μῦθοι Mythoi
Motif

Animal as guard of person or house.

Animals. · Friendly animals. · Services of helpful animals. · Animals serve men. · view the constellation · filed as B576.1

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“Then they exchanged arrows, the Sun giving him four arrows of his own. The points of these arrows were made of coal." Now the young man began to climb the mountain. When he came up to the goats, he took one of the arrows, aimed it, and shot. It struck the animals, but fell down without killing it. The same happened with the other arrows. When he had spent all his arrows, they rushed up to him from the four sides, intending to kill him.”

— Tales of the North American Indians, Tale 39 · served from our shelf  receiptuncorrected OCR — being verified against the scan

Attested across traditions
In our texts — keyword-matched, unreviewed
Scholars’ trail — 12references

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.

  • Irish mythCross
  • Missouri FrenchCarrière
  • EnglishWells 60 (Syre Gawene and the Carle of Carelyle). Jewish: Neuman
  • India*Thompson-Balys
  • Buddhist mythMalalasekera II 704 (elephant)
  • HawaiiBeckwith Myth 24 (bird), 129 (shark), 84, 349 (dog). – N. Am. Indian: *Thompson Tales 308 n. 113c. – Jamaica: Beckwith MAFLS XVII 273 No. 86
  • Africa (Hottentot)Bleek 55 No 28.
  • general Rösch FFC LXXVII 107 (Type 516)
  • general *Fb "bjørn" IV 42a, "løve" II 518
  • general Chauvin VI 6 No. 182
  • general *Loomis White Magic 63
  • general Dickson Valentine and Orson 198
Within the index

Filed under Animal as guard.

2 finer motifs beneath it
Guardian animals evadedRobbers frightened by grateful dog
Filed beside it
Animals guard treasureAnimal as herdsmanAnimal guards master's dead bodyAnimal as guard of shop
Travels with
Cat and dog as guards of imprisoned beauty. (Cf. B576.1.)
Keeps company with — shares receipted episodes
Sun father-in-lawAnimal bribed with food. (Sop to Cerberus.)Guardian animals evadedTransformation: man to featherProtean beggar: Person assumes successive forms in order to begTransformation combat. Fight between contestants who strive to outdo each other in successive transformationsTransformation to reach difficult placeTransformation to escape difficult situationTransformation to receive foodBurning magically evaded. (Cf. D1656.)Resuscitation by arrangement of members. Parts of a dismembered corpse are brought together and resuscitation follows. (Sometimes combined with other methods.)Resuscitated eaten animal. (Cf. E171.) An animal is eaten. When his bones are reassembled he revives

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