Yu.E. Berezkin, E.N. Duvakin

Thematic classification and distribution of folklore and mythological motifs by area

Analytical catalogue

Introduction
Bibliography
Ethnicities and habitats

K22aa. Birds in the north are people in the south .16.27.29.

A person enters a country whose inhabitants are birds that live with us in the summer, and when they fly to their homes, they become human beings.

Germans (Rügen Island), Bulgarians, Georgians, Armenians.

Western Europe. Germans (Rügen Island) [for the winter, storks fly south to a distant country, where they take the form of human beings; but they feed on frogs and mice as they do in the north; one captain is caught in a storm, all the others died, he went ashore; asked local people for food, they brought him a dish with frogs and mice; it turned out that these storks were on Rügen in the summer; when the captain returned home, people are talking about that forgot - it was too long ago]: Haas 1903, No. 172:157-158.

The Balkans. Bulgarians [Silyan was married, but he continues to sit back and drink; undertakes to accompany a priest who wants to go to Jerusalem; they were caught in a storm at sea, only S. escaped; finding himself on on the island, regrets how he behaved, remembers his wife Neda, Bosilka's sister, Velko's son; local people know him: they are storks, but when they arrive on their island, they become human; they change their appearance, drenched in a special water; S. agrees to fly with them, becoming a stork and taking with him a bottle of water that turns into a person; but the bottle broke; S.stork lives unrecognized next to his ex-family; his son hit him with a stone in his father tried to drive his head away, broke his leg with a stick; S. returns to the island, flies home again a year later, this time turns into a man; talking about his adventures, he pulls it out of the nest monisto sisters and a ball of his wife's black threads, which he, as a stork, deliberately stole and hid]: Klyagina-Kondratyeva 1951:29-38.

Caucasus - Asia Minor. Georgians (Khevsureti): Virsaladze 1973, No. 64 [(=Chikovani 1985, No. 155:325-326; =1986:492-495; first publication 1961); Hogais Mindy from Amga village is full of Lezgins; there a woman prepares medicine from snake blood; XM wants to commit suicide by licking blood, but licks only a drop, cuts the swelling under his sinuses, lice come out of there, he becomes light, understands the language of all creatures; ran away, saw the ash-sprinkled bridge passed backwards; seeing the tracks, the pursuers stopped chasing; XM came to a village of dwarfs the size of a finger; in the evening they began to carry chips and branches to fortify; They are about to be attacked by flocks of kites, magpies, rooks, cranes; HM took the bow, dispersed the birds; the dwarfs are grateful, one one-eyed says he is the cuckoo XM once knocked out his eye; they are all cuckoos , they turn into birds across the mountain; he leads XM through the ash city to Amga, flies, showing the way; at home, XM understood the language of plants, did not mow hay, did not cut firewood; at his wife's insistence, he cut down a tree, lost knowledge; he was drafted into the army, he was killed], 65 [when Hogais Mindy was born from the Arkhoti Gorge, two suns rose in the sky; dwarf jamni (spirits of diseases) took him and hero Gakhua to the north side of the Caucasus ridges; XM was captured by the Kaji, began to fatten, he ate ash, lost weight; when the child was the watchman, XM walked across the ash-sprinkled bridge, stepping backwards, fled from the Kajas; fell into the country of the Googuli ( cuckoos); one-eyed G. says that as a child, XM knocked out his eye with a stone, although he was the one who brought spring to Arhoti; the cuckoos are attacked by an army of rooks, XM killed the rooks with a stick; he was given snake meat, after insects came out of the abscess, XM became light; the one-eyed Googuli took him home; XM understood the language of animals and plants; but began to kill animals, cut down trees, then stopped understanding; XM was killed by the Vainakhs] : 111-113, 114-118; Armenians [storks in their country have a human appearance; when preparing to fly, they swim in the river and put on feathers; when they return, they climb the mountain and make a sacrifice, they bathe again and become human; every year a stork strangles one chick as a sacrifice to God; one woman forgot her bracelet by the river, did not find it; met a plowman, who called her by name; said that he was a stork who made a stork the nest is in her yard; he hid the bracelet to prevent others from taking it away; with the onset of spring, the stork country's farmers swam in the river, put on wings, gave wings to the woman, turned to storks, flew to our land; if you aim at a crane, it immediately turns into a beautiful woman with a baby in her arms]: Harutyunyan 2007:43-44.