MYTHS & LEGENDS EXPLAINED Neil philip Previously published as Annotated Guides: Myths & Legends C ontents LONDON, NEW YORK, MELBOURNE, MUNICH, AND DELHI Introduction 6 Cupid and Psyche 34 Art Editor Sasha Howard Project Editors Antonia Cunningham and Fergus Day Artemis and Actaeon 36 Senior Art Editor Heather McCarry Senior Managing Editor Anna Kruger Deputy Art Director Tina Vaughan Apollo and Daphne 38 Production Controllers Meryl Silbert and Manjit Sihra Picture Researcher Jo Walton King Midas 40 US Editor Chuck Wills Pan and Syrinx 42 For Ruth and Michael First published in the United States in 1999 Zeus and Danaë 44 This revised edition published in 2007 by DK Publishing 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014 Perseus and Andromeda 46 07 08 09 10 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 MD391 – 05/07 Osiris, Isis, and Nephthys The Tragedy of Oedipus 48 Detail from page 17 Copyright © 1999, 2007 Dorling Kindersley Limited Without limiting the rights under copyright The Labors of Hercules 50 reserved above, no part of this publication may E be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a gypt retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by Jason and the Golden Fleece 52 any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, The Creation 12 recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the Theseus the Hero 54 above publisher of this book. Re, the Sun God 14 Published in Great Britain The Minotaur 56 by Dorling Kindersley Limited. Osiris, Isis, and Horus 16 A catalog record for this book is available Dionysus and Ariadne 58 from the Library of Congress. ISBN: 978-0-7566-2871-0 S Leda and the Swan 60 umEria DK books are available at special discounts when purchased in bulk for sales promotions, premiums, The Epic of Gilgamesh 18 The Judgment of Paris 62 fund-raising, or educational use. For details, contact: DK Publishing Special Markets, 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014 or [email protected]. Odysseus Returns Home 64 i ran Dido and Aeneas 66 Ahura Mazda and Ahriman 20 g r rEEcE and omE Gods of Olympus 22 Prometheus 24 Bellerophon Aphrodite and Ares 26 Detail from page 47 The Rape of Persephone 28 Color reproduction by DK India, India and GRB, Italy Printed and bound by Toppan Printing Co Ltd, China Orpheus and Eurydice 30 Discover more at Venus From page 32 Aphrodite and Adonis 32 Voodoo Symbols Detail from page 91 n E p orthErn uropE olynESia The Norse Gods 68 Maui-of-a-Thousand-Tricks 106 The World Tree Myth 70 i ndia Sigurd the Dragon-Slayer 72 t c hE arribEan The Churning of the Ocean 108 Lohengrin 74 The Voodoo Gods 90 The Avatars of Vishnu 110 The Story of Väinämöinen 76 Shiva and His Family 112 n a orth mErica Rama and Sita 114 Mountainway 92 Lone Man 94 c hina Myths of the Arctic Circle 96 The Ten Suns of Heaven 116 The Eight Immortals 118 c a Entral mErica Legends of Quetzalcoatl 98 The Hero Twins 100 Japanese Dragon Detail from page 120 a uStralia The Dreaming 102 Tristan Kills Mordred Detail from page 82 The Killing of Lumaluma 104 c Eltic Lumaluma Detail from Lord of the Beasts 78 page 104 J apan The Holy Grail 80 The Sacred Mountain 120 Tristan and Iseult 82 Amaterasu Hides Away 122 The Death of Arthur 84 WESt africa thE grEEk godS 124 Eshu the Trickster 86 indEx 125 Venus From page 32 The Cosmic Serpent 88 acknoWlEdgmEntS 128 I  ntroductIon • n o tI It is in the nature of huMankind to tell stories, and at the root of every human culture are c u the stories we call myths—stories of the creation of the world and of humankind, of the deeds d o r of gods and heroes, and of the end of time. Such stories explain and justify the world, and t In define our role within creation. Once a civilization has become established, the myths that formed it may dwindle into superstition or entertainment, but even so, they never lose their intrinsic power, for the world’s mythologies enshrine all the poetry and passion of which the human mind is capable. From ancient Egypt to Greece and Rome, from West Africa to Siberia, from the Hindu concept of Brahman and the endless cycle of creation to the eternal Dreaming of the Australian Aboriginals, the same themes recur, as humankind engages with the great mysteries of life and death. The best definition of myth is Maya Deren’s in her book on the Voodoo gods: “Myth,” she writes, “is the facts of the mind made manifest in the fiction of matter.” What is Myth? Like poetry, mythology offers a The word myth derives from the Greek way of understanding the world mythos, signifying “word” or “story.” through metaphor. Stories adapt and A myth has different meanings for the change according to the teller and believer, the anthropologist, the folklorist, the context; myths are not fixed and the psychologist, the literary critic. That dogmatic but fluid and interpretive. is one of myth’s functions—to celebrate ambiguity and contradiction. There Myth and tiMe is no more point expecting a myth to Many mythologies start before the offer a single, clear, consistent message dawn of time, with the coming into than there is in trying to turn one of consciousness of a creator god, such as Shakespeare’s sonnets into plain prose. the Egyptian Re (see p. 12). Re himself is described as the awareness of an all-encompassing divine being, Nebertcher, the lord without limit. Mythological time, unlike clock time, is cyclical rather than linear. The Maya believed that this current It presupposes what the writer cycle of creation began on August 13, Mircea Eliade called “the myth of the 3114 bce. Although they projected events eternal return.” It is set in motion forward until at least 4772 ce, they did by a particular event—in Egypt, not think it would continue forever. Their the call of the Benu bird as sacred book, the Chilam Balam, tells us: it alighted upon the first “All moons, all years, all days, all winds, land. It will come to an end reach their completion and pass away. So eventually, and the cycle of does all blood reach its place of quiet, as it creation will begin again. reaches its power and its throne. Measured The mythology of was the time in which they could praise the Aztec and Maya, and of the splendor of the Trinity. Measured Native American nations such was the time in which they could know the as the Navajo, describes this sun’s benevolence. Measured was the time world as being the fifth one. For in which the grid of the stars would look the Navajo, the first four worlds were down upon them; and through it, keeping beneath this one, from which humanity watch over their safety, the gods trapped The First People climbed up in the myth of the emergence. within the stars would contemplate them.” This West African carving shows the world in For the Aztec, four suns had shone on Even the dualistic philosophy of the form of a calabash gourd, with the first man and woman and the cosmic serpent. The Fon call previous creations before this, the world Zoroastrianism, with its opposing gods of this serpent Aido-Hwedo, and he carried the of the sun Nahui Ollin, which is blown good and evil, Ahura Mazda and Ahriman, creator in his mouth when the world was made. across the sky by the breath of the was set in motion when the god of eternal Aido-Hwedo is said to have accompanied the first man and woman to earth. god Quetzalcoatl. time, Zurvan, gave birth to the twin gods. The Eternal Wheel of Time This Aztec calendar stone, found beneath the central plaza of Mexico City, is a wheel of time of many such accounts, and owes much to commemorating the five world the Sumerian/Babylonian account in the creations, of which the latest is the current world. The fifth sun, Epic of Gilgamesh, in which the Noah Nahui Ollin, was made by the gods figure is named Utnapishtim (see p. 19). at Teotihuacan (just north of The ancient Greeks told how Zeus modern Mexico City), which was also the birthplace of the gods tried to destroy mankind with a flood, but themselves. The stone is not a Prometheus (see p. 24) warned Deucalion fully-functioning calendar; and Pyrrha. Manu was saved from the the complex Aztec calendar was based on a 52-year cycle Hindu deluge Vishnu in the form his fish known as the calendar avatar, Matsya (see p. 110). Flood myths round, which reconciled can be found in Peru and in China, among the concurrent 260-day the Australian Aboriginals and in many and 365-day years. Native American cultures, including the Mandan myth of Lone Man (see p. 94). Our notion of time, Even in the 19th century, folklorists could the limited time of still collect in Serbia a cycle of Slavonic creation, is merely a myths about the great flood from which trick of Ahura Mazda’s the sole survivor Kranyatz was preserved to limit the power of by the trickster god of wine, Kurent. Ahriman. At the end of time, all will be purified, and—as in Norse the Creator One thing that all mythologies agree on is mythology—a fresh, that the world was created by the deliberate new creation will arise. act of a divine being, and that men and women were created especially to live in it. the flood In the Mandan creation myth, First Just as many mythologies look Creator and Lone Man send a mudhen forward to the destruction of this down to fetch sand from the bottom of the world in a catastrophe, such as the primeval flood, in order to make the land. Norse cataclysm called Ragnarok, The Ainu of Japan tell how the creator so many record a time, within this Kamui sent a water wagtail down from creation, when the gods grew angry heaven to accomplish the same task (see p. with humankind, and attempted 120). According to the Yoruba people to destroy them with a flood. The in West Africa, the world was made when biblical story of the deluge is one Obatala, the son of the great sky god Olorun, threw earth from a snail shell, and got a pigeon and a hen to scatter it. The supreme gods of Africa tend, like Olorun, to withdraw from their creation leaving the main work to their successors. In the original myth preserved by the priests of the Fon sky- cult, it is the androgynous deity Noah and the Flood Noah’s ark rides the flood after the biblical deluge, in a wood-engraving from the Nuremberg Bible of 1483. I God decided to destroy humanity n t because of its wickedness, but warned r o the pious Noah of the coming flood, d and told him to build the ark and take u c on board two of every living creature. t After the ark had grounded on Mount Io n Ararat, God sent the rainbow as a • symbol of his covenant never again to 7 destroy the creatures he had made. Noah lived to be 950 years old. 8 • n o tI c u d o Vishnu the Preserver tr Vishnu and his wife Lakshmi (or Shri) n are shown riding on their mount, the I celestial bird Garuda. Vishnu, the “wide-strider,” measured out the cosmos in three strides. He is regarded as the protector of the world, and because of his compassion for humankind, descends to earth in various avatar forms, such as Prince Rama, to fight evil. Whenever Vishnu is incarnated, so is Lakshmi, to be his bride. Here, Garuda is taking the loving couple to their own heaven, Vaikuntha. of the world, to take on his many avatar forms in order to help humanity in times of crisis. His final avatar, Kalkin, the white horse, will appear at the end of this era, to usher in a new age. The GreaT MoTher Creator gods tend to be male, but much of the work of creation may be delegated to a goddess. For example, among the Keres of the American Southwest, Utsiti, the creator god, who made the world from a clot of his own blood, sent his daughter Iatiku with her sister to make the earth fruitful. Iatiku sends her son to lead the people up into this world, and then Iatiku and her sister sing a creation song, all the while casting seeds Nana-Buluku who creates the world, and killing them all. So the lesser gods, the and images of their song out of a basket then gives it into the keeping of his children abosom, act as intermediaries between given them by Spider Woman (see p. 93). Mawu and Lisa (see pp. 88–89); but Nana- the sky god and humanity. We still talk of “mother earth.” Native Buluku is now almost forgotten, and the Often, as with the Yoruba god of fate, Americans consider this as a fact. Smohalla, work of creation credited to Mawu. Eshu (see pp. 86–87), such intermediaries the Wanapam founder of the Dreamer The Ashanti tell how the supreme god may be tricksters who introduce an element religion in the mid-19th century, said: “You Onyankopon (or ’Nyame) used to live of chance, play, and humor into humanity’s ask me to plow the ground! Shall I take a near men, but moved to the top of the sky relationship with the gods. Obatala, the knife and tear my mother’s bosom? Then because he was constantly annoyed by an creator, is hymned by the Yoruba as the when I die she will not take me to her bosom old woman who used to knock him with father of laughter, who rests in the sky “like to rest. You ask me to dig for stone! Shall her pestle as she pounded yams in her a swarm of bees.” The Mandans believe I dig under her skin for her bones? Then mortar. When the old woman realized what that First Creator actually turned into the when I die I cannot enter her body to be had happened, she told all her children to trickster god Coyote. Such tricksters, whose born again. You ask me to cut grass and make gather mortars and pile them on top of mischief may lead them into wickedness, hay and sell it, and be rich like white men! the other. At last they had a pile that are found throughout mythology, from the But how dare I cut off my mother’s hair?” nearly reached to Onyankopon. They Greek Dionysus to the Norse Loki to the An Anglo-Saxon charm beseeches the only needed one more mortar. So the old Japanese Susano (see pp. 58, 69, and 123). favor of “Erce, Erce, Erce, Mother of woman told them to take the mortar from But another theme is the Creator’s care Earth” with similar fervor. Yet, despite the the bottom, and put it on the top. When for the beings he has made. It is this care obvious connection between agricultural they did so, the whole pile collapsed, that leads Vishnu, the Hindu preserver and human fertility, the earth is not always of Gilgamesh, in which she first desires Such a belief illustrates the crucial Gilgamesh and then, when he rejects her, importance of myth in holding the world exacts a terrible revenge (see p. 18). together, just as the cosmic serpent coils The Egyptian Isis became absorbed into securely around the earth in the Fon creation Roman myth, and it is she who speaks, with story. Australian Aborginal stories about the the unmistakable voice of the great goddess, Dreamtime, such as the Gunwinggu story to Lucius, the hero of Apuleius’ novel The of Lumaluma (see pp. 102–3), are not just Golden Ass, when he is initiated into her entertainments or nursery tales—they are cult: “I am Nature, the universal Mother, sacred charters for existence. To understand mistress of all the elements, primordial them fully one must enter eternal time. child of time, sovereign of all things Similarly the myths underlying Navajo spiritual, queen of the dead, queen also of rituals such as Mountainway (see pp. 92–93), the immortals, the single manifestation of and its sandpaintings of the Holy People, all gods and goddesses that are.” define and express what it means to be Navajo. At the end of such a ritual, “The holdinG The World ToGeTher world before me is restored in beauty.” In the Mysteries of Eleusis in ancient When Jasper Blowsnake revealed the sacred Greece, the great goddess formed the Winnebago Medicine Rite to anthropologist central focus of Greek religion (see Paul Radin (published under the title p. 29). These rituals, open only to the initiated, related to the myth of the Nut, the Egyptian All-Mother grain goddess Demeter, and her daughter The Egyptian sky goddess Nut arches over the earth in this ancient tomb painting. She is about to swallow the evening Persephone, the ineffable maiden. Those sun, which is shown again on her upper arm as it starts its who witnessed the rites were assured of a night journey. Nut became regarded as the mother of all, new birth in death. The Mysteries were for even the sun god Re entered her mouth each night to travel through her body and be reborn next morning. A thought by the Greeks to “hold the figure of Nut inside Egyptian coffin lids promised the entire human race together.” same nurture and rebirth for the souls of the dead. Neolithic Mother Goddess The Venus of Willendorf, a stone figurine of a fertility goddess found at Willendorf in Austria, dates from the neolithic period. The breasts and belly are deliberately exaggerated in this representation of the great mother goddess. female. The Egyptians, for example, worshiped Geb as god of the earth, and his sister-bride Nut as the goddess of the sky. Nowhere has worship of the eternal female been so strong as in India, where various goddesses are worshiped under the enveloping spell of Mahadevi, the great goddess. Devi is the consort of the god Shiva (see pp. 112–13), and is worshiped as benign Parvati or Uma or as ferocious and vengeful Durga or Kali. Sankara wrote of her in the 9th century, “Your hands hold delight and pain. The shadow of death I n and the elixir of immortal life are yours.” tr o The combination of “delight and pain” d u is not confined to India. The great goddess c t of ancient Mesopotamia, variously called Io n Ishtar and Inanna, also combined the roles • of goddess of love and goddess of war. 9 These dual aspects are explored in the Epic