| Motif | Name | Description |
| a12 | Eclipses: monster’s attack | Some creature or creatures regularly (sunrise and sunset, summer and winter, lunar phases) or irregularly (solar and lunar eclipses, eschatological events) attack the luminaries or shade their light |
| a3 | Male sun and female moon | The Moon is female or bisexual, the Sun is male |
| a32 | Figure on lunar disc | A figure or an imprint of some being or object are seen in the Moon. (For statistical analysis motifs A32A – A32J are also included into A32) |
| a32c1 | Predator animal in the Moon | A predator animal (fox, wolf, dog, coyote, jaguar, lion) or its imprint is seen in the Moon |
| a34 | The fox and the Moon | Jackal, coyote, or fox are connected with the Moon (usually with the origin of spots on the lunar disc) |
| b2a | The female earth | The earth is a female person (alone or together with a male person); she is female being or associated with a woman |
| b2d | Marriage of the sky and the earth | The male Sky (the Sun, the Thunder, the creator of the sky) marries the female Earth (or its female creator) or the female Sky marries the male Earth |
| b3a | Primeval waters | Water is the original element, the dry earth appears later |
| b3b | Earth grows big | Original earth was small and later increased in size or the fertile soil grew from a small amount of original substance |
| b40a | Missed opportunity to have horns | Animal who has no horns now had them before or missed opportunity to get them |
| b42 | Cosmic hunt | Certain stars or constellations are interpreted as hunters, their dogs and game that the hunters pursue |
| b42b | Sky hunters pursue an ungulate | In the cosmic hunt tale the game pursued by the hunters is an ungulate (elk, deer, mountain sheep, etc.) |
| b42h | The Belt of Orion is the game, other star is the hunter | The Belt of Orion is the animal or three animals, other star (of the Orion or outside of this constellation) is the hunter |
| b42hh | Orion and the Cosmic Hunt | Constellation of Orion is related to the Cosmic Hunt tale |
| c6 | Valuables brought from the lower world | Persons or animals dive or otherwise decend to the lower world to get a desired object and to bring it to earth (besides episodes in the fairytales, cf. motif k27x9) |
| c6a | The diver is turtle or frog | A turtle or a frog (toad) brings the desired object from the bottom of the water body or from the lower world |
| c6c | The diver is a bird | An aquatic bird dives and brings the desired object from the bottom |
| c6d | The aquisition of the earth from the lower world | The dry land (the earth) grows from a small amount of solid substance (sand, clay, dirt and the like) brought from the lower world (usually from the bottom of the ocean) |
| d4q | Fly obtains fire | Fly(-woman) obtains fire by "washing" her hands like a fire-drill twirler |
| e32 | People born from trees | First people are born by trees or come out of a tree, flower, reed |
| e5a | Mankind ascends from the underworld | The first people (or only the first men or the first women) are not created but come to earth from the underworld (from a cave) or from a small enclosure under the earth or on its surface (tree trunk, rock, gourd, etc.). Many people of both sexes and of different ages or people and different species of animals come out together |
| f34b | The paramour is not a human being | A girl (a woman, a group of women) intentionally takes a penis-being, a snake, an eel, a lizard, a worm, a big water animal or water monster or a big terrestrial mammal for paramour. People kill or maim the paramour, the woman and/or her progeny or she is transformed herself into an animal. She is blamed for her behavior |
| f40b | A man in a village of women | A man gets into the village of women. Usually he has to satisfy every woman against his will or every woman claims him for herself |
| f42 | The men abandon the women | The men feel themselves offended by the women and abandon them |
| f44 | Women and men separate | The women and the men of the primeval community quarrel and abandon each other |
| g6 | Primeval tree | One of the trees is the principal, original one (emerged before all the other; ancestor of wild or cultivated plants; ocean or rivers inside it; world axis; higher than all the others; overshadows sky) |
| h12 | The alive person comes to the land of the dead after somebody’s death | The alive person comes to the land of the dead to bring back somebody who has recently died (besides stories about shamans who journey to the other world to bring back the soul of a sick person) or, having no particular aim, goes there in company of somebody who had recently died or following his or her tracks |
| h2 | The selfish animal | Animals ask God to make people mortal because people would be too numerous and step on the animals, deprive them of their food and habitat, or because the animals want to feast on the human corpses |
| h36gg | Death and the coyote | Coyote is responsible for introduction of permanent death |
| i103 | The dog star | Sirius is associated with a dog or a wolf |
| i42 | Rainbow is a pair of creatures | Rainbow is two creatures or persons, usually a male and a female |
| i55 | Stars are openings | Stars are openings in the firmament; holes in dwelling's covering are thought to be stars |
| i69 | Star dung | Shining sky objects or atmospheric phenomena are excrements of sky dwellers |
| i9 | Colors of the cardinal directions | Four cardinal directions and/or some objects associated with them are associated with different colors |
| k27 (motif is not in the correlation table) | Competitions and difficult tasks | Person is suggested to fulfill tasks that are mortally dangerous or cannot be fulfilled without supernatural helpers or capacities. The person fulfills the tasks and remains alive. A contest between persons has form of a competition or game in which the loser is deprived of his status or life |
| k27n | Difficult tasks of the in-laws | A man must fulfill difficult tasks (to win competition) to receive the permission for a marriage |
| k27n3a | Task-giver is the Sun, Moon, Thunder, or Wind | Person who gives difficult tasks to the hero is associated with the Sun, Moon, Thunder, or Wind (Cloud, Rain) |
| l19a | Beings with even number of heads | Beings (any besides birds) with even but not more than ten number of heads are described in tales or represented in art. Beings that with even number of heads named in a row with other multi-headed beings and the highest number is even or bigger than ten are not considered |
| m151a | Holding up the rock | (Animal) person pretends to hold up a rock, tree etc. and explains that otherwise it will fall |
| m29b | Trickster-fox, jackal or coyote | In episodes related to deception, absurd, obscene or anti-social behavior the protagonist is fox, jackal or coyote |
| m41 | The eye-juggler | Person plays throwing his eyes or (Alaska Athabascans) his tooth up or away. Eyes or tooth first come back to eye sockets or mouth but eventually are lost |
| m42 | Eyes: taken out of orbits and lost | Person loses his eyes because of his playfulness or negligence. He makes new eyes of some substance or/and takes eyes of another person |
| m42b | Eyes of gum | Person loses his eyes, makes new ones of gum and is able to see again (though usually not well) |