H16. Rivers of tears. 15.24.28.30.-.34.40.-.42.52.55.
There are rivers of tears in the other world. Tears shed on the ground fill large containers there. Cf. motives K33F, N34, N35.
Portuguese, Basques, Toraja, Zoroastrianism, Turkmens, Lithuanians, Udmurts, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Altaians, Shors, Tuvans, Central Yupik, Ingalic, Tlingit, Popoluka, Nahuatl, Lacandons, Colombian quiche, Kogi, mestizos.
Southern Europe. The Portuguese (many records) [the older brother and then the other two go on a journey (or all three go together); or the poor man goes to look for work, gets advice from the host; everyone meets an old lady (St. Virgo), should be kind to her; the owner sends everyone with instructions and instructions (written in the letter): feed the child, do not touch certain objects (do not stop), do not be surprised when strange; older brothers do not comply with the conditions, disappear, die; the younger one does everything right; crosses the bloody river (he is helped by St. Virgo); chooses a blessing rather than the owner's money; envious older brothers bury him alive; he is rewarded, receives explanations for what he has seen; rivers of blood, milk, tears: Christ's blood, milk and tears Mary; orchard - Eden; skinny sheep in fat pastures and vice versa: sinners and righteous; colliding cobblestones: tongues of evil women; a man knocking down mature and unripe figs from a tree: death that takes anyone; woodcutter: cooks firewood to burn souls in hell; paradise palace; man dies (stays in paradise)]: Cardigos 2006, No. 461:112-113; Basques [two witches gather in three waves sink a ship; one wave of milk, another tear, a third of blood; one witch tells another that fishermen will be able to escape only if they throw a harpoon from the middle of the last, i.e. bloody wave; the fisherman overheard This, he threw the harpoon, there was a groan; at home I found my aunt dying, her daughter was terrified; they were witches]: Walter 2008:147-148; Maltese [two brothers leave, the youngest remains with his blind mother; the second brother is hired; he must ride a horse to see where the dog accompanying him stops; must jump across the stream of blood and swim across the river of tears; returns when he sees a prickly a fence; receives a salary and leaves; a younger brother is hired for the same service; he cries when he sees a stream of blood (this is Christ's blood), a river of tears (the tears of the Virgin), and a barbed fence (the Savior's crown of thorns); The dog touches the fence, which opens a passage leading to the garden and palace; in it is Our Lady, she gives the young man two pink beads for him and his mother; he returns to the owner; he explains that two The Moor guards were his brothers in hell, and 300 years have passed since he was hired; the young man returns to his mother, both die]: Mifsud-Chircop 1978, No. 471:124-125.
Malaysia-Indonesia. Eastern torajas [the dead come to the Nail Tree, whose trunk is as thick as a rice barn; leave nail prints on the bark; the older the person is and the larger the animal was sacrificed at his funeral (chicken, pig, buffalo), the higher his print; the tree has a bench on which the deceased sits, so that tears form a pond; when he weeps, he forgets the past so the tree is also called the Tree of Oblivion]: Adriani, Kruyt 1950, No. 38:465.
Central Europe. Ukrainians, Belarusians [A barrel of tears: a mother who cried a lot for her deceased daughter stays in church and sees her daughter carrying a barrel filled with tears on her shoulders]: SUS 1979, NO. 755A: 189.
Iran - Central Asia. Zoroastrianism [Masdaist concept in a late Pahlavi spring; the soul of Arţā Vīrāf leaves his body and visits heaven and hell; the Chinwat Bridge passes, which is being made for him wide; a country of those whose sins and virtues balance each other (they suffer only from cold and heat, waiting for the world to renew); some souls easily cross the river of tears shed for the dead relatives; those for whom they cried too much find it difficult to cross it; then AB sees the torment of sinners]: Carnoy 1964:344-345; Turkmens (Chelken yomudas) [the soul of the deceased visits its home every Friday; sometimes water blocks her way - tears from relatives]: Demidov 1962:196.
Baltoscandia. Lithuanians [nine brothers leave home, the eldest puts a gold ring on his sister Onutte's finger; O. grows up, her mother lets her look for her brothers; the hare asks to take him with him, sits down with her in a cart; laume is swimming in the sea, the name is O., they say that there is a river of milk behind them, and wine is oozing from the shore; the hare explains that it is a river of tears, and blood is pouring from the shore; Laume stretches out his back leg in anger; the same with another laume, she throws the Hare off the cart; the third makes O. swim with her; turns her into a louse, herself into a flea, whoever jumps out of the water first wears beautiful clothes, and the other wears an old one leather; O. puts on clothes, but O. still has the ring; they come to 9 brothers, O. sends them to watch the horses; O. talks about what happened to his skate, the older brother hears it, tells O. wash his hair, sees the ring; O. washes, dresses beautifully; the brothers put a horse in the doorway, smear it with resin, the name is Laume, she sticks with one hand, leg, other, stomach; the horse is whipped, she Laumer-baby story is thrown against a rock, half falls into the water, half on land; so the skull]: Schleicher 1857 in Espinosa 1930:146-148.
Volga - Perm. Udmurts [every day a widow cries at her husband's grave; friends tell her not to cry; her husband comes in a dream, says he cannot sleep because of dampness; the sorcerer explains that she drowns her husband in tears; the woman continues to go to the cemetery; the owner of the cemetery, Azrali, black with glowing eyes, comes out to her, telling her not to go again]: Kelmakov 1978, No. 8:120-121.
Turkestan. Kazakhs [a widow should not cry much; tears should not fall into the ground, because this would be an additional burden (burden) for the deceased; it was also believed that too many tears would turn into a "flood" for the deceased]: Toleubayev 1991:94; Kyrgyz [the soul of the deceased can hear crying, which will suffer from this, tears may turn into a sea on the path of the deceased's soul to paradise and it will not be able to cross this sea of tears]: Bayaliyeva 1972:71.
Southern Siberia - Mongolia. Altaians: Anokhin 1924:3-4 [(also p. 2-3: E. sues the deceased and makes his worker); Erlik's Palace stands at the confluence of nine rivers into one - Toybodym, which flows human tears; a horsehair bridge will stretch across it; if the soul tries to return to our world, the bridge under it breaks off, brings it back to E.; E.'s palace is guarded by the monsters of Jutpalar, their jaws are like big boat] (retelling to Surazakov 1985:50); Dyakonova 1976 [(probably according to Karunovskaya); in Erlik's underworld there is a lake filled with tears of people mourning the dead; a red lake formed from the blood of those killed, suicides and accidentally killed; E. lives in a palace made of black mud or blue iron on the banks of the Toybodym River (out of human tears), over which a horsehair bridge is thrown; he is guarded by tulip monsters; at the palace guards are standing - E. (Elchi)'s servants with a hook (karmak)]: 278-279; Karunovskaya 1935 [the shaman's soul passes the lake of tears shed by relatives for the deceased; the lake of suicide blood, by accident cut, etc.; then a bottomless lake with black water, across which a hair bridge will be thrown]: 177; Nikiforov 1915 [see motif K27; hero Ain-Shain-Shikshirge was sent to Yerlik to bring from him vessels and a fur coat; E. leaves his time on his throne, tells him not to go to the mountain; ASHSH goes, sees lakes of people's tears, a bush made of their hair]: 60; Shors: Dyrenkova 1940, No. 97 [the soul of the deceased two rivers cross; the remaining houses cry; tears from the right eyes form the Kanchul River, from the left eyes the Chashchul], 99 [if relatives shed too many tears, the rivers overflow and the soul cannot cross]: 333, 335; Western Tuvans [Erlik's country had gorges filled with human blood, lakes with tears of those who mourned the dead]: Dyakonova 1976:278-280.
The Arctic. Central Yupik [a young woman is dead; her late grandfather wakes her up, leads her to the land of the dead; they come to the village; in one house an old woman tries to hit her with a stick, drives her away; the grandfather explains that this is a village of dogs; now a woman understands how dogs suffer when they are beaten; finds herself by the river of tears shed on the ground for the dead; straw and garbage float along the river, stop in front of her; therefore She crosses the bridge to the other side; comes to the village of the dead; returns to people with them for a holiday; comes to life because the old woman, her namesake, died in her place]: Nelson 1899:488-490.
Subarctic. Ingalic (Anvik) [a person dies, his soul follows a wide path, from which the narrow souls of various animals leading to villages are distracted; he goes through a village of human souls, then the souls of dogs; there two dog souls guard him, this place is dangerous; he crosses the black river in a boat first out of the sweat of the dead, then through the bright one, from tears shed during mourning; he is sent back, he returns to her body and talks about what he saw]: Nelson in Vanstone 1978:55-56.
NW Coast. Tlingits: Boas 1895, No. XXV/3 [the shaman dies, returns from the afterlife because his mother is very sorry for him; talks about what he saw; by the river he screamed for a long time, no one heard; when he yawned, the dead sent a boat for him; the water in the Gorkaya River is tears shed by wives]: 321-322; Kamensky 1906 [when the relatives of the deceased cry a lot, the soul has to go to the takanka by water, along the tundra ]: 98; Kamenskii 1985 [(in English transcription: da g an k ú)]: 72; Krause 1989 [water in the river on its way to the world of the dead is bitter as bile]: 192.
Mesoamerica Popoluka, Nahuatl [on their way, the souls of the dead must cross the river of blood]: Munch 1983a: 154; lacandons [the soul comes to the river of tears shed by relatives; gives bone to the dog; if a person was kind to a dog during his lifetime, it transports it across a crocodile-infested river]: Boremanse 1986:83; quiche [see J4B motif; Hun-Hun-Ahpu and Wukub-Hun-Ahpu brothers are invited play ball in Xibalba; going down to the lower world, they cross the river of blood and the river of pus, but do not drink from them; at the intersection of red, black, white and yellow roads, they choose black; the same episode with the journey to S. sons of XXA]: Popol Vuh 1959:36, 59; Popol Vuh 1985:105-160.
The Northern Andes. Kogi [the soul comes to the first river, gives its jaw to the dog to be transported to the other side; then comes to the river of tears shed by relatives; waits for it to dry; at the third river meets an old woman; she is the mother of the deceased, but he does not recognize her; she helps to cross if her son or daughter were kind to her]: Reichel-Dolmatoff 1984:66; 1985 (2), No. 19:153; mestizos of Aritama District [souls the dead are met on the way of a river of tears, milk, blood; a black, white, red dog accordingly transports those who were kind to dogs during their lifetime]: Reichel-Dolmatoff, Reichel-Dolmatoff 196:380.