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Lecture Notes Classic Mythology (GE2V14012)
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Lecture Notes from all Classical Mythology (GE2V14012) Lectures of Rolf Strootman.
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Lecture 1 || 25-4 || What is Mythology?Classical → Ancient Greeks and Romans
Today: What is mythology?
- The study of myth…
- But what is a myth?
Course manual information
- Mid-term exam (online)
- Tuesday, May 17th, 7pm to Wednesday, May 18th 11:59 pm (ca. 1 hour)
- Assignments, to be uploaded to Blackboard each week (schedule in course manual)
- A final take-home essay exam in Week 7 (Tuesday, June 7, 9:00 am, to Thursday,
June 9th, 11:59 pm)
Contents of today
- What is Mythology? definitions
- What is Mythology about
- What is the meaning of myths (probably)
1/ What is Mythology?
“Myth is a story” (Robert A. Segal, Myth (Oxford 2004))
A myth is a fictional story that is true because it is meaningful
Een mythe is een verzonnen verhaal dat waar is
Myths are the stories that order and explain everything. They have truth in them.
In summary
1. A myth is a story (=mythos)
2. A myth is a ‘traditional’ story
3. A myth is a meaningful story
4. Mythology and religion are connected
5. A myth is a functional story
Myth is a traditional tale with (secondary partial) reference to something of collective
importance (W. Burkert, Greek Mythology and Ritual (1979))
Types of myths (there are more than listed below)
Cosmogony = Creations myths;
Theogony = Myths that explain how the gods came into the world (polytheism);
Myths abouts Gods;
Hero myths;
Foundation myths = Where do the people come from, how was the city founded;
Etiological myths = Widespread stories that explain where things in the world come from
(explaining natural phenomena);
Etymological myths = Why do certain places / people have a certain name;
Literary myths (mythopoia) = Invented by a certain author (Tolkien for example).
VERY IMPORTANT!!!
, - Myths (often) are inconsistent stories;
- myths (usually) are not logical;
- there (regularly) are several versions and/or local variants;
- myths influence each other and they can melt together;
- myths are constantly in flux, there is no standard version;
- the recorder (written) version is usually not the ‘original’ one.
What is mythology not?
- saga
germanic tale
not too much magic
no gods
heroic tale around a historic core
set in an elite world (warriors, kings, aristocrats)
- legend
- fable
- allegorical tale
- animal tale (a form of fable)
- a clear, often explicit moral
- folktale
- fairy tale (a form of folktale)
- set in a world of common people (not heroes, gods and queens)
- time and place are undetermined
- anonymous protagonists
- stand-alone stories
- standardized motifs and compositions (3 times 3)
- and they lived happily ever after…
- not assumed to be based on real events
- ghost story
- urban myth (broodje aap verhaal)
- lier tale
2/ What is classical myth about?
Written sources:
Epic poetry: Homer(us), Apollonios, Virgil (Vergilius)
Greek poetry: Hesiod, Pindar, Theokritos
Latin poetry: Ovid(ius)
Mythography: Apollodoros
Tragedies: Aischylos, Sophokles, Euripides
Visual sources:
Vase paintings
Reliefs
Mosaics
Sculpture
We have to search for clues within these works to constructs myths
,Periodization of Greek History
Archaic Period ca. 800-500 BCE
Classical Period ca. 500-350 BCE
Hellenistic Period ca. 350-150 BCE
Roman Period ca. 150 BCE
3/ What is the meaning of myth?
Principal ‘schools’ in myth explanation
1. myths are a form of primitive (‘prescentific’) science (social darwinism)
2. myths establish, explain and legitimize social order (Malinowski);
3. myths are to be associated with (religious) ritual;
4. myths regulate the conduct of humans vis-à-vis the gods;
5. myths are the product of human psychology, in particular the (universal)
‘subconscious’;
6. each myth must be understood in its specific historical and cultural context;
7. myths originally were concerned with organizing the landscape.
Although often presented as monolithic, all these theories of myth can be true.
E. B. Tylor (1832-1917)
- Primitive Culture
- myths explain nature in a pre-scientic society
Lecture 2 || 26 - 6
3 // The meaning of myth
1. Myths are ‘primitive’ forms of science
○ Social Darwinism
○ Colonial influence
2. Myths establish and explain social order
○ Malinowski
3. Myths are to be associated with (religious) rituel
4. Myths are the product of human psychology
5. Myths help construct collective identities
○ Othering → we are ‘this’ and ‘others’ are weird
E.B. Tylor (1832-1917)
- Primitive Culture (1871)
- Theory → Myths as ‘primitive’ science
- Natural sciences and religions are opposites (both with the objective to try to
understand and control the physical world);
- written myths are versions of original myths as how they were told;
- these prehistoric primal myths (original myths) are primitive explanations of reality.
Friedrich Max Müller (1823-1900)
- An Indologist who applied then current linguistic theory to reconstruct prehistoric
‘primal myths’ and their dispersion across Eurasia, creating family trees.
- Used singularities to study/understand myths.
, - These primal myths are originally explanations of cosmological phenomena by
primitive agricultural societies, whose main concern is the seasons, viz. the sun.
- Believed all myths originated from India.
- (We do not believe all this anymore)
Andrew Lang
- Myths are pre-scientific explanations of the origin of things (=etiological myths).
Monolithic theory = Meant to explain ALL of mythology
Bronisław Malinowski (1884-1942)
- Turning point of Anthropology to fieldwork
- The end of armchair anthropology
- The interest on contemporary mythology was sparked
- Malinowski thought that: Stories had a function in society and were used to order
society. → Functionalism
- Theory: Myths explain social order and social hierarchies.
Summary
- Tylor: myths are primitive, pre-scientific explanations of natural phenomena.
- Müller: all (‘Indo-Germanic’) myths share a common background in primitive ‘primal
myths’ that explain the coming and going of the seasons, and the rising and setting of
the sun
- Lang: myths are primitive, pre-scientific explanations of the origins of all things in the
world.
Sacred Places || The relation between myths and landscape || Myths and sanctuaries
For example: Ovid(ius) always mentions where the myths he writes about take place.
Myths are connected to places, and also explain something about places (why they are
sacred).
Sanctuaries = Sacred places
In Greek mythology places usually are sacred because an epiphany (the intervention of a
God / the manifestation of a divine power) has taken place there.
Periodization of Greek History
Archaic Period ca. 800-500 BCE
- Archaos means old
- Around 800 BCE writing started
Classical Period ca. 500-350 BCE
- Supposed ‘Golden Age’
Hellenistic Period ca. 350-150 BCE
Roman Period ca. 150 BCE
1/ Myth, Religion and Landscape
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