meat and fat rendered from a certain creature or obtained in some other way. Some received a lot, others remained thin. Click here if would you like to see a distrbution map combining all of B36's motifs? |
Top 10 Motifs with similar dispersal patterns
| Motif | Similarity | Motif Summary |
|---|---|---|
| B36A | 99.14% | Two zoomorphic characters adorn each other, after which one is satisfied with the result and the other is not. |
| F47B | 98.86% | In order to create new people (new women) to replace those who have been destroyed, the character leaves something (feathers or pieces of flesh) in each empty hut (in the hearth, in the hammock, in the village), from which new people (new women) appear. |
| F43 | 98.24% | The women of the community of the first ancestors kill or abandon the men. |
| L36 | 98.18% | At the moment when the husband climbs or descends from a tree, his wife (or her brother) kills or maims him or turns into a demon that pursues him. |
| C9A | 98.17% | During the flood or when crossing a river, those who drowned or were saved turn into aquatic or amphibious animals. |
| M14A | 97.90% | To take revenge on his wife or her relatives for (allegedly) causing him offence, the husband roasts his wife alive. See motif M14. |
| E13A | 97.84% | Sacred knowledge, objects and rituals were first obtained by humans from the inhabitants of the underwater world. |
| M35 | 97.74% | Two zoomorphic characters compete to see which of them will spend the whole night in the cold and stay alive. By morning, one of them dies. Cf. K27A motif (the cold test does not involve a two-animal competition). |
| H24F | 97.72% | The character has the ability to put a large amount of meat or fish into a bag or container that is easy to carry. |
| M70 | 97.47% | The oldest character poisons the youngest with his intestinal gases. |
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Map of Motif Dispersal
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This motif has been recorded in 56 traditions: Southern Vanuatu: Tanna, Aneiteum (Polynesian component not included), Eromanga, Tikopia, Bellona, Rennell, partly Aneytium, Futuna (=Erronan, not to be mixed with Futuna in Western Polynesia), Vaeaka-Taumato, incl Matema, Nifeloli, Nukapu, Nupani, Pileni, Maori, Moriori (Chatam Islands), Batak (Toba, Dairi), Chin-Naga: Ao, Mao, Sema, Zeme, Kolren, Kom, Lhota, Rengma, Angami, Kabui, Tangkhul, Koirenf, Iranian literary tradition (including Avesta, Pahlevi scripts, Sah-nameh, Marzban-nameh); Zoroastrians of Iran, Indian Parsees, Zoroastrianism, Nootka (Nu-chah-nulth), Makah, Lenape (Delaware), Micmac, Western Ojibwa (Chippewa), Montagnais, Menominee, Sauk (Sak, Mesquakie), Fox, Kickapoo, Five Nations Iroquois (Seneca, Mohawk, Onondaga, Oneida, Cayuga), Plains Ojibwa, Shuswap, Quileute, Chemakum (Hoh), Quinault, Shasta; Chimariko, Karok, Yurok, Yana, Guajiro, Sanema, Yanomamo (Yanoama): Yanomam, Yanomami, Waiwai, Trio, Hixkariyana, Akawai, Maue (Mawe), Urubu (Urubu-Kaapor), Aimara, Amuesha, Machiguenga, Shipibo, Conibo, Setebo, Cashibo, Chacobo, Ese’ejja, Parintintin; Villa Bella (tribal affiliation unknown), Mundurucu, Curuaia, Kamayura, Rikbaktsa, Kayabi, Nambikwara, Paresi, Sanapana, Lengua (incl Angaite), Mocovi; Kechua of Santiago del Estero with probable Guaikuruan substratum; Abipon, Vilela, Ayoreo, Chamacoco (Ishir), Mataco, Chorote, Caduveo, Mbaya, Manao, Katawishi (Teffe lake); groups of uncertain affiliation mostly from Rio Jamunda, Biloxi, Matses (Mayoruna)