Motifs

There are 133 motifs recorded in the database

• (Threat of) bodily mutilation
• Accidental death
• Adultery
• Age versus youth
• Animal tale
  • Bird
  • Boar
  • Lion
  • Monkey
  • Rabbit
  • Rooster
  • Serpent
  • Swan
  • Weasel
• Arranged marriage
• Assassination
• Bathing
• Beating
• Beheading
• Biblical narrative
• Blindness
• Blood
• Bodily transformation
• Body fluids
• Cannibalism
• Caves and underground spaces
• Chastity
• Childbirth
• Children
• Christianity
• Clothes
• Conversion to Christianity
• Court of law
• Cross dressing
  • Cross dressing: man in women’s clothes
  • Cross dressing: woman in men’s clothes
• Death of husband
• Death of lover
• Death of son
• Debt
• Deception
  • Deceitful advisor
  • Deceitful lover
  • Deceitful old man
  • Deceitful old woman
  • Deceitful son
  • Deceitful woman
  • Deception of would-be lover
• Disguise
• Disposal of corpse
• Dog
• Dreams
• Dwarf
• Dynastic marriage
• Elephant
• Evidence
• Failed/rejected seduction
• False evidence of unchastity/criminality
• False evidence of virtue
• Familial duty
• Familial relationships
• Father/daughter relationships
• Father/son relationships
• Fish
• Food and drink
• Fox
• Fratricide
• Friendship
• Gender play
• Genitalia
• Grief
• Gullible (would-be) lover
• Gullible husband
• Homosexuality
• Humiliation
• Hunchback
• Identification object
• Identity object
• Illegitimacy
• Illness
• Impossible conditions
• Impotence anxiety
• Imprisonment
• Islam
• Islamophobia
• Judgement
• Lecherous old man
• Lesson: flattery
• Lesson: greed
• Lesson: haste
• Lesson: loyalty
• Lesson: women’s cleverness and deceit
• Magic
• Magical beings (spirits, demons, djinn, witches)
• Marriage
• Medicine
• Member of Clergy
• Military conflict
• Mistaken or concealed identity
• Money in exchange for promise of sex
• Mother/daughter relationships
• Mother/son relationships
• Multiple lovers
• Murder
• Nature tale: tree
• Necklace
• Old woman
• Old woman as go-between
• Orientalised setting
• Overheard secret
• Patricide
• Person concealed within a chest
• Poison
• Pregnancy
• Punishment for theft
• Rape
• Religious conflict
• Revenge
• Riches
• Ring
• Sex change
• Slander: wife falsely accused
• Suicide
• Sword
• Talking bird
• Theft
• Unjust execution
• Violent punishment
• Wicked stepmother/mother-in-law
• Wise child
• Wise old man
• Wise old woman
• Woman tricked/coerced into sex