MYTHS ARE HISTORY
Introduction
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On Seeing the Past Anew:
Notes on the Historical Approach to Myths of Creation |
This book argues for an historical approach to a comparative analysis and synthesis of the myths of creation found worldwide. These myths were stories that passed into history, and thereby imparted meaning to history, for dozens of concurrent Bronze and Iron age cultures around the globe. But considering how these stories seem best understood today as imaginative responses to physically overwhelming natural events in late prehistory — this book takes up this historical perspective as the absolute origin of all myth-making peoples’ cosmovisions and regular ritual observances, and the very ground of the direct parallels and cross-correlations that run so distinctly between them.
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In the comparative reading of creation myths that follows, I aim to present the cosmological events witnessed by humankind as a coherently integrated series of events that impacted all of planet Earth. The key mythological traits, tropes and themes featured herein derive from the primary sources of dozens of cultures worldwide — from the earliest written examples of the Bronze and Iron ages, to the word-of-mouth testimonies of preliterate cultures recorded near and far over the past few hundred years. What is presented here, these ancient cosmovisions retold, should be of paramount interest to all humankind, as regards the modern recovery of the cultures and civilizations of our myth-making ancestors, and the visual vocabulary of their mythologies that still remains the common heritage of everyone alive today.
It has indeed for some time been generally known that similar myths and ritual practices could once be found in almost all cultures, varying in composition and complexity according to place and time. But up to now, however, these various cultural renditions, by nature forming an organic whole, have been dispersed in hundreds of various volumes among several sub-disciplines of scientific study. — Nevertheless, our initial inquiries into the past have already demonstrated that world history always formed an organic whole; and the affairs of one corner of the world have always been interlinked with those of all other corners. Not only is there no real incompatibility between myth and history, myth and history have always been mutually interdependent from the start. |
Therefore, along these lines — emphasizing the basic principle that “seeing was believing,” and focusing our attention on how myth-making cultures related to the celestial heavens in the past — what follows here is a synoptic overview: a systematic, comparative survey of all known available materials relative to the mythological theme of creation: arranged in an anthology-like gathering of bundled extracts, by which many cultural traditions may be more easily compared and contrasted systematically, from one end of the globe to the other.
It should then become perfectly possible, in setting forth the basic patterns revealed by this analysis, to venture explanations for the direct comparisons and contrasts we find around the globe; and from there begin to place analogous tropes from multiple cultures side by side — and even position them in sequential order. Our ultimate goal here is to reconcile as many cultural renditions as possible into a chronological framework of events, and offer a coherent account of the larger, all-inclusive cosmological history of the ancient world as a unified whole. |
Nevertheless, the following reconstruction is not exhaustive, nor is it the only assemblage possible. I am far from the first to try my hand at arranging the world’s mythologies in an ideal and timeless history, in which all the actual histories of all nations could be embodied. I make no claim to have added to the stock of detailed historical information, but only to have assigned a new setting and made a new arrangement of to previously established facts, unseen clues and long-overlooked illuminating details. — For these reasons, almost everything stated in the following survey of prehistory remains only probable at best.
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The study of comparative mythology in a multi-cultural context presents us with an opportunity to extract from the historical cultural records of many regions an unprecedented view of the memorable astronomical, geophysical and ethnological events that unfolded during the past several thousand years. The task of analyzing the world’s bulky mythological literature, carefully distinguishing the various motifs at play, and arranging it all under one historical conspectus, however, will require the employment of some specific tactics and principles of research in order to be meaningfully successful.
— In light of all the above, three basic steps of paramount importance seem called for: |