Mythology is a very interesting cultural phenomenon. The significance of myths in modern culture is difficult to overestimate, because on their basis works of art, literature arose, and philosophical teachings were based. The uniqueness of this phenomenon lies in the fact that it has passed through millennia, preserved in the memory of generations. Consider the definition of a myth, analyze in detail their types, and also clarify how a myth differs from a fairy tale and a legend.
Myth: definition, properties, occurrence
Our distant ancestors tried to explain all kinds of natural phenomena, their place in the world, the origin of the Universe and its possible death. Because they had no scientific knowledge, they did not know physics, astronomy or anthropology. This is how myths were created. Gradually, with the development of science, interest in myths weakened, but they were passed from mouth to mouth and thus reached the present. This phenomenon is a real chronicle of human knowledge and ideas.
It is a mistake to believe that myth-making is the prerogative of ancient people. This is not so: and in modern times we encounter this phenomenon. There is still something surreal in human life,fantastic. This is explained by modern myths.
In the question of how a myth differs from a fairy tale, one should be guided by the functions of these phenomena. A fairy tale is designed to teach, educate, maybe even entertain. A myth that aims to explain the essence of things is quite another matter. Closest to him, researchers put fairy tales, where the elements of nature help the heroes.
Even more polar concepts are myths and legends. The latter are a reflection of a certain historical event, which is always perceived as real. Myths and legends and fairy tales were created by the people.
Cosmogonic myths
The content of such stories is diverse, because they affect all aspects of a person's life. Therefore, the main types of myths are distinguished depending on what they are talking about. In addition, there are those that were created before the beginning of any knowledge in a pre-class society, and there are those that are reflected in the culture of civilization.
Cosmogonic is the first myth of any system. It talks about how the world was created. As a rule, creation is preceded by chaos (ancient Greece), fragmentation, lack of order (ancient Egypt), the power of fire and water (mythology of the Scandinavians) or earth and sky in the world egg (mythology of ancient India).
All cosmogonic myths of the world are united by one plot: the creation of a system of world order around a certain axis. It can be a tree - world ash, like the ancient Scandinavians, or luminaries to control night and day in the Jewish tradition. Also, "order out of chaos" can create a marriage union. So, in the mythology of ancient Greece, this isUranus and Gaia, and in Polynesia - Papa and Rangi. It is noteworthy that the impetus for all this action is given by the supreme deity: Vishnu, God.
Further, these types of myths describe the creation of the first people and the departure from the affairs of the supreme deity with the transfer of ownership of creation into the hands of creatures.
Anthropogonic myths
Anthropogogical myths are close in subject matter to cosmogonic myths. Some scientists do not distinguish them into a separate group, but consider them an integral part of the legends about the origin of the Universe. They tell about the origin of a person or a married couple. The emergence of the first people may be different. Summarizing the myths of the world, we come to the conclusion that a person happens in the following ways:
- From totem animals - this is taught by the most ancient mythologies, for example, Australian.
- From wood and clay (the first appears in Norse mythology, the second - among the Egyptians, Akkadians, Ob Ugrians).
- By moving from the lower world to the earth (among the Sumerians, the peoples of Tropical Africa).
- Revival of people, endowing them with a soul (this is usually the prerogative of mythologies, where there are two opposing deities, one, "evil", is made unable to create a real person, and only the supreme deity gives soul and life). As an example, one can cite Christian mythology and Ob-Ugric.
Astral, solar and lunar myths
The types of myths that tell about the origin of stars and planets are close to cosmogonic - astral. It is on them thatastrology that still exists today. From the point of view of the ancient constellations, these are transformed animals, plants, and even people (for example, a hunter). The interpretation of the Milky Way in various mythologies is interesting. Most often it is a connection between the worlds. The ancient Greeks associated it with Hera's milk, the Babylonians imagined it as ropes holding the Earth in the Universe.
Our distant ancestors used to identify certain deities or animals with planets and stars, they observed their movement across the night sky, revealed patterns. This is how they appear in the mythologies of China and the Middle East. It was these beliefs that gave rise to the development of astrology.
A special place is occupied by ancient myths about the sun. They are in almost all mythologies. In some, these are heroes who somehow got to heaven, sometimes for misconduct (Scandinavia), in others - a couple of spouses or a brother and sister, where one (the moon) obeys the other (the sun). For example, this is characteristic of the mythology of Korea.
Many nations identified their rulers with the children of the sun. These were the myths of the peoples of Egypt, Japan, South America (the Inca tribe).
Etiological myths
Myths that explain the emergence of plants, animals, weather phenomena, landscape features are called etiological. These are very ancient myths dating back to primitive society. Of course, the ability to discover the cause of things unites mythological beliefs in general, however, it is etiological ones that purposefully tell about the origin of everything that surrounds a person.
At the very first step are the myths,which we now perceive as fairy tales of the peoples of Australia, New Guinea, and the Adaman Islands. For example, they explain the day blindness of bats, the absence of a tail in a marsupial bear.
One step up are the beliefs that explain the appearance of plants and animals in principle. These are the myths about the origin of dolphins from malicious shipbuilders, and the spider is the weaver Arachne, punished by Aphrodite.
The most perfect etiological beliefs tell about the origin of the luminaries: the sun, the moon, the firmament. Such myths exist in every religion. For example, in New Zealand and Egypt, the appearance of the sky is explained by a higher power that “torn off” the sky from the earth. Also, the myths of the peoples, absolutely all, explain the daily and annual movement of the sun across the sky.
Cult myths are a subcategory of etiological myths: they tell how this or that ritual happened, why it must be performed this way and not otherwise.
Heroic myths
The heroes of the myths of this subject are the center of the story. It tells about life, any feats, performing overwhelming tasks. The structure is roughly the same:
- The miraculous birth of a hero.
- Feats or trials imposed by the father or some other close relative, the future father-in-law, the leader of the tribe, and even a deity can also be the initiator. As a rule, at this stage, the hero is an exile: he violated a social taboo, committed a crime.
- Meeting future wife and marriage.
- Continuation of exploits.
- Death of a hero.
If we talk about the mythology of the ancient Greeks, herethe heroes of myths are the children of a god and a mortal woman. It is these beliefs that underlie fairy tales and other epic works.
Totemic and cult myths
The following types of myths are quite similar in subject matter: totemic and cult. A classic example of the former is the deities of Ancient Egypt, each of whom had certain zoomorphic features: a crocodile, a cat, a jackal, and others. These myths reflect the relationship of certain groups, castes of people and totems, which are animals or plants.
Besides the Egyptian deities, one can cite as an example the mythology of the Australian tribes, where the sacred stones, animals, plants are the reincarnated zoomorphic first ancestors who once lived. Papuans and Bushmen had the same beliefs.
Very often in totemic myths there is the theme of the marriage of a zoomorphic creature and an ordinary person. As a rule, the origin of nationalities is explained in this way. It is among the Kirghiz, Orochs, Koreans. Hence the images of fairy tales about the frog princess or Finist the Bright Falcon.
Cult myths are perhaps the most mysterious. Their contents are known to a few, mainly to the cult keepers. They are very sacred and tell about the root cause of any action. A classic example is bacchanalia organized in honor of the ancient Greek god Dionysus. Another example is from ancient Egypt. The myths about the gods Osiris and Isis underlay the cult action, when Isis was looking for the body of her lover, after which he was resurrected.
Eschatological myths
The majority of beliefs are logically completed by eschatological tales,talking about the end of the world. These types of myths are antonymous with cosmogonic ones. Only the world is not created here, but destroyed. As a rule, the impetus is the impoverishment of the moral foundations of society. Such beliefs are typical for highly developed mythologies. For example, among the ancient Scandinavians, Hindus, Christians.
The topics of eschatological beliefs can be divided into several groups:
- Described a global catastrophe that separated the world of myth from the present. These are the views of the Kets and the Saami.
- Loss of the "golden age" of mankind, its imperfection. An example is Iranian mythology, where three space eras are described, each in moral qualities worse than the previous one. This also includes Ragnarok from the mythology of the Scandinavians - a universal fire that will renew the planet.
- Another topic is the cyclical nature of civilizations, where at the end of each period a catastrophe occurs, as if cleansing the Earth. These are, for example, the era of four suns in Aztec mythology. The first ends with a jaguar attack, the second with hurricanes, the third with a fire, and the fourth with a flood.
- Messianism. It is a mistake to believe that this is the prerogative of Christian beliefs. There are myths about messianic gods in Hinduism (Kalki), Islam (Mahdi), and Buddhism (Buddha Maitreya).
Calendar myths
Calendar types of myths are closely connected with cosmogonic and cult ones. It was common for mankind to explain the change of seasons, day and night, the death of nature in autumn and winter and the resurrection in spring.
These thoughts are reflected in the calendar myths. They are based on observations of astronomical phenomena, festivities on the occasion of the entry into the new calendar year, harvesting and planting. Consider the most interesting mythologies from the standpoint of this topic.
If we talk about the change of months in a year, there is a close connection with astral myths. The alternating months are explained in terms of the signs of the zodiac. Mesopotamian mythology was especially successful in this.
In the beliefs of the ancient Egyptians, the god Thoth was responsible for time, its change and the movement of the luminaries in astrology and astronomy. It is thanks to him that the year is divided into 365 days. The last 5 were allocated so that the deities Osiris, Set, Isis and others were born. The five-day celebrations at the end of the calendar year were dedicated to them. If we talk about the change of day and night, the Egyptians explained it this way: the god Ra descends on a boat into the underworld, or Set and Horus are fighting.
In ancient Rome, each calendar month was attributed to a certain deity: April - Aphrodite, June - Juno, March - Mars. The beginning of each month was determined by the priest on the new moon. In adjoining Roman Greek mythology, there were deities - mountains, responsible for the change of seasons.
The god Marduk from Sumerian and Akkadian mythology was responsible for the calendar. The New Year for these peoples began on the day of the vernal equinox.
The change of seasons in some mythologies is associated with the life and death of a deity. Suffice it to recall the ancient Greek story of Demeter and Persephone. Hades stole the latter to his underground kingdom. Demeter, being the goddess of fertility, missed her daughter so much that she deprived the earth of fertility. Although Zeus ordered Hades to return Persephone, she was forced to return to the realm of the dead once a year. The Greeks associated the change of seasons with this. Approximately similar plots with the mythical heroes Osiris, Yarila, Adonis, Baldr.
Modern mythology
It is a mistake to think that only ancient civilizations were engaged in myth-making. This phenomenon is also characteristic of modern times. The difference of modern mythology is that it is based on extensive scientific knowledge. Having built powerful telescopes and seeing the surface of Mars, people began to create mythical theories about the possible existence of life there, and all kinds of explanations for "black holes" can also be included here. It can be said that all modern science fiction is a kind of myths, because it tries to explain phenomena that are still incomprehensible.
Also, the transformation of heroic myths can be considered such heroes of films and comics as Spider-Man, Batman, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Indeed, each of them has its own history, rejection by society (exile); they perform fantastic feats for the benefit of society.
It is also worth mentioning modern urban mythology. Fantastic creatures, its fruits, appeared in the minds of people already in the XX-XXI centuries. Along with such creatures as, for example, gremlins, entire urban myths appeared.
As a rule, they are based on the historical realities of a particular city and its inhabitants. For example, stories about the dungeons of Kaliningrad andtreasures hidden there by the retreating Nazis during the capture of the city by the Soviet army.
