myth

Literature

2022

We explain what a myth is and what is the origin of this traditional story. Also, its main characteristics and some examples.

Myths have no historical testimony but are considered valid in the culture.

What is a myth?

A myth is a traditional, sacred story, endowed with a symbolic character, that usually relates extraordinary and transcendent events involving supernatural or fantastic beings (such as gods or demigods, monsters, etc.), and that function within the framework of a mythology or a cosmogony (conception of the universe) determined.

For example, the myths of ancient Greece responded to his culture religious and the way in which they understood the universe and explained its origin, so its heroes, gods, monsters and traditional episodes, inherited orally (and later in writing) from previous generations, contained all that very specific cultural load.

Myths do not have historical testimony, that is, they are not verifiable, despite the fact that they are generally considered true or valid in the culture. This is because they function as imaginary explanations for complex phenomena, and serve to convey values, beliefs and concepts to generations to come. Myths don't work outside of such belief systems.

Since the entry into force of the scientific values ​​and the enlightened thinking, the term myth was loaded with a pejorative sense, used to indicate that some belief or assumption was due more to the order of the imaginary or of faith, than to that of tangible and verifiable facts.

At the same time, the term is used contemporaneously as synonymous epic, bombastic, or to refer to the central and important stories of a community determined.

Origin of the myth

Myths generally have an oral and traditional origin, inheritance of the primary ages of cultures, in which the construction of a story and a narrative imaginary was necessary to "explain" the origin of things or certain codes of conduct. Precisely for this reason, myths vary enormously in their transmission throughout the generations and generally there are different versions of the same myth.

The great religious, political or existential events of humanity are usually accompanied by myths: from the creation of the universe, the founding of Ancient Rome to the use of corn as food The main feature of certain pre-Hispanic American cultures, myths answer fundamental human questions and provide them with an imaginary and narrative accompaniment.

Characteristics of a myth

The myths are characterized, according to the French anthropologist and ethnologist Claude Levi-Strauss, by:

  • Narratively address existential questions of humanity, such as the creation of things, the origin of things traditions, the death, birth, etc.
  • Being starred by irreconcilable contrary concepts, such as creation-destruction, lifedeath, gods-men, good-evil, that somehow define the philosophical poles of the culture that created them.
  • In the end it provides a reconciliation of irreconcilable opposites to calm anguish or provide a certain sense of harmony, Justice or peace.

Examples of myths

Classical Antiquity is full of myths that have survived to this day. For example, the Greek myth of Orion, a famous hunter and hero born in Boeotia, of which there are numerous variants and versions, relates that he was blinded by passion when he contemplated the daughters of Pleyone, an oceanic nymph, for which he dedicated himself to chase them for seven years throughout Greece.

The Pleiades, named for their mother, begged the father god Zeus for their salvation and were raised to the sky, where they became the set from stars of the same name. Orion, frustrated in his desire, died much later due to a scorpion sting, and was also taken to the sky by the gods, so that he could continue his pursuit up there. But they did the same later with the scorpion that killed him, thus giving rise to both the Orion and Scorpio constellations.

A small review of the most popular mythologies could include the Judeo-Christian (The myth of Eden, the myth of Noah's Ark, the Myth of Moses and the forty years in the desert), the Greek (Pandora's box, Theseus and the Minotaur, Ulysses and the Trojan horse) or to pre-Columbian mythology (The Popol Vuh of the Mayans, or The origin of the moon in Teotihuacan of the Aztecs).

Differences between myth and legend

The fundamental difference between myths and other popular tales lies in their key cultural function. While myths offer narrative and fantastic explanations for events of great cultural or philosophical importance in their culture, such as the origin of the Earth or of the constellations in the sky, as in the previous example, the narrations Rather, the popular ones offer traditional stories of moral teaching, which work towards a final moral that seeks to transmit values.

In the case of legends, they usually narrate fantastic and explanatory versions of real and historical events (the legend of the Cid campeador, for example), recognizable and often with real protagonists. On the other hand, myths are not verifiable and are usually located in ancient times, since they tend to point to original or foundational themes.

Finally, myths are part of complex webs of meaning in a culture, whereas a legend can simply narrate fantastically a particular event in the history of a region.

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