μῦθοι Mythoi
Motif

Stronger and Strongest. The frost-bitten foot. Mouse perforates wall, wall resists wind, wind dissolves cloud, cloud covers sun, sun thaws frost, frost breaks foot.

Miscellaneous groups of motifs. · Formulas. · Cumulative tales. · Chains with interdependent members. · view the constellation · filed as Z42

Filed across the traditions
  • Africa (Ekoi) Talbot 384, (Zanzibar): Bateman 67 No. 5.
  • general *Taylor JAFL XLVI 84 No. 2031, Hdwb. d. Märchens II 182ff.
  • general **DeCock Volkssage 22–36
  • general BP I 148 n. 2
  • general Haavio FFC LXXXVIII 20
  • general Köhler-Bolte II 47
  • general Stiefel Zs. f. Vksk. V 448–50
  • general Benfey Panchatantra I 373–78, II 264
  • general Chauvin II 97f.
  • general DeVries Volksverhalen I 1–3 No. 1, 356
  • general Voorhoeve 166 No. 176
  • general Clouston Tales I 309. – India: Thompson-Balys
Within the index

Filed under Chains with interdependent members.

3 finer motifs beneath it
The Esdras chain: stronger and strongest, wine, king, woman, truth Abraham learns to worship God. At nightfall Abraham worships a star, then the moon, then the sun, and finally gives up idolatry Brahmin worships idol and sets sacrifices before it daily. Rat devours offerings and he sets it up as his idol as a being more powerful than his idol. When cat devours rat, he worships it instead. His wife accidentally kills the cat, so he sets her up to worship. He happens to slap her and she loses consciousness. Thereafter he worships himself as most powerful after all
Filed beside it
The old woman and her pig. Her pig will not jump over the stile so that she can go home. She appeals in vain for help until the cow gives her milk. The final formula is: cow give milk for cat; cat kill rat; rat gnaw rope; rope hang butcher; butcher kill ox; ox drink water; water quench fire; fire burn stick; stick beat dog; dog bite pig; pig jump over stile. (Various introductions.) The cock's whiskers. A mouse throws a nut down and hits the cock on the head. He also steals the cock's whiskers. The cock goes to get an old woman to cure him. The final formula is: Fountain give up water for forest, forest give up wood for baker, baker give up bread for dog, dog give up hairs to cure the cock. (Variant: mouse loses tail.) The house that Jack built. Final formula: This is the farmer that sowed the corn that fed the cock that crowed in the morn, that waked the priest all shaven and shorn, that married the man all tattered and torn, that kissed the maiden all forlorn, that milked the cow with a crumpled horn, that tossed the dog, that worried the cat, that caught the rat, that ate the malt that lay in the house that Jack built The Horseshoe Nail. For want of a nail the shoe was lost, for want of a shoe the horse was lost, for the want of a horse the rider was lost .... and all for the want of a horseshoe nail The climax of horrors. The magpie is dead? – Overate on horseflesh. – Horses dead? – Overworked at fire. – House burned down? – etc Series of trick exchanges Miscellaneous interdependent chains
Carried in tale types

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