A mythology, in the sense of a collection of myths, is an important feature of many

cultures. According to Alan Dundes, a myth is a sacred narrative explaining how the world

and humankind assumed their present form, although, in a very broad sense, the word

can refer to any traditional story. Bruce Lincoln defines myth as "ideology in narrative

form". Myths may arise as either truthful depictions or overelaborated accounts of historical

events, as allegory for or personification of natural phenomena, or as an explanation

of ritual. They are used to convey religious or idealized experience, to establish behavioral

models, and to teach. Modern mythopoeia such as fantasy novels, manga, and urban legend,

with many competing artificial mythoi acknowledged as fiction, supports the idea of myth as a

modern, not just ancient, social practice. Mythology, in the sense of the study of myths,

dates back to antiquity. Early rival classifications of Greek mythos by Euhemerus, Plato's Phaedrus,

and Sallustius were developed by the neoplatonists and revived by Renaissance mythographers.

Nineteenth-century comparative mythology reinterpreted myth as a primitive and failed counterpart

of science, a "disease of language", or a misinterpretation of magical ritual. By contrast,

many later interpretations have rejected a conflict between myth and science, sometimes

viewing myths as expressions of, or metaphors for, human psychology. Tension between the

search for a monomyth or Ur-myth and skepticism toward such comparativism has marked scholarship

on myth.

Nature of myths Characteristics

The main characters in myths are usually gods, supernatural heroes and humans. As stories,

myths are often endorsed by rulers and priests and closely linked to religion or spirituality.

In the society in which it is told, a myth is usually regarded as a true account of the

remote past. In fact, many societies have two categories of traditional narrative, "true

stories" or myths, and "false stories" or fables. Creation myths generally take place

in a primordial age, when the world had not yet achieved its current form, and explain

how the world gained its current form and how customs, institutions and taboos were

established. Terminology

The term "mythology" can refer either to the study of myths or to a body or collection

of myths. For example, landscape mythology is the study of landscape features in terms

of totemistic mythology, whereas Hittite mythology is the body of myths of the Hittites. Alan

Dundes defines myth as a sacred narrative which explains how the world and humanity

evolved into their present form, "a story that serves to define the fundamental worldview

of a culture by explaining aspects of the natural world and delineating the psychological

and social practices and ideals of a society". Many scholars in other fields use the term

"myth" in somewhat different ways; in a very broad sense, the word can refer to any traditional

story or, in casual use, a popular misconception or imaginary entity. Because the folkloristic

meaning of "myth" is often confused with this more pejorative usage, the original unambiguous

term "mythos" may be a better word to distinguish the positive definition from the negative.

Closely related to myth are legend and folktale. Myths, legends, and folktales are different

types of traditional story. Unlike mythos, folktales can be set in any time and any place,

and they are not considered true or sacred by the societies that tell them. Like mythos,

legends are stories that are traditionally considered true, but are set in a more recent

time, when the world was much as it is today. Legends generally feature humans as their

main characters, whereas myths generally focus on superhuman characters.

The distinction between myth, legend, and folktale is meant simply as a useful tool

for grouping traditional stories. In many cultures, it is hard to draw a sharp line

between myths and legends. Instead of dividing their traditional stories into myths, legends,

and folktales, some cultures divide them into two categories, one that roughly corresponds

to folktales, and one that combines myths and legends. Even myths and folktales are

not completely distinct. A story may be considered true in one society, but considered fictional

in another society. In fact, when a myth loses its status as part of a religious system,

it often takes on traits more typical of folktales, with its formerly divine characters reinterpreted

as human heroes, giants, or fairies. Myth, legend, and folktale are only a few

of the categories of traditional stories. Other categories include anecdotes and some

kinds of jokes. Traditional stories, in turn, are only one category within folklore, which

also includes items such as gestures, costumes, and music.

Origins of myth Euhemerism

One theory claims that myths are distorted accounts of real historical events. According

to this theory, storytellers repeatedly elaborated upon historical accounts until the figures

in those accounts gained the status of gods. For example, one might argue that the myth

of the wind-god Aeolus evolved from a historical account of a king who taught his people to

use sails and interpret the winds. Herodotus and Prodicus made claims of this kind. This

theory is named "euhemerism" after the mythologist Euhemerus, who suggested that the Greek gods

developed from legends about human beings. Allegory

Some theories propose that myths began as allegories. According to one theory, myths

began as allegories for natural phenomena: Apollo represents the sun, Poseidon represents

water, and so on. According to another theory, myths began as allegories for philosophical

or spiritual concepts: Athena represents wise judgment, Aphrodite represents desire, etc.

The 19th century Sanskritist Max Müller supported an allegorical theory of myth. He believed

that myths began as allegorical descriptions of nature, but gradually came to be interpreted

literally: for example, a poetic description of the sea as "raging" was eventually taken

literally, and the sea was then thought of as a raging god.

Personification

Some thinkers believe that myths resulted from the personification of inanimate objects

and forces. According to these thinkers, the ancients worshipped natural phenomena such

as fire and air, gradually coming to describe them as gods. For example, according to the

theory of mythopoeic thought, the ancients tended to view things as persons, not as mere

objects; thus, they described natural events as acts of personal gods, thus giving rise

to myths. Myth-ritual theory

According to the myth-ritual theory, the existence of myth is tied to ritual. In its most extreme

form, this theory claims that myths arose to explain rituals. This claim was first put

forward by the biblical scholar William Robertson Smith. According to Smith, people begin performing

rituals for some reason that is not related to myth; later, after they have forgotten

the original reason for a ritual, they try to account for the ritual by inventing a myth

and claiming that the ritual commemorates the events described in that myth. The anthropologist

James Frazer had a similar theory. Frazer believed that primitive man starts out with

a belief in magical laws; later, when man begins to lose faith in magic, he invents

myths about gods and claims that his formerly magical rituals are religious rituals intended

to appease the gods. Functions of myth

Mircea Eliade argued that one of the foremost functions of myth is to establish models for

behavior and that myths may also provide a religious experience. By telling or reenacting

myths, members of traditional societies detach themselves from the present and return to

the mythical age, thereby bringing themselves closer to the divine.

Lauri Honko asserts that, in some cases, a society will reenact a myth in an attempt

to reproduce the conditions of the mythical age. For example, it will reenact the healing

performed by a god at the beginning of time in order to heal someone in the present. Similarly,

Roland Barthes argues that modern culture explores religious experience. Because it

is not the job of science to define human morality, a religious experience is an attempt

to connect with a perceived moral past, which is in contrast with the technological present.

Joseph Campbell writes: "In the long view of the history of mankind, four essential

functions of mythology can be discerned. The first and most distinctive – vitalizing

all – is that of eliciting and supporting a sense of awe before the mystery of being."

"The second function of mythology is to render a cosmology, an image of the universe that

will support and be supported by this sense of awe before the mystery of the presence

and the presence of a mystery." "A third function of mythology is to support the current social

order, to integrate the individual organically with his group;" "The fourth function of mythology

is to initiate the individual into the order of realities of his own psyche, guiding him

toward his own spiritual enrichment and realization." In a later work Campbell explains the relationship

of myth to civilisation: The rise and fall of civilisations in the

long, broad course of history can be seen largely to be a function of the integrity

and cogency of their supporting canons of myth; for not authority but aspiration is

the motivator, builder, and transformer of civilisation. A mythological canon is an organisation

of symbols, ineffable in import, by which the energies of aspiration are evoked and

gathered toward a focus. And yet the history of civilisation is not

one of harmony. There are two pathologies. One is interpreting

myth as pseudo-science, as though it had to do with directing nature instead of putting

you in accord with nature, and the other is the political interpretation of myths to the

advantage of one group within a society, or one society within a group of nations.

Campbell gives his answer to the question: what is the function of myth today? in episode

2 of Bill Moyers's The Power of Myth series. Study of mythology

Historically, the important approaches to the study of mythology have been those of

Vico, Schelling, Schiller, Jung, Freud, Lévy-Bruhl, Lévi-Strauss, Frye, the Soviet school, and

the Myth and Ritual School. Pre-modern theories

The critical interpretation of myth goes back as far as the Presocratics. Euhemerus was

one of the most important pre-modern mythologists. He interpreted myths as accounts of actual

historical events, distorted over many retellings. Sallustius, for example, divides myths into

five categories – theological, physical, animastic, material and mixed. This last being

those myths which show the interaction between two or more of the previous categories and

which, he says, are particularly used in initiations. To ones who are even trying to change content

of the myth according to probability would be found criticism in Plato Phaedrus, in which

Socrates says that it is the province of one who is "vehemently curious and laborious,

and not entirely happy . . .". Although Plato famously condemned poetic myth

when discussing the education of the young in the Republic, primarily on the grounds

that there was a danger that the young and uneducated might take the stories of Gods

and heroes literally, nevertheless he constantly refers to myths of all kinds throughout his

writings. As Platonism developed in the phases commonly called 'middle Platonism' and neoplatonism,

such writers as Plutarch, Porphyry, Proclus, Olympiodorus and Damascius wrote explicitly

about the symbolic interpretation of traditional and Orphic myths. Interest in polytheistic

mythology revived in the Renaissance, with early works on mythography appearing in the

16th century, such as the Theologia mythologica.Myths are not the same as fables, legends, folktales,

fairy tales, anecdotes, or fiction, but the concepts may overlap. Notably, during the

nineteenth century period of Romanticism, folktales and fairy tales were perceived as

eroded fragments of earlier mythology. Mythological themes are also very often consciously employed

in literature, beginning with Homer. The resulting work may expressly refer to a mythological

background without itself being part of a body of myths. The medieval romance in particular

plays with this process of turning myth into literature. Euhemerism refers to the process

of rationalization of myths, putting themes formerly imbued with mythological qualities

into pragmatic contexts, for example following a cultural or religious paradigm shift.

Conversely, historical and literary material may acquire mythological qualities over time,

for example the Matter of Britain referring to the legendary history of Great Britain,

especially those focused on King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table, and the Matter

of France, based on historical events of the fifth and eighth centuries, respectively,

were first made into epic poetry and became partly mythological over the following centuries.

"Conscious generation" of mythology has been termed mythopoeia by J. R. R. Tolkien[16],

and was notoriously also suggested, very separately, by Nazi ideologist Alfred Rosenberg.

19th-century theories The first scholarly theories of myth appeared

during the second half of the 19th century. In general, these 19th-century theories framed

myth as a failed or obsolete mode of thought, often by interpreting myth as the primitive

counterpart of modern science. For example, E. B. Tylor interpreted myth

as an attempt at a literal explanation for natural phenomena: unable to conceive of impersonal

natural laws, early man tried to explain natural phenomena by attributing souls to inanimate

objects, giving rise to animism. According to Tylor, human thought evolves through various

stages, starting with mythological ideas and gradually progressing to scientific ideas.

Not all scholars — not even all 19th century scholars — have agreed with this view. For

example, Lucien Lévy-Bruhl claimed that "the primitive mentality is a condition of the

human mind, and not a stage in its historical development."

Max Müller called myth a "disease of language". He speculated that myths arose due to the

lack of abstract nouns and neuter gender in ancient languages: anthropomorphic figures

of speech, necessary in such languages, were eventually taken literally, leading to the

idea that natural phenomena were conscious beings, gods.

The anthropologist James Frazer saw myths as a misinterpretation of magical rituals;

which were themselves based on a mistaken idea of natural law. According to Frazer,

man begins with an unfounded belief in impersonal magical laws. When he realizes that his applications

of these laws don't work, he gives up his belief in natural law, in favor of a belief

in personal gods controlling nature — thus giving rise to religious myths. Meanwhile,

man continues practicing formerly magical rituals through force of habit, reinterpreting

them as reenactments of mythical events. Finally, Frazer contends, man realizes that nature

does follow natural laws, but now he discovers their true nature through science. Here, again,

science makes myth obsolete: as Frazer puts it, man progresses "from magic through religion

to science". Robert Segal asserts that by pitting mythical

thought against modern scientific thought, such theories implied that modern man must

abandon myth. 20th-century theories

Many 20th-century theories of myth rejected the 19th-century theories' opposition of myth