Analysis of the Worldwide Distribution of the ‘Man or Animal in the Moon’ Motifs

Abstract

For millennia, people have seen a man, an animal, or an object as they look at the moon. The motif of the ‘frog/toad in the Moon’ was recorded in writing in the Book of Changes (I Ching) over 2400 years ago. The ‘man in the Moon’ theme is found in old Norse literature in the Younger Edda. In Mesoamerica, the story of the ‘rabbit in the Moon’ is pre-Columbian. This study analyses the different versions by combining areal studies as well as structural and statistical analyses with information from ancient texts and archaeological artefacts. In particular, I compare the geographic distribution of the main motifs to the 2,278 motifs in Yuri Berezkin’s database. In this context, I report on the observed similarities between the geographic distribution of the ‘man or animal in the Moon’ motifs and the two of the most widespread earth creation myths.