Myths Sentence Examples

Andre had another idea, one that might increase the chances of success, based on ancient myths from the time-before-time.

Unlike Indra, Varuna has no myths related of him.

The world had never quite forgotten the history of the primitive Greeks as it had forgotten the Mesopotamians, the Himyaritic nations and the Hittites; but it remembered their deeds only in the form of poetical myths and traditions.

According to him, the myths arose from definite local (especially atmospheric and aquatic) phenomena, and represented the annually recurring processes of nature as the acts of gods and heroes; thus, in Achill (1853), the Trojan War is the winter conflict of the elements in that district.

Portrayed in hymns and myths as a god of war and pestilence, there can be little doubt that Nergal represents the sun of noontime and of the summer solstice which brings destruction to mankind.

These deities are not easily ' One of the most important sources for the ancient Mexican traditions and myths is the so-called " Codex Chimalpopoca," a manuscript in the Mexican language discovered by the Abbe analysed, but on the other hand Tonatiuh and Metztli, the sun and moon, stand out distinctly as nature gods, and the traveller still sees in the huge adobe pyramids of Teotihuacan, with their sides oriented to the four quarters, an evidence of the importance of their worship. The war-god Huitzilopochtli was the real head of the Aztec pantheon; his idol remains in Mexico, a huge block of basalt on which is sculptured on the one side his hideous personage, adorned with the humming-bird feathers on the left hand which signify his name, while the not less frightful war-goddess Teoyaomiqui, or " divine wardeath," occupies the other side.

Im Neuen dos Alte (1837), which contains his theory of the origin and explanation of the Greek myths, which he never abandoned, in spite of the attacks to which it was subjected.

In Egypt too the systematizers were busily engaged in the co-ordination of myths.

Myths of origins there must indeed have been in those countries before Babylonian influence became so overpowering, but, if so, these myths must have become recast when the great Teacher of the Nations half-attracted and halfcompelled attention.

On the traces of dragon and serpent myths in the Old Testament and their significance, see Gunkel, Schopfung and Chaos (1895) - a pioneering work of the highest merit - and Ency.

The artist must indeed start with imaginative types, revealed to him in visions or borrowed from current myths.

The ancient Greeks associated this constellation with many myths.

Philochorus also wrote on oracles, divination and sacrifices; the mythology and religious observances of the tetrapolis of Attica; the myths of Sophocles; the lives of Euripides and Pythagoras; the foundation of Salamis.

Yet, for the most part, they either relate to objects thoroughly incapable of poetic treatment, where the writer's endeavour is rather to expound the matter fully than to render it poetically beautiful, or else expend themselves on short isolated subjects, generally myths, and are erotic in character.

This was followed by a long series of popular treatises in rapid succession, amongst the more important of which are Light Science for Leisure Hours and The Sun (1871); The Orbs around Us and Essays on Astronomy (1872); The Expanse of Heaven, The Moon and The Borderland of Science (1873); The Universe and the Coming Transits and Transits of Venus (1874);(1874); Our Place among Infinities (1875); Myths and Marvels of Astronomy (1877); The Universe of Stars (1878); Flowers of the Sky (1879); The Peotry of Astronomy (1880); Easy Star Lessons and Familiar Science Studies (1882); Mysteries of Time and Space and The Great Pyramid (1883); The Universe of Suns (1884); The Seasons (1885); Other Suns than Ours and Half-Hours with the Stars (1887).

Moreover, the myths were rationalized and allegorized, which was not in either case an original procedure.

They make counter attacks on polytheism as a folly and on the shamefulness of obscene myths.

His legendary presentation as the " Friend of God," like Abraham, to whom as to Cretan Moses the law was revealed on the holy mountain, calls myths.

Within a hundred years of his death the Cid had become the centre of a whole system of myths.

His investigation tends to show that in the course of tradition cosmological myths are transformed into eschatological dogmas.

There are obvious points of similarity, possibly of derivation, between the details in our text and the above myths, but the subject cannot be further pursued here, save that we remark that in the sun myth the dragon tries to kill the mother before the child's birth, whereas in our text it is after his birth, and that neither in the Egyptian nor in the Greek myth is there any mention of the flight into the wilderness.

The conception of an encompassing ocean bounding the habitable world is found in the creation myths of the most ancient civilizations.

The Jewish records are put on a level with the Greek myths, and miracles are laughed at as magical tricks.

Plato (Rep. x.) embodies the idea in one of his finest myths.

The subjects of the historical epics were generally some of the well-known myths, in the exposition of which the writer could exhibit the full extent of his learning and his perfect command of verse.

Considerable attention began to be paid to the ancient history of Greece, and to all the myths relating to the foundation of states and cities.

Myths, folk-lore, hunting charms, fetishes, superstitions and customs were based on the same idea.

The Dene (Tinneh) myths resembled those of the Eskimo, and all the hunting tribes of eastern Canada and United States and the Mississippi valley have a mythology based upon their zootechny and their totemism.

In this work he for the first time systematized an old Oriental (perhaps Phoenician) method of interpreting the popular myths, asserting that the gods who formed the chief objects of popular worship had been originally heroes and conquerors, who had thus earned a claim to the veneration of their subjects.

When the Israelites entered Canaan, they would learn myths partly of Babylonian origin.

Certain of the most ancient Babylonian myths, especially that of Adapa, may also be traced back to the shrine of Ea at Eridu.

The urns themselves are of alabaster, with the figure of the deceased on the lid, and reliefs from Greek myths on the front.

In the interpretation of myths Neoplatonism followed the allegorical method, as practised especially by the Stoa; but the importance it attached to the spiritualized myths was unknown to the Stoic philosophers.

The latter interpreted the myths and were done with them; the later Neoplatonists treated them as the proper material and the secure foundation of philosophy.

Ancient myths are admitted without undergoing analysis; the most naïve realism alternates with daring efforts at spiritualizing.

He gave a meaning to the myths of the popular religions, and he had something to say even for magic, soothsaying and prayer.

In this philosophy the mystical properties of numbers are a leading feature; absurd and mechanical notions are glossed over with the sheen of sacramental mystery; myths are explained by pious fancies and fine-sounding pietistic reflections; miracles, even the most ridiculous, are believed in, and miracles are wrought.

The church and church theology, to whose guidance the masses now surrendered themselves, took in along with them their superstition, their polytheism, their magic, their myths, and all the machinery of religious witchcraft.

This is a Gnostic interpretation of the various myths of the great mother-goddess's many loves and love-adventures with other gods and heroes.

From the same group of myths must be derived the idea of the goddess who descends to the under-world, and is there taken prisoner against her will by the lower powers; the direct prototype of this myth is to be found, e.g.

And since the Gnostics were compelled to draw the figure of the Saviour into a world of quite alien myths, their Christology became so complicated in character that it frequently recalls the Christology of the later dogmatic of the Greek Fathers.

It is the MS. of Father Francisco Ximenez, Historia de la Provincia de San Vicente de Chiapa y Guatemala, in three big volumes in folio, which contain the famous Spanish translation of the Quiche myths or the " Popol-Vuh."

The anecdotes told of Gaia Caecilia are aetiological myths intended to explain certain usages at Roman marriages.

America; and all over that region it is the chief figure in a group of myths, fulfilling the office of a culture hero who brings the light, gives fire to mankind, &c. Together with the eaglehawk the crow plays a great part in the mythology of S.E.

Euhemerus of Messenia tried of old to rationalize the Greek myths by supposing that the Olympian gods were deified men.

The Quiche Popol Vuh, or "Book of History," which was translated into Spanish by the Dominican friar Ximenes, and edited with a French version by Brasseur de Bourbourg, is an important document for students of the local myths.

Just as the background of Christianity was formed by the Hebrew scriptures, and just as the Hebrew legends of the creation became the basis of its scheme of human redemption from evil, so the Avesta, with its quaint cosmogony and myths, formed the background of Mani's new faith.

It is here that Busiris enters into the circle of the myths and parerga of Heracles, who had arrived in Egypt from Libya, and was seized and bound ready to be killed and offered at the altar of Zeus in Memphis.

Similar myths are found in relation to the Finnish smith-god Ilmarinen, who made a golden woman, and the Teutonic Wieland; a belief in the magical power of metal-workers is a common survival from an age in which their art was new and mysterious.

In 1869 he issued the Queen of the Air, lectures on Greek myths, a subject he now took up, with some aid from the late Sir C. Newton.

Various myths surround their birth.

But a great deal of what was formerly assigned to Phoenician influence in the Aegean at an early period - pottery, ornaments and local myths - must be accounted for by the vigorous civilization of ancient Crete.

No doubt the Phoenicians had their legends and myths to account for the origin of man and the universe; to some extent these would Myth R e!,, o logy have resembled the ideas embodied in the book of and Genesis.

The Ophites are said to have not only used myths but forbidden marriage and held that the resurrection was purely spiritual (Lightfoot); this, however, is probably no more than an interesting coincidence, and all attempts to identify the errorists definitely must be abandoned.'

The close connexion of the Hyperboreans with the cult of Apollo may be seen by comparing the Hyperborean myths, the characters of which by their names mostly recall Apollo or Artemis (Agyieus, Opis, Hecaergos, Loxo), with the ceremonial of the Apolline worship. No meat was eaten at the Pyanepsia; the Hyperboreans were vegetarians.

The poem is evidently intended to display the writer's knowledge of obscure names and uncommon myths; it is full of unusual words of doubtful meaning gathered from the older poets, and many long-winded compounds coined by the author.

Then the gods themselves are myths, and nothing more."

The greatest defect of all is their relative silence with regard to the myths.

For the story of Isis and Osiris we have indeed the late treatise ascribed to Plutarch, and a few fragments of other myths may be culled from earlier native sources.

But the multitude of the deities and the variety of the myths that it strove to incorporate prevented the development of a uniform theological system, and the heterogeneous origin of the religion remained irretrievably stamped upon its face.

Numberless semi-divine beings had no r purpose than to fill,out the myths, as, for instance, the tering apes that greeted the sun-god Re as he rose above eastern horizon, and the demons who opened the gates of nether world at the approach of the setting sun.

His Homer and the Epic appeared in 1893; a new prose translation of The Homeric Hymns in 1899, with essays literary and mythological, in which parallels to the Greek myths are given from the traditions of savage races; and his Homer and his Age in 1906.

Works are extant in papyri and on temple walls, treating of geography, astronomy, ritual, myths, medicine, &c. It is probable that the native priests would have been ready to ascribe the authorship or inspiration, as well as the care and protection of all their books of sacred lore to Thoth, although there were a goddess of writing (Seshit), and the ancient deified scribes Imuthes and Amenophis, and later inspired doctors Petosiris, Nechepso, &c., to be reckoned with; there are indeed some definite traces of such an attribution extant in individual cases.

The Iranian tradition, preserved in the Avesta and in Firdousi's Shahnama, localizes a part of its heroes and myths in the east of Iran, and has transformed the old gods who fight with the great snake into kings of Iran who fight with the Turanians.

While Theseus was in Crete, Minos, 1 The story of Theseus is a strange mixture of (mostly fictitious) political tradition, of aetiological myths invented to explain misunderstood acts of ritual and of a cycle of tales of adventure analogous to the story of the labours of Heracles.

Much time is spent, especially after the evening meal, in asking riddles, in rhyming, &c. The recital of songs and myths.

Without doubt many of their gods are deified men; but it is clear that some are the forces of Nature personified, while others appear to represent human passions which have become identified with particular persons who have an existence in their historical myths."

These agree with the more or less clear allusions in the Old Testament to myths of creation, Eden, deluge, mountain of gods, Titanic folk, world-dragons, heavenly hosts, &c., and also with the unearthed seals, tablets, altars, &c. representing mythical ideas.

The older incantations, associated with Ea, were re-edited so as to give to Marduk the supreme power over demons, witches and sorcerers; the hymns and lamentations composed for the cult of Bel, Shamash and of Adad were transformed into paeans and appeals to Marduk, while the ancient myths arising in the various religious and political centres underwent a similar process of adaptation to changed conditions, and as a consequence their original meaning was obscured by the endeavour to assign all mighty deeds and acts, originally symbolical of the change of seasons or of occurrences in nature, to the patron deity of Babylon - the supreme head of the entire Babylonian pantheon.

According as the one or the other aspect of such a power is brought into the foreground, Ishtar becomes the mother of mankind, the fertile earth, the goddess of sexual love, and the creative force among animals, while at times she appears in hymns and myths as the general personification of nature.

Myths that symbolized changes in season or occurrences in nature were projected on the heavens, which were mapped out to correspond to the divisions of the earth.

In another division of the religious literature of Babylonia which is largely represented in Assur-bani-pal's collection - the myths and legends - tales which originally symbolized the change of seasons, or in which historical occurrences are overcast with more or less copious admixture of legend and myth, were transferred to the heavens, and so it happens that creation myths, and the accounts of wanderings and adventures of heroes of the past, are referred to movements among the planets and stars as well as to occurrences or supposed occurrences on earth.

The impetus to the purification of the old Semite religion to which the Hebrews for a long time clung in common with their fellows - the various branches of nomadic Arabs - was largely furnished by the remarkable civilization unfolded in the Euphrates valley and in many of the traditions, myths and legends embodied in the Old Testament; traces of direct borrowing from Babylonia may be discerned, while the indirect influences in the domain of the prophetical books, as also in the Psalms and in the so-called "Wisdom Literature," are even more noteworthy.

With the establishment of the Babylonian empire, under Khammurabi, early in the 2nd preChristian millennium, the religious as well as the political centre of influence was transferred to Babylon, Marduk became the Bel or lord of the pantheon, many of En-lil's attributes and myths were transferred to him, and E-kur was to some extent neglected.

The result is instructive when we turn to the numerous serpent myths and legends from the Old World and the New, to the stray notices in old writers, or to the fragmentary scraps of popular superstition everywhere.

It is impossible to trace a safe path through the complicated aetiological myths, the fragments of reshaped legend and tradition, or the adjustment of rival theologies.

The religious myths are generally identifiable with the Polynesian, but a belief in the gods proper is overshadowed by a general deification of ancestors, who are supposed from time to time to occupy certain blocks of stone, set up near the family dwelling, and surrounded by circles of smaller ones.

As a scientific explanation of the myths the theory is of no value, but it affords fine scope for the exercise of Bacon's unrivalled power of detecting analogies in things apparently most dissimilar.

He is described as the patron (if a somewhat ungenerous one) of literature; it was under his auspices that Firdousi collected the ancient myths of Persia and produced the great epic Sha/inama (Book of the Kings).

It is difficult to extract any historical fact out of this maze of myths; the various groups cannot be fully co-ordinated, and a further perplexing feature is the neglect of Thebes in the Homeric poems. At most it seems safe to infer that it was one of the first Greek communities to be drawn together within a fortified city, that it owed its importance in prehistoric as in later days to its military strength, and that its original "Cadmean" population was distinct from other inhabitants of Boeotia such as the Minyae of Orchomenus.

Others attach chief importance to the slaying of Neoptolemus (Pyrrhus) by Orestes at Delphi; according to Radermacher (Das Jenseits im Mythos der Hellenen, 1903), Orestes is an hypostasis of Apollo, Pyrrhus the principle of evil, which is overcome by the god; on the other hand, Usener (Archiv fur Religionswesen, vii., 1899, 334) takes Orestes for a god of winter and the underworld, a double of the Phocian Dionysus the "mountain" god (among the Ionians a summer-god, but in this case corresponding to Dionysus j Xavaiyis), who subdues Pyrrhus "the light," the double of Apollo, the whole being a form of the well-known myths of the expulsion of summer by winter.

The forms of worship were known to be trivial or mischievous, the myths unworthy or immoral.

All this has left traces in still living myths about the early history of the South-west.

We may indeed with Mr Andrew Lang explain the many myths of the bestial transformations of Zeus on the theory that the God was the tribal ancestor and assumed the shape of the animal-totem in order to engender the tribal patriarch; 7 but on the actual cults of Zeus theriomorphism has left less trace than on those.

It is itself compounded of the Semjaza and Azazel myths, and in its present composite form is already presupposed by lxxxviii.-Ixxxix.

One of the most extraordinary and persistent myths of medieval natura history, dating back to the 12th century at least, was the cause of transferring to these organisms the name of the barnack or bernacle goose (Bernicla branta).

The old myths in which Bel of Nippur was celebrated as the hero were transformed by the priests of Babylon in the interest 'The name Mordecai denotes "belonging to Maduk."

In the oldest usage BEoX6yoc were those who dealt in myths, like Hesiod and like the supposed Orpheus, the OeoX6yos par excellence.

Paul Natorp 1 contends that OEoXoyia in Plato 's Republic refers wholly to the control of myths.

Such myths were often based on grotesque philological analogies, according to which an existing connexion between two personalities (cities, &c.) was traced back to a common mythical origin.

For a good example of the evolution of such myths, see the argument under Aegina, History.

The myths of civilized peoples, as of Greeks and the Aryans of India, contain two elements, the rational and what to modern minds seems the irrational.

The rational myths are those which represent the gods as beautiful and wise beings.

The senseless stories or myths about the gods are soon felt to be at variance with this hypothesis.

As soon as this sense -of perplexity is felt by poets, by priests, or by most men in an age of nascent criticism, explanations of what is most crude and absurd in the myths are put forward.

Thus, in the 6th century before Christ, Xenophanes of Colophon severely blamed the poets for their unbecoming legends, and boldly called certain myths " the fables of men of old."

First (as Arnobius and Eusebius reminded their heathen opponents), the allegorical explanations are purely arbitrary, depend upon the fancy of their author, and are all equally plausible and equally unsupported by evidence.6 Secondly, there is no proof at all that, in the distant age when the myths were developed, men entertained the moral notions and physical philosophies which are supposed to be " wrapped up, " as Cicero says, " in impious fables."

According to this author, the myths are history in disguise.

Precisely the same convenient line was taken by Sahagun in his account of Mexican religious myths.

While we need not believe with Euemerus and with Herbert Spencer that the god of Greece or the god of the Hottentots was once a man, we cannot deny that the myths of both these gods have passed through and been coloured by the imaginations of men who practised the worship of real ancestors.

We may therefore say that, while it is rather absurd to believe that Zeus and Tsui-Goab were once real men, yet their myths are such as would be developed by people accustomed, among other forms of religion, to the worship of dead men.

The ancient systems of explaining what needed explanation in myths were, then, physical, ethical, religious and historical.

Some later philosophers, especially of the 17th century, misled by the resemblance between Biblical narratives and ancient myths, came to the conclusion that the Bible contains a pure, the myths a distorted, form of an original revelation.

The abbe Banier published a mythological compilation in which he systematically resolved all the Greek myths into ordinary history.

Thomas Taylor, at the end of the i 8th century, indulged in much mystical allegorizing of myths, as in the notes to his translation of Pausanias (1794) At an earlier date (1760) De Brosses struck on the true line of interpretation in his little work Du Culte des dieux fetiches, ou parallele de l'ancienne religion de l'Egypte avec la religion actuelle de Nigritie.

A vast symbolical explanation of myths and mysteries was attempted by Friedrich Creuzer.

Another school (also somewhat divided against itself) believes that misunderstood language played but a very slight part in the evolution of mythology, and that the irrational element in myths is merely the survival from a condition of thought which was once common, if not universal, but is now found chiefly among savages, and to a certain extent among children.

The former school considered that the state of thought out of which myths were developed was produced by decaying language; the latter maintains that the corresponding phenomena of language were the reflection of thought.

But Max Muller's system is based on scientific philology, not on conjecture, and is supported by a theory of the various processes in the evolution of myths out of language.

But myths precisely similar in irrational and repulsive character, even in minute details, to those of the Aryan races, exist among Australians, South Sea Islanders, Eskimo, Bushmen in Africa, among Solomon Islanders, Iroquois, and so forth.

The facts being identical, an identical explanation should be sought, and, as the languages in which the myths exist are essentially different, an explanation founded on the Aryan language is likely to prove too narrow.

Once more, even if we discover the original meaning of a god's name, it does not follow that we can explain by aid of the significance of the name the myths about the god.

Myths of unknown antiquity, for example, have been attracted into the legend of Charlemagne, just as the bons mots of old wits are transferred to living humorists.

Therefore, though we may ascertain that Zeus means " sky " and Agni " fire," we cannot assert, with Max Muller, that all the myths about Agni and Zeus were originally told of fire and sky.

These exploits would therefore be explained erroneously if regarded as originally myths of sky or fire.

Thus the story originally told of a man or woman bearing the name " sun," " dawn," " cloud," may be mixed up later with myths about the real celestial dawn, cloud or sun.

Thus Max Muller's theory that myths are " a disease of language " seems destitute of evidence, and inconsistent with what is historically known about the relations between the language and the social, political and literary condition of men.

Spencer attempts to account for the state of mind (the foundation of myths) in which man personifies and animates all phenomena.

As Spencer thinks ancestor-worship the first form of religion, and as he holds that persons with such names as sun, moon and the like became worshipped as ancestors, his theory results in the belief that nature-worship and the myths about natural phenomena - dawn, wind, sky, night and the rest - are a kind of transmuted worship of ancestors and transmuted myths about real men and women.

It is now necessary first to recapitulate the chief points in the problem, and then to attempt to explain them by a comparison of the myths of various races.

It is extremely difficult to keep these different categories of myths separate from each other.

If we investigate myths of the origin of the world, we often find gods in animal form active in the work of world-making.

If we examine myths of human descent from animals, we find gods busy there, and if we try to investigate the myths of the origin of the gods, the subject gets mixed up with the mythical origins of things in general.

As the ancestors of the Greeks, with the Aryans of India, the Egyptians, and others advanced in civilization, their religious thought was shocked and surprised by myths (originally dating from the period of savagery, and natural in that period) which were preserved down to the time of Pausanias by local priesthoods, or which were stereotyped in the ancient poems of Hesiod and Homer, or in the Brahmanas and Vedas of India, or were retained in the popular religion of Egypt.

The senseless element in the myths would by this theory be for the most part a " survival."

If this view of mythology can be proved, much will have been done to explain a problem which we have not yet touched, namely, the distribution of myths.

But, while the possibility of the diffusion of myths by borrowing and transmission must be allowed for, the hypothesis of the origin of myths in the savage state of the intellect supplies a ready explanation of their wide diffusion.

Many myths may be called " human " in this sense.

Such myths might spring up anywhere among untutored men, and anywhere might survive into civilized literature.

Therefore where similar myths are found among Greeks, Australians, Egyptians, Mangaians and others, it is unnecessary to account for their wide diffusion by any hypothesis of borrowing, early or late.

The same explanation may be applied to Greek and Aztec myths of the deluge, to Australian and Greek myths of the original theft of fire.

It is true that some philologists deprecate as unscientific the comparison of myths which are found in languages not connected with each other.

The objection rests on the theory that myths are a disease of language, a morbid offshoot of language, and that the legends in unconnected languages must therefore be kept apart.

But, as the theory which we are explaining does not admit that language is more than a subordinate cause in the development of myths, as it seeks for the origin of myths in a given condition of thought through which all races have passed, we need do no more than record the objection.

Max Muller asked (when speaking of the mental condition of men when myths were developed), " was there a period of temporary madness through which the human mind had to pass, and was it a madness identically the same in the south of India and the north of Iceland?

The missionary is sometimes anxious to prove that religion can only come by revelation, and that certain tribes, having received no revelation, have no religion or religious myths at all.

Sometimes the missionary, on the other hand, is anxious to demonstrate that the myths of his heathen flock are a corrupted version of the Biblical narrative.

In the former case he neglects the study of savage myths; in the latter he unconsciously accommodates what he hears to what he calls " the truth."

All these ideas are the stuff of which myths are made, and the evidence of savage institutions, in every part of the world, proves that these ideas are the universal inheritance of savages.

The basis of these myths, which are just as much a part of early conjectural science as of early religion, is naturally the experience of the savage as construed by himself.

If there were no direct evidence in favour of Tylor's opinion, it would be enough to point to the nature of savage myths themselves.

Thus savage myths answer the questions - What was the origin of the world, and of men, and of beasts ?

Frazer, the human representatives or animal representatives, in the rites, of the spirit of vegetation; of the corn spirit; of the changing seasons, winter or summer, have been developed into many forms of gods, with appropriate myths, explanatory of the magic, and of the sacrifice of the chief performer.

In the same way the adoration of living human beings, the deification of living kings - whose title survives in our king or queen of the May, and in the rex nemorensis, the priest of Diana in the grove of Aricia - has been most fruitful in myths of divine beings.

This is the philosophy of savage life, and it is on these principles that the savage constructs his myths, while these, again, are all the scientific explanations of the universe with which he has been able to supply himself.

Myths of the origin of the world and man are naturally most widely diffused.

Man has everywhere asked himself whence things came and how, and his myths are his earliest extant form of answer to this question.

If we try beginning with myths of creative gods, we find that the world is sometimes represented as pre-existent to the divine race.

If we try beginning with myths of the origin of the world, we frequently find that it owes its origin to the activity of preexistent supernatural beings.

There is no such consistency of opinion in myths, whether of civilized or savage races.

Perhaps the plan least open to objection is to begin with myths of the gods.

In examining the myths of the gods we shall begin with the conceptions of the most backward tribes, and advance to the divine legends of the ancient civilized races.

It will appear that, while the non-civilized gods are often theriomorphic, made in accordance with the ideas of non-civilized men, the civilized gods retain many characteristics of the savage gods, and these characteristics are the " irrational element " in the divine myths.

It is not easy to separate the discussion of savage myths of gods from the problem, Whence and how arose the savage belief in gods ?

The All-Father, even at his best, among the Kurnai, Kamilaroi and Euahlayi, is the centre of many grotesque and sportive myths.

Many of the wilder myths are the expressions of the sportive and humorous faculties.

To explain these, myths have been developed to show that they arose in some grotesque incident of Baiame's personal existence on earth.

These two birds in many tribes give names to the two great exogamous and intermarrying divisions; in their case there is a va et vient of divine, human and theriomorphic elements, just as in the Greek myths of Zeus.

The baser Greek myths of the wanderings, amours and adventures of the gods, myths ignored by Homer, are parallel to the adventures of the Alcheringa people, and the fable of the mutilation of Osiris and the search for the lost organ by Isis, actually occurs among the Alcheringa tales of Messrs Spencer and Gillen.

He has a wife, an adopted daughter, whose real father is the " swallower " in Bushman swallowing myths, and the daughter has a son, who is the Ichneumon.

The heavenly bodies are gods among the Bushmen, but their nature and adventures must be discussed among other myths of sun, moon and stars.

This author collected the old notices of Hottentot myths, and added material from his own researches.

At the same time, the Zulus have many " nursery tales," the plots and incidents of which often bear the closest resemblance to the heroic myths of Greece, and to the marchen of European peoples.'

These indications will give a general idea of African divine myths.

An excellent account of the myths of the Banks Islanders and Solomon Islanders was given in Journ.

The myths of Qat's adventures, however, are very crude, though not so wild as some of the Scandinavian myths about Odin and Loki, while they are less immoral than the adventures of Indra and Zeus.

These are the best known divine myths of the Melanesians.

Yehl is the Prometheus Purphoros of the Tlingits, but myths of the fire-stealer would form matter for a separate section.

In Oregon the coyote is also the " demiurge," but most of the myths about him refer to his creative exploits, and will be more appropriately treated in the next section.

Among the Tinneh a miraculous dog, who, like an enchanted fairy prince, could assume the form of a handsome young man, is the chief divine being of the myths.

Passing from the lower savage myths, of which space does not permit us to offer a larger selection, we turn to races in the upper strata of barbarism.

In the beginning (as in the Greek myths of Uranus and Gaea), Heaven (Rangi, conceived of as a person) was indissolubly united to his wife Earth (Papa), and between them they begat gods which necessarily dwelt in darkness.

The adventure is one of the myths of the origin of death, which are almost universally diffused.

The old contemporary missionary Sahagun has left one of the earliest detailed accounts of the natures and myths of these gods, but, though Sahagun took great pains in collecting facts, his speculations must be accepted with caution.

The creative myths and sun myths are crude and very early in character.

The divine myths of the two nations had points in common, but there are few topics more obscure than Egyptian mythology.

The beast-gods and dualistic and creative myths of savages are looked on as the natural product of the savage reason and fancy.

The same beast-gods and myths in civilized Egypt are looked on as survivals from the rude and early condition of thought to which such conceptions are natural.

Though Egypt was rich in gods, her literature is not fertile in myths.

In these works the myths are taken for granted, are alluded to in the course of addresses to the divine beings, but, naturally, are not told in full.

Osiris, Horus, Typhon (Seth), Isis and Nephthys were the children of Seb (whom the Greeks identified with Cronus); the myths of their birth were peculiarly savage and obscene.

Plutarch remarked the fact that the Greek myths of Cronus, of Dionysus, of Apollo and the Python, and of Demeter, " all the things that are shrouded in mystic ceremonies and are presented in rites," " do not fall short in absurdity of the legends about Osiris and Typhon."

Plutarch naturally presumed that the myths which seem absurd shrouded some great moral or physical mystery.

Unfortunately Egyptologists have rarely a wide knowledge of the myths of the lower races, while anthropologists are seldom or never Egyptologists.

The Brahmanas, on the other hand, later compilations, canonized books for the direction of ritual and sacrifice, are rich in senseless and irrational myths.

Sometimes these myths are probably later than the Veda, mere explanations of ritual incidents devised by the priests.

Many of the myths of the origin of the divine beings are on a level with the Maori theory that Heaven and Earth begat them in the ordinary way.

The chief foes of Indra are Vrittra and Ahi, serpents which swallow up the waters, precisely as frogs do in Australian and Californian and Andaman myths.

Turning to separate gods, Indra first claims attention, for stories of Heaven and Earth are better studied under the heading of myths of the origin of things.

Space does not permit us to recount the equally puerile and barbarous legends of Vishnu, Agni, the loves of Vivasvat in the form of a horse, the adventures of Soma, nor the Vedic amours (paralleled in several savage mythologies) of Pururavas and Urvasi.2 Divine Myths of Greece.

Yet in the mythology and religion of Greece we find abundant survivals of savage manners and of savage myths.

Gill, Myths and Songs from the South Pacific, p. 60.

Thus the light which the science of language throws on Greek myths is extremely uncertain.

In the Iliad 9 will be found some of the crudest Homeric myths.

In New Zealand, Chinese, Vedic, Indian and Greek myths the pair had to be sundered.'

Very much later the name was mistaken for a genuine patronymic, In Homer and in Hesiod myths enter the region of literature, and become, as it were, national.

But it is probable that the local myths of various cities and temples, of the " sacred chapters " which were told by the priests to travellers and in the mysteries to the initiated, were older in form than the epic and national myths.

From these sources come almost all the more inhuman, bestial and discreditable myths of the gods.

The other divine myths are equally complex.

The Scandinavian myths of the gods are numerous and interesting, but the evidence on which they have reached us demands criticism for which we lack space.

That there are in the Eddas and Sagas early ideas and later ideas tinged by Christian legend seems indubitable, but philological and historical learning has by no means settled the questions of relative purity and antiquity tin the myths.

It is now necessary to cast a hasty glance over the chief divisions of myths.

The question of the origin of the marks and characteristics of various animals and plants has also produced a class of myths in which the marks are said to survive from some memorable adventure, or the plants and animals to be metamorphosed human beings.

Examples of all these myths are found among savages and in the legends of the ancient civilizations.

We have found it difficult to keep myths of the gods apart from myths of the origin of the world and of man, because gods are frequently regarded as creative powers.

The prevalence of animals, or of godanimals, in myths of the stealing of water, soma and fire, is very remarkable.

These vary in quality with the civilization of the races in which they are current, but the same ideas which we proceed to state pervade all cosmogonical myths, savage and civilized.

As a rule the most backward races, while rich in myths of the origin of men, animals, plants, stones and stars, do not say much about the making of the world.

The Navaho and the Digger Indians take earth for granted as a starting-point in their myths.

In the South Sea Islands, generally, the fable of the union and separation of Heaven and Earth is current; other forms will be found in Gill's Myths and Songs from the South Pacific. The cosmogonic myths of the Aryans of India are peculiarly interesting, as we find in the Vedas and Brahmanas and Puranas almost every fiction familiar to savages side by side with the most abstract metaphysical speculations.

So much for the Indian cosmogonic myths, which are a collection of ideas familiar to savages, blended with sacerdotal theories and ritual mummeries.

In another class of myths, man was evolved out of the lower animals - lizards in Australia; coyotes, beavers, apes and other beasts in America.

The Greek myths of the descent of the Arcadians, Myrmidons, children of the swan, the cow, and so forth, inay be compared.

In savage and civilized myths they are usually metamorphosed men, women and beasts.

This is a thoroughly good example of the savage myths (as in Peru, according to Acosta) by which beasts and anthropomorphic gods and stars are all jumbled together.'

The Moon in Greek myths loved Endymion, and was bribed to be the mistress of Pan by the present of a fleece, like the Dawn in Australia, whose unchastity was rewarded by a gift of a red cloak of opossum skin.

Solar and lunar myths usually account for the observed phenomena of eclipse, waning and waxing, sunset, spots on the moon, and so forth by various mythical adventures of the animated heavenly beings.

The mark of the hare in the moon has struck the imagination of Germans, Mexicans, Hottentots, Sinhalese, and produced myths among all these races.'

Men are assumed to be naturally immortal, hence a series of myths to account for the origin of death.

As to the myths of Hades, the place of the dead, they are far too many to be mentioned in detail.

In almost all the gates of hell are guarded by fierce beasts, and in Ojibway, Finnish, Greek, Papuan and Japanese myths no mortal visitor may escape from Hades who has once tasted the food of the dead.

To discuss these myths as far as they can be considered apart from divine and explanatory tales would demand more space than we have at our disposal.

It will become evident to any student of the romantic myths that they consist of different arrange 3 See also Vishnu Purana, i.

See Cornhill Magazine, " How the Stars got their Names " (1882, p. 35), and " Some Solar and Lunar Myths " (1882, P. 440); Max Muller, Selected Essays, i.

This story is but one specimen of the personal human character of animals in myths, already referred to the intellectual condition of savages.

The old explanation was that marchen are degenerate heroic myths.

The priestesses by whom she was served are depicted in early art as armed with the double-headed axe, and the dances they performed in her honour with shield and bow gave rise to the myths which saw in them.

Harrison (Myths and Monuments of Ancient Athens, xxvii.- xxxvi.) as a fiction to explain the ceremony performed by the two maidens called Arrephori.

At one time it was held that the constellation names and myths were of Greek origin; this view has now been disproved, and an examination of the Hellenic myths associated with the stars and star-groups in the light of the records revealed by the decipherment of Euphratean cuneiforms leads to the conclusion that in many, if not all, cases the Greek myth has a Euphratean parallel, and so renders it probable that the Greek constellation system and the cognate legends are primarily of Semitic or even pre-Semitic origin.

It demands a careful study of the myths and religious thought of primitive peoples; and the tracing of the names from one language to another belongs to comparative philology.

Among the lowest races the culture-hero commonly wears a bestial guise, is a spider (Melanesia), an eagle hawk (in some myths and south-east Australia), a coyote (north-west America), a dog or raven (Thlinkeet), a mantis insect (Bushman), and so forth, yet is endowed with human or even super-human qualities, and often shades off into a permanent and practically deathless god.

Myths like this kill two birds with one stone, and at once account for the possession of fire by men and for the marking of certain animals regarded as fire-bringers.'

This hypothesis at least explains all myths of fire-stealing by the natural needs, passions, and characters of men, "a jealous race," whereas the philological theory explains the Greek myth by an exceptional accident of changing language, and leaves the other widely diffused myths of fire-stealing in the dark.

Our ancestors were immortalized --albeit incorrectly --in myths.

This is absolutely incredulous, requiring one to connect with ancient astronaut theories or Atlantis myths.

Adult, teenage and baby acne problems are surrounded by myths.

The Guardian column, heavily censored, was aimed to debunk sex myths.

It aimed to enable young people to recognize the commonality between the different cultures and dispel many of the myths that are perpetuated.

The ancient world was a virtual cornucopia of myths of gods and heroes.

Their myths are inhabited by the lusty trickster Coyote, and other primordial zoomorphic demigods.

Jane Griffin, consultant nutritionist and accredited sports dietitian, takes a hard look at the truth behind the myths.

The fact that we are holding Ladders Week and have published guidance on how to use ladders safely will hopefully dispel these myths.

What is truly extraordinary is that each of these myths is exactly contrary to what can clearly be demonstrated was the case.

Immersed in Celtic myths & legends, hear about the Selkies, the mischievous faeries and learn the secret of eternal youth!

Whilst most are entirely fictitious, bred form urban myths of payouts for nothing - always a " friend of a friend " .

The exhibits and labels show wit, creativity and scholarship, and include folklore and myths about plants, as well as scientific facts.

Often, but not always, myths are recited explaining the origin, attributes and behavior of these strange and sacred habitants of liminality.

Long term use Despite the myths, heroin is a relatively harmless drug, especially compared to alcohol or nicotine.

From an atheistic humanist 's point of view all these notions of God are myths.

The same ilk of clues feature in the Greek myths, too.

For the public it wanted heroic figures which perpetuated racist myths or sickly sentimental kitsch.

And thus he shatters many of the myths about history, especially military history.

Similarly many history books have been published which perpetuate long established myths.

Medea's story is the most terrible of the Greek myths.

Celtica Celtica is a unique attraction telling the story of Celtic myths and legends.

Jung's followers Despite the popular appeal of Jung's seductive elaborations about myths, generally they have failed to convince academic mythologists.

Myths are deadly serious Modern mythologists use the term ' myth ' without any pejorative overtones.

She really likes her greek myths, and def getting the pantheon of greek gods sussed!

Many Greek myths were oral tales passed down through the centuries with an essentially patriarchal Greek overlay.

Real science takes on the myths of biological psychiatry.

National stepfamily Association UK Provides information on the myths of stepfamily life, special challenges stepfamilies face, and the latest research on stepfamilies.

Reading aloud TEFL seems to be particularly susceptible to myths.

The forgotten truth is that both myths celebrate the triumph of Good over Evil and promise an eschatological salvation.

In these, puma heads spout volutes from their open jaws in a form of visual representation of indigenous myths and legends.

So how does the humanist mother go about producing reasonably well-balanced, well-educated, moral human beings, protected from irrelevant and oppressive myths?

The religion of primitive peoples is no less mythical than their history, since they could only conceive of it by means of myths.

But Eastern tradition, so tenacious of the old myths of primitive man, has a short memory for actual history, and five centuries later Alexander was only remembered in Iran as the accursed destroyer of the sacred books, whose wisdom he had at the same time pilfered by causing translations to be made into "Roman."

Nearly all of his books were first given to the public in the form of lectures or magazine articles, revised and collected under a general title, such as Myths and Myth-Makers (1872), Darwinism and Other Essays (1879), Excursions of an Evolutionist (1883), and A Century of Science (1899).

Gilgamesh becomes a god, and in certain portions of the epic clearly plays the part of the sungod of the spring-time, taking the place apparently of Tammuz or Adonis, the youthful sun-god, though the story shows traits that differentiate it from the ordinary Tammuz myths.

At the end of 1900 Loisy secured a government lectureship at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes Pratiques, and delivered there in succession courses on the Babylonian myths and the first chapters of Genesis; the Gospel parables; the narrative of the ministry in the synoptic Gospels; and the Passion narratives in the same.

This section is compounded of the Semjaza and Azazel myths, and in its present composite form is already presupposed by 1 Enoch lxxxviii.

Ancient myths are admitted without undergoing analysis; the most naïve realism alternates with daring efforts at spiritualizing.

From the inability of the savage in all ages and in all lands to comprehend death as a natural phenomenon, there results a tendency to personify death, and myths are invented to account for its origin.

The unexpected occurrence of these worms in pools and puddles, often in great numbers, has given rise to myths about showers of worms. They occasionally make their way into the human stomach with the drinking-water and are vomited; but this is a case of pseudo-parasitism - they are no true parasite of man.

The record of the earliest days of Thebes was preserved among the Greeks in an abundant mass of legends which rival the myths of Troy in their wide ramification and the influence which they exerted upon the literature of the classical age.

A very common class of myths (see ToTEMrsM) assures us that certain stocks of men are descended from beasts, or from gods in the shape of beasts.

There is a large body of myths about the Alcheringa folk, or Mura-Mura (see Spencer and Gillen, Native Tribes of Central Australia, Native Tribes of Northern Australia, and Howitt, Native Tribes of SouthEastern Australia), and the myths of their wanderings, prodigies and institution of rites and magic are represented in the dances of the mysteries.

If we are to regard the Egyptian myths about the gods in animal shape, and about the non-natural superhuman heroes, and their wars and loves, as esoteric allegories devised by civilized priests, perhaps we should also explain Pund-jel, Qat, Quawteaht, the Mantis god, the Spider creator, the Coyote and Raven gods as priestly inventions, put forth in a civilized age, and retained by Australians, Bushmen, Hottentots, Ahts, Thlinkeets, Papuans, who preserve no other vestiges of high civilization.

From the blood of Uranus (this feature is common in Red Indian and Egyptian myths) were born furies, giants, ash-nymphs and Aphrodite.

Of these formulae '(chosen because illustrated by Greek heroic legends) - (I) is a sanction of barbarous nuptial etiquette; (2) is an obvious ordinary incident; (3) is moral, and both (3) and (1) may pair off with all the myths of the origin of death from the infringement of a taboo or sacred command; (4) would naturally occur wherever, as on the West Coast of Africa, human victims have been offered to sharks or other beasts; (5) the story of flight from a horrible crime, occurs in some stellar myths, and is an easy and natural invention; (6) flight from wizard father or husband, is found in Bushman and Namaqua myth, where the husband is an elephant; (7) success of youngest brother, may have been an explanation and sanction of " tungsten-recht " - Maui in New Zealand is an example, and Herodotus found the story among the Scythians; (8) the bride given to successful adventurer, is consonant with heroic manners as late as Homer; (9) is no less consonant with the belief that beasts have human sentiments and supernatural powers; (to) the " strong man," is found among Eskimo and Zulus, and was an obvious invention when strength was the most admired of qualities; (II) the baffled ogre, is found among Basques and Irish, and turns on a form of punning which inspires an " ananzi " story in West Africa; (12) descent into Hades, is the natural result of the savage conception of Hades, and the tale is told of actual living people in the Solomon Islands and in New Caledonia; Eskimo Angekoks can and do descend into Hades - it is the prerogative of the necromantic magician; (13) " the false bride," found among the Zulus, does not permit of such easy explanation - naturally, in Zululand, the false bride is an animal; (14) the bride accused of bearing be 1st-children, has already been disposed of; the belief is inevitable where no distinction worth mentioning is taken between men and animals.

The quest for divine immortality is a main thread of all the ancient myths associated with this constellation.

He used study evidence to rebut vigorously, myths surrounding the use of dialysis in older patients.

Myths do not necessarily recount tales of the origins of the cosmos, gods, rituals, or sacred events.

They explain how the most familiar myths surrounding the queen developed from the concerns of her contemporaries and continue to reverberate today.

Seneca 's blood-stained tragedies reworked Greek myths, arguing for a return to stoic values.

There is also some questionable material, retailing myths such as Al-Qaida 's use of steganography and the salami scam.

Scotching the Myths During 1997 we will be sharing some events that happened in Scotland on the date the magazine comes out.

Myths are inextricably bound up with the image and self-image of nations.

And we must beware of myths - especially the myth that drug relief invariably means a shortening of life.

Possible scene of first issue; a bunch of guys sitting around at a bar, telling Urban Myths to each other for laughs.

National Stepfamily Association UK Provides information on the myths of stepfamily life, special challenges stepfamilies face, and the latest research on stepfamilies.

These themes range from myths and legends to physical forces and strandline objects.

There are a lot of myths about sufficiency of evidence, even within the those in the know.

It is unfortunate that fairytales and myths have stereotyped step-mothers as cruel, when many step-moms are actually kind and forgiving.

There are some great names combined with extremely interesting stories that can be found in ancient myths and legends.

There are websites dedicated to the ancient myths and legends of different civilizations, and these are a good source of names.

There are many myths surrounding people legally ending their marriage, and it can be difficult to separate divorce facts from fiction.

According to Dr. Uffe Ravnskov, M.D., P.h.D. and author of the book The Cholesterol Myths, reducing food-based sources of cholesterol can only reduce the total serum cholesterol by a few points in most people.

Encyclopedia Mythica - This is a well-done site attempting to catalog myths and mythic figures from around the world.

Greek stories can be found embedded throughout western legends, myths and even many of the laws that govern society today.

If you've convinced yourself that every scrapbook page you create needs to be a work of art, it's time to debunk some of common myths about simple scrapbooking.

There are many myths about what stress is and it's important to set those straight."

The first section of your instruction should cover common myths.

Whether you want to incorporate your Asian ancestry, want to infuse the myths symbolized by this plant in your wedding, or just want a tasteful elegant favor for your reception, a bamboo plant may fit the bill.

Several myths also surround bamboos that are related in some way to love and/or marriage.

There are a lot of myths associated with both abuse and addiction.

One of the most common myths is that teens are going to experiment with drugs no matter what.

Students who choose distance learning may have to grapple with common myths and biases about their courses of study, but the truth is that an online education is equal to on-site learning in almost every way.

For informed students, perpetual myths about online learning are easy to disprove, but much of the misinformation persists among the general public.

Other online resources, such as eLearners.com, provide valuable information about getting the most out of the search process, avoiding scams, and busting scholarship myths.

The company's website is packed with information about their special formulas, comparison charts, myths surrounding pet foods, the controversial wild diet, and feeding charts.

For more information about homebound status, see, Myths About Home Care, by the American Academy of Home Care Physicians.

They are aware that aging will change sexual function and desire, but the wealth of myths about senior sex make it difficult to get useful information.

Learn about some of the most popular Greek and Roman myths with Custom and Myth.

One of the myths about albinism is that it causes people to have pink or red eyes.

Children are also often told it is wrong or unhealthy, myths that are not supported by medical research.

Myths about why stuttering occurs abound.

Adolescents should also be informed about the myths and misconceptions of acquiring STDs.

Chinese symbols for love and eternity are different from Western culture symbols.Like Western love symbols, there are ancient myths and legends tied to Chinese symbols of love.