The article examines various versions of the myth of the division of the world among the saints in the South-Balkan folklore. Notwithstanding the diversity in the recorded versions of this myth, the functions of a master of death and of the nether world of souls are attributed to Archangel Michael; the Islamic peoples and communities on the Balkans assign the functions of an angel of death to Israel/Azrael. Many Christian saints have got the power to punish human beings by depriving them of

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... r lives. Usually, in such cases the motif of a committed sin is involved, most often in relation to non-observance of a particular kind of taboo.