μῦθοι Mythoi
Motif

Bodies of water from tears. (Cf. A901, A920.1.5, A941.2, A1012.)

Mythological motifs. · Topographical features of the earth. · Water features. · Origin of water features – general. · view the constellation · filed as A911

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On our shelf — the index’s citations, resolved to served chapters
The motif on our shelf — written from the served texts; every claim cited  receipt

After Aino drowns rather than wed old Wainamoinen, her mother’s grief turns hydrological. The mother who confesses she “Drove away my lovely Aino” weeps tears that run down face, bosom, garment, and shoe to the ground [The Kalevala, Rune IV]. The text is exact about what they become: “Form they streamlets three in number, / And their source, the mother’s eyelids”; each streamlet, “larger growing, / Soon becomes a rushing torrent”, and “In each rushing, roaring torrent, / There a cataract is foaming” [ibid.]. The waters keep building landscape: “Rise three pillared rocks in grandeur”, hillocks on the rocks, birches on the hillocks, and on each birch a golden cuckoo — calls of love, of suitor, of consolation — the last singing “For the broken-hearted mother” all its life [ibid.]. The rune even draws its own moral: “Never urge unwilling daughters” [ibid.]. Rivers, cataracts, and crags from one woman’s weeping — the geography of grief, mapped stream by stream. Thompson’s Irish, Nebraska, and Upoto authorities for water-from-tears are parsed but unwired; the Finnish page is the only witness served, and it is complete.

Witnesses: The Kalevala, Rune IV

Scholars’ trail — 4references

The index’s own references — the collections where scholars sighted this story-shape, tradition by tradition. Titles on our shelf are live links; the rest is the frontier, not yet shelved.

Within the index

Filed under Origin of water features – general.

Filed beside it
Waters created on first day of creationWaters created as punishmentBodies of water in primitive abyss sinkBodies of water remnant of floodWaters created by divine twinsOrigin of tidesMountains push water westwardWhy waters do not engulf the earthQuarrel between earth and watersMale and female waters
Travels with
Flood from fluids of the bodyTopographical features caused by experiences of primitive hero (demigod, deity). Footprints of the gods, thoroughfares of heroes, etcLakes originate from tears. (Cf. A901, A911.)Springs originate from tears. (Cf. A901, A911.)
Keeps company with — shares receipted episodes
Refuge on rock in sea

wander