83 motifs match “words”  ·  back to the chapters

• Angels created from words uttered by God. A52.0.6
• God's words. A139.6
• Why Saora wave axes and swords and shout while dancing. A1689.4
• Disenchantment by speaking proper words. D789.6.1
• Love charm (words). (Cf. D1273.) D1355.18
• Magic power of dying man's words. D1715
• Wild hunt heralded by clash of swords. E501.13.1.3
• Words uttered from the tomb. E545.0.1
• Mountain-spirit teaches hero swordsmanship. F460.4.2.3
• Skull has words miraculously written on it. F559.4.1
• Strong hero tests weapons. Breaks first swords. F611.3.3
• Skillful marksman throws swords and scabbards so that swords are sheathed in air. F661.7.2
• Skillful fencer (swordsman). F667
• Expert swordsman cuts clothes bag in two. (Cf. F611.3.3.1) F667.3
• Man can lengthen swords by twirling them between his fingers. F679.2
• Words of Decalogue legible on both sides. F883.1.3
• Waters react to words of poet. F996
• Words heard though only thought and not uttered. F1099.3
• Female ogre seduces men with charm (words). G264.3
• Words of religious comfort cause devil and his crew to vanish. G303.16.4
• Devil writes down all idle words spoken in church. His parchment is not long enough and he has to stretch it. G303.24.1.6
• Act of truth. Person asserts a thing as true declaring: "If my words are true, may this or that happen." H252
• Test of cleverness: uttering three wise words. Youths called on to do so display by their answers extraordinary powers of deduction. H505
• Suitors receive enigmatic answers. Girls answer in single words, which, when arranged in certain order, show that they accept. H593
• Riddle: what are the two combatants without hands or feet or words? (The bull and the buffalo.) H861
• Quest to lower world for lost words. H1276
• Quest for unknown magic words. Hero seeks them on the heads of swallows, the necks of swans, the backs of geese, and the tongues of reindeer. H1382.1
• "Consider the end": counsel proved wise by experience. Barber hired to cut king's throat sees on the bottom of the basin the words "Whatever you do, do wisely and think of the consequences." He drops the razor and confesses. J21.1
• Wise words of dying father. Counsel proved wise by experience. J154
• Wise words of father. J154.0.1
• Wise words of dying woman (queen). (Cf. J154.) J155.6
• Among many vain words may be found some of wisdom. J263
• Cotton put in ears so as not to hear abusive words. J672.2
• Ruler angered by evil spoken of him is placated by soft words of speakers. J811.4
• King brought to sense of duty by woman's words. Drunken king sentences unjustly. Woman asks to appear before the king before he has dined. Her case is retried. J816.3
• Catching by words. J1521.5
• Poor girl outwits prince in fright-contest. He frightens her and later mocks her with her words of fright. She plays the same trick on him. J1525
• The good words. A man pledged to give his wife only good words hits her with a prayer book. J1541.1
• Singer repaid with promise of reward: words for words. J1551.3
• Reinforcement of the request for alms. A clown asks for alms and receives nothing. He then throws pellets made of herbs at the steward, saying that there is great power in words, herbs, and stones: he has tried two of them and plans to try the third. He is given alms. J1581.2
• Tidings brought to the king: You said it, not I. The messenger arranges it so that the king says the words in the form of a question. J1675.2.1
• Poet uses words which student cannot understand and so confounds him. (Cf. J1803.) J1684
• Words in a foreign language thought to be insults. J1802
• Learned words misunderstood by uneducated. J1803
• Other misunderstandings of words. J1805
• Similar sounding words mistaken for each other. J1805.1
• Bird protruding from king's stomach cut out with swords: king killed. J1842.3
• Preliminary drawing of swords. Travelers say they will not have time to do so when attacked. J2255
• Numskull believes that he is married to a man. Two men's hands joined in fun with words "I marry you." Fool thinks that he must get a bishop to annul the marriage. J2323
• What should I have done (said)? The mother teaches the boy (the man his wife) what he should say (do) in this or that circumstance. He uses the words in the most impossible cases and is always punished. J2461
• Religious words or exercises interpreted with absurd literalness. J2495
• The imitative choir. Minister tells congregation that he has forgotten his spectacles, that he cannot line out the hymn as he customarily did. The choir sings his words. He tries to explain, apologizes. The choir repeats the apology in song. J2498.1
• Priest's words repeated. Man sent to priest for religious service to repeat priest's words. Keeps repeating "Who are you?" "Where do you come from?" J2498.2
• Parrot knowing only two words sold as speaking foreign language. K137.2
• Devil is cheated by giving him task: counting the letters in the church Bible. He is unable to read the holy words. K211.1
• The priest made sick of his bargain: three words at the grave. A poor man in return for a steer gets permission from the priest to speak three words at the burial of his enemy, the rich man. Priest: "From earth are you come." Man: "Now the steer is dead." Priest: "In earth shall you remain." Man: "Father, do you want the meat?" Priest: "I wish you were in hell!" etc. K262
• Victim lured by kind words approaches trickster and is killed. K815
• Dogs listen to wolves' hypocritical words. Are killed. K815.3
• Boat lured to land with kind words and wrecked in order to take vengeance on the men. K815.12
• Fish, lured by kind words, are killed by old man. K815.14.1
• Casual words uttered by dupe used to cheat him of his property. A miser is persuaded by his servant to fast nine days. He calls out on the fifth day "the half" and on the ninth "the whole". She makes people believe that he is making his will and giving everything to her. It is so ordered. K1155
• Princess made to speak desired words when hero threatens to report (falsely) her amorous conduct. K1271.1.2
• Sham parson repeats same expression over and over or says a few words of Latin. K1961.1.2
• Peasant has kind words for daws, but drives them from his seeds. K2090.1
• Saint uses kind words to pagan priest who has just smitten a Christian. This causes pagan to repent. Conversion follows. L350.2
• Curse: when brothers' swords bite the very best, they will all be killed by a single man. M441.1.1
• The sun brings all to light. The murderer repeats as he sees the rays of the sun, the last words of the dying man, thus betraying the crime. N271.1
• Criminal in church mistakes words of service as accusation. (Cf. Type 1833.) N275.5
• Numskull's outcry overawes tiger who is carrying him on his back. Tiger thinks that words are the name of the "demon" riding him. N691.1
• Punishment: choking with smoke. This given a lawyer who has "sold smoke", i.e., idle words. Q469.5
• Forgotten fiancée sends lover false diamond inscribed with Christ's last words: "Oh Lord why hast Thou forsaken me?" Lover returns. (Cf. D2003.) T56.3
• Strength in words, in herbs, and in stones. When first two do not cure shrewish wife, the last does. (Cf. J1563.6, J1581.2, J2412.5.) T251.5
• Religious exercises weighed in balance. A son doubts whether the words spoken by the priests to whom his father has willed a sum of money is worth so much. The words are put on paper and are found to outweigh the money. V4.1
• Negligent priests buried under bags filled with words omitted from service. V5.2
• "Ave" on the tongue. Because of faithfulness in saying "Aves" the words are found imprinted on the dead man's tongue. (Cf. V86.2.) V254.3
• "He that asks shall receive." Hermit wants to prove truth of these words of the Gospel and asks for the hand of the princess. Performs the difficult task imposed upon him. V316.1
• Pagan disputant with Christian bested by the words put in his mouth by God. V352.1
• Insult worse than wound. The lion to the man: "The wound has healed, but the pain of harsh words still remains." W185.6
• Misunderstood words lead to comic results. In some the people are not really deaf but fail to catch a word; in some they are deaf. X111.7
• The boy applies the sermon. Makes a present application of the words of the parson. X435
• Lie: words freeze. X1623.2
• Lie: frozen words thaw out in the spring. X1623.2.1
• The death of the little hen described with unusual words. Each act of mourning described by a neologism: the table untables itself. (Cf. X1506.) Z32.2.1