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Aarne–Thompson–Uther index
About this index and how to read it
The ATU index classifies international folktales by type. Each row gives the type number, its title and summary, followed by the references it inherits: Arne Thompson is the earlier Aarne–Thompson type number, and Thompson lists the motif references from Thompson's Motif-Index of Folk-Literature associated with that type.
Cross-references inside a summary open the relevant tale-type or motif record. Thompson motif references in the final column are linked directly to the corresponding entry in the Stith Thompson Motif Index when that reference exists in the database. Any column heading can be clicked to sort by it, and clicking again reverses the order. Following a type number opens that type on its own page.
| ATU | Title | Summary ▲ | Arne Thompson | Thompson |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1844 | The Parson Visits the Sick | |||
| 327 | The Children and the Ogre | , 3227C, 327, 327A, 327B, 327F, 327G | , G412.1.1., G512.3.2.1.3.2.1., G512.3.2.3.2., G526., G61., G82., G82.1.1.1.1., K1611., K1832., K335.1.2.1.1.2.1., R135., R135.1.1., S321. | |
| 68 | The Jackal Trapped in the Animal Hide | , 68, 68*, 68A | J2131.5.7., J655.2., K1022.1.1., K565.2. | |
| 223 | The Bird and the Jackal | |||
| 411 | The King and the Lamia | |||
| 241 | The Officious Bird and the Monkey | A bird, sitting in its nest during a cold rain, asks shivering monkey why it doesn't build a house since it has hands like a man. The enraged monkey destroys the bird's nest. | ||
| 767 | Food for the Crucifix | A boy offers bread to a statue of Christ or the Virgin [Q172.1]. | 767 | Q172.1. |
| 1832 | Boy answers the priest | A boy rides with a rich man. Goes into church and leaves his coat lying in the sled. Hears the parson preach about the rich man who went to hell. The boy calls out, »Then he took my coat along» [X435.5]. | ||
| 321 | Won Back the Eyes from the Witch | A boy takes service with a blind couple. Warned not to let goats (sheep) wander beyond certain point, he does so and there defeats the witch who has stolen the blind couple's eyes. He restores the eyes. [D2161.3.1.1]. | 321 | D2161.3.1.1.3.1.1. |
| 1294 | Getting the Calf's Head out of the Pot | A calf gets its head caught in the pot. A fool cuts off the calf's head and then breaks the pot to get it out. [J2113]. | 1294 | J2113. |
| 441 | In Enchanted Skin | A childless woman gives birth to a hedgehog [C758.1, T554]. The king unwittingly promises the hedgehog his daughter when the latter shows him the way out of the forest [S226]. The hedgehog takes the bride [B641.5]. His hedgehog's skin is burnt, and… | , 441 | B641.5., C758.1., D721.3., S226., T554. |
| 409 | The Girl in the Form of a Wolf | A childless woman wants a child even if it be an animal: she bears a goat-child (jackdaw). When she sends the goat-child to get water for its father, the goat lays off goat-skin and plays. A prince sees her and sends wooers to her house. The prince… | , 409, 409A | D113.1., D721., Q261., T554. |
| 1533 | The wise carving of the fowl | A clever person divides it symbolically head to head of house, neck to wife, wings to daughters, legs to sons; keeps rest for himself. (Cf. Type 875 II e.) [H601]. | 1533 | NA |
| 1165 | The troll and the christening | A farmer is on friendly terms with a troll whom he does not wish to invite to his child's christening, knowing the troll's appetite. Not wishing to offend him, he sends to invite him; but he is to say that among the guests will be found the Virgin… | 1165 | K1736. |
| 101 | The old dog rescues the child | A farmer plans to kill a faithful old dog. The wolf makes a plan to save the dog. The latter is to rescue the farmer's child from the wolf. The plan succeeds. The wolf in return wants to steal the farmer's sheep. The dog objects and loses the wolf's friendship. | 101 | K231.1.3. |
| 212 | The Lying Goat | A father sends his sons one after the other to pasture the goat. The goat always declares he has had nothing to eat. The father angrily sends his sons from home and learns, when he himself tries to pasture the goat, that he has been deceived. Cf.… | 212 | K1151. |
| 710 | The Black Madonna | A girl comes into possession of her foster mother through an unwitting promise to her father. The girl falsely denies having looked into a forbidden room, and becomes dumb. She becomes the wife of the king... | , 710 | C611., C911., C912., C944., D2025.1., G261., H215., J213., K2116.1.1., N711.1., Q451.3., S211., S240., V271. |
| 1135 | Eye-remedy | A glowing mass is put into his eye [K1011]. Cf. Type 1137. | , 1135 | K1010., K1011. |
| 231 | The Heron (Crane) Transports the Fish | A heron (crane) tells the fish in a lake that is drying up that it will transport them one by one to another lake, but eats them instead. A crab sees through the deception, seizes the heron by the throat and kills it. | 231 | J657.3. |
| 1086 | Jumping into the Ground | A hole already dug and covered with boughs [K17.1]. Cf. Type 1085. | ||
| 1916 | The Breathing Tree | A hunter cuts down a tree packed so full of animal that a crack opens as the animals inhale, closes when they exhale. | 1916 | X1116. |
| 180 | The rebounding bow | A hunter kills several animals but is in turn bitten by a snake. A jackal comes by, nibbles at the hunter's bow, and is killed when the bow rebounds. | ||
| 1556 | The Double Pension (Burial Money) | A husband and wife are jointly under a pension from the king. She reports her husband dead and gets the whole pension. He likewise reports her dead and gets the whole money. [K441.1]. (Sometimes concerned with money for the burial.) (K482.1). | 1556 | K482.1. |
| 1410 | Four Men's Mistress | A husband disguises as a priest to hear his wife's confession. She says that she has been the mistress of a servant, a knight, a fool, and a priest; i.e., her husband when he was her servant, and later her knight. He had then been a fool for… | 1410 | J1545.2. |
| 1418 | The Equivocal Oath | A husband insists that his wife take oath that she has been intimate with no one but himself. The paramour masks as ass-driver. She hires an ass from him, falls down, and lets him pick her up. She swears no one has touched her except the husband and… | 1418 | K1513. |
| 1431 | The contagious yawns | A husband planning to punish his wife, who has yawned in church at the same time as a man, sees his error when his wife in the woods calls out, »The squirrels hop from bough to bough as the yawns from mouth to mouth.» [J1448]. | ||
| 678 | The King Transfers his Soul to a Parrot | A king has learned how to transfer his soul [E725] to dead bodies, as has his vizier or another servant. The king transfers his soul to a parrot and the vizier transfers his soul to the king's body. The queen determines the truth (she hears of wise… | ||
| 1951 | Is Wood Split? | A lazy man asks if wood is split before he accepts it as a gift [W111.5.12]. Sometimes, if rice is cooked. | 1951 | W111.5.10. |
| 1250 | Bringing Water from the Well | A log is laid across the top of the well. One man holds to the log with his hands, the next climbs down and holds to his feet, and so on; the uppermost man becomes tired and lets go to spit on his hands. [J2133.5]. Cf. Type 121. | 1250, 1250A | J2133.5., J2133.6.1. |
| 889 | The Faithful Servant | A lord makes a wager with his neighbor on the faithfulness of his servant [N25]. The servant is sent to the neighbor's house, where he is made drunk, etc. The neighbor loses the wager. Sometimes joined with Type 930 III a. | , 889 | J751.1., N25. |
| 237 | The Parrot That Talked Too Much | A magpie is punished by his master, who throws him into a mud puddle. The magpie sees a muddy sow. He says, "You also must have had a quarrel with your master." | 237 | J2211.2. |
| 428 | The Wolf | A maiden in the service of a witch. Assigned seemingly impossible tasks, among others to deliver to another witch a letter with instructions to kill the maiden. A wolf helps her to escape. The wolf is thereby disenchanted and becomes a prince who… | ||
| 407 | The Flower Girl | A maiden is transformed into a flower [D212]. A man breaks a stalk of the flower and she becomes human again [D711.4]. He takes her as his wife [T101]. Cf. Type 652. | , 407, 407A, 407B | , D212., D711.4., T100. |
| 440 | The Frog King | A maiden promises herself to a frog in a spring. The frog comes to the door, the table, the bed. Turns into a prince. I. Promise to Marry the Frog. (a) To the youngest of three sisters a frog in a spring gives clear water (a ball thrown into the… | , 440 | B211.7.1., C41.2., D789., F875., S215.1. |
| 1558 | Welcome to the Clothes | A man at a banquet is neglected because of his poor clothes. He changes clothes, returns, and is honored. »Feed my clothes,» he says, »for it is they that are welcomed.» [J1561.3]. | 1558 | J1561.3. |
| 2041 | The Bird Indifferent to Pain | A man catches a mango-bird eating mangoes and strikes it against the roots of a mango-tree. The bird cannot be made to say it suffers from the blow. In turn, he puts it in water, strikes it on the ground, a stile, a door-frame, singes its feathers,… | ||
| 1645 | The Man Who Became Rich through a Dream | A man dreams that if he goes to a distant city he will find treasure on a certain bridge. Finding no treasure, he tells his dream to a man who says that he too has dreamed of treasure at certain place. He describes the place, which is the first man's… | , 1645, 1645A | E721., E730., N531.1., N531.3. |
| 1917 | The Stretching and Shrinking Harness | A man driving a team with a wagon in the rain finds on arrival at the top of the hill that the tugs of rawhide have stretched and that the loaded wagon is still at the bottom. He unhitches the horses and throws the harness across a stump. Later when… | ||
| 1545 | The boy with many names | A man gets lodging in a beautiful woman's house. He pretends not to know how to sleep in bed; she must go with him. | 1545, 1545B | K1327., K602. |
| 217 | The Cat and the Candle | A man has a cat trained to hold up lighted candles on its head. The king has a mouse let loose. The cat drops the candle and chases the mouse. (Often used as a method of cheating in a game [N7].) | ||
| 329 | Miss the Magic Mirror | A man hides himself three times (in the belly of the fish, etc.). (Sometimes combined with Types 301 or 313.) I. The Task. (a) A princess (devil) assigns her suitors the task of hiding themselves. (b) She has magic windows that give her magic sight.… | , 329 | D641., H321. |
| 821 | The Devil as Advocate | A man is accused of theft. The devil carries the judge from the court room and thus repays the hospitality of the accused. | 821B | J1191.2. |
| 839 | One Vice Carries Other With It | A man is permitted to choose one of the following vices: theft, incontinence, drink. He chooses the last, which seemed to him least harmful. All the other vices follow in the train of the first. [J485]. | 839 | J485. |
| 1579 | Carrying Wolf, Goat, and Cabbage across Stream | A man is to set across a stream, in a boat that will hold himself and only one other object, a wolf, a goat, and a cabbage. He must do this so that the wolf doesn't eat the goat, nor the goat the cabbage. Two solutions: (1) (a) take goat over, (b)… | 1579 | H506.3. |
| 670 | The Language of Animals | A man learns animal languages. His wife wants to discover his secret. The advice of the cock. Cf. Types 517, 671. I. The Gift of the Snake. A man receives from a grateful snake the power of understanding animal languages. He is not to reveal this… | , 670 | B216., B350., B491.1., C425., N451., N456., T252.2., T253.1. |
| 1228 | Shooting with a Gun | A man looks down the gun-barrel as it is shot [J2131.4.1]. Cf. Type 1158. | ||
| 1807 | The Equivocal Confession | A man makes an equivocal confession to the priest he has robbed, e.g., says that he has saved a man from a bear, (meaning that he stole the priest's furs); asks his confessor for guidance. The priest, misunderstanding the confession, even praises the… | ||
| 1138 | Gilding the Beard | A man named »Such a one» persuades the ogre to have his beard gilded. Covers it with tar, and leaves the ogre caught to the tar-kettle. The ogre with his kettle wanders about and asks everyone »Have you seen such a one?» [K1013.1]. | 1138 | K1013.1. |
| 842 | The Man Who Kicked Aside Riches | A man practices austerities for many years. He asks the god for wealth as a reward and the god signifies that his request is granted. On the way home, the man decides to close his eyes to feel how a blind man feels when he walks. He stumbles against… | ||
| 150 | The Bird's Three Precepts | A man releases a fox (bird) if the latter will give him three counsels: "When you have a fox, don't let him loose." | , 150 | J21.12., J21.13., J21.14., K604. |
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