This article, based on cognitive dialectology principles, presents the results of research of motivational models for animal naming in Kuban region sub-dialects. It establishes synchronous and diachronous motivational characteristics of dialect zoonyms, which have direction properties and are generally similar to the ones observed in Russian sub-dialects and Common Slavic context. It identifies various motivemes different by their degree of productivity, which include age, color, habitat,

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... made by an animal, its behavioral features, means of getting food, human actions it is exposed to, etc. The article reviews personified folk names of animals and zoonym euphemisms. It demonstrates that the folk etymology can be projected not only in a synchronous plane, but in a diachronous one as well, thus showing the metalinguistic consciousness of linguistically creative sub-dialect carriers who possess some background knowledge. The article demonstrates the ethnocultural features that reflect the unique world view of Kuban sub-dialect carriers, which manifests in peculiar implementation of motivemes in folk naming of animals.