Introduction
Mythology refers to the scholarly study of the different myths associated with different cultures. Myths are stories that tend to explain why things are or happen the way they do. These stories include stories of different cultural heroes and heroes; thus, the term mythology refers to the study and interpretation of such stories. There are several theories that explain the origin and classification of myths they include: euhemerism, allegory, personification, and the myth ritual theory.
Theories explaining the origin of myths
Euhemerism
This theory expounds on the conceptualization of myths as actual accounts of vast ages events and that those who recount these accounts as storytellers repeated the stories to take up the status of gods. For example, the myth about a king who though his people to interpret the wind and use it to sail, the Indian mythology, e.g., the Jakarta tales, etc. (Armstrong, 2006)
Allegory
Other theorists argued that some myths originated from the allegories for natural occurrences. For example, Apollo was to mean fire (Apollo was the Greek god of the sun, prophecy, music, youth, and hearing), and so on. Others said that myths originated from the allegories of religious or philosophical issues (Australian Aborigine Creation Myth 2006)
Personification
Some scholars believed that myths also resulted from the personification of human forces and abstracts. According to these scholars, in ancient times the natural phenomena such as wind and fire were worshiped, and gradually they became to be associated with the Supreme Being (Adams, 1992).
The myth-ritual theory
Myths rose to explain the occurrence of rituals. The proponents of this theory claim that in ancient times rituals were conducted, and people forgot the purpose of that rituals. For example, it is believed that religious values arose from the failure in magic that when believers of magic lost faith in it, the myth for religion offered them an alternative account (Armstrong, 2006).
Comparative mythology
Comparative mythology refers to the systematic comparison of myths. However, it is important to note. The systemic analysis is based on myths from various cultural grounds. It outlines common myths for different cultures. Most of the 19th-century mythology is more of comparison (Adams & Page, 1996).
Approaches to comparative mythology
There are several approaches applied in comparative mythology. This includes structural, psychological, and linguistic approaches.
Linguistic
This approach tends to compare and contrast myths of different cultures. For example, they compare the names of gods from different cultural backgrounds. In this relation, mythologist argues that there is a relationship between religious names given to gods in the Indian and European cultures (Lewis, 2005),
Structural
Other scholars analyze the underlying structure of different myths. For example, Russian fairy tales have the same plot in which the occurrences of events are predictable (Adams, 1992). In determining the underlying structural relationship, they came to the conclusion that myths serve the purpose of uniting all the culture hence removing the tension created by the rituals (Levine, 2005).
Psychological
On the other hand, some scholars associated with the sociologist Sigmund Freud argued that myths from different cultures symbolized the same psychological forces in those cultures. They argue that there are several stories from different cultures that reflect the same expression of different cultures.
The Roman Mythology and the Greek Mythology
These myths consisted of the Romanic cultures, values, ritual activities, and stories of various supernatural happenings from the period dated from earlier Christianity. However, according to the scholars of Romanic mythology the Romanic mythology was affected by Greek mythology, and as a result, it was completely replaced. According to UNVR history, the website origins of myths were unknown to Roman writers. Poet Ovid, who created the Fasti (Calendar), is one among many classical writers who drew their mythical works from inspirations such as Hellenistic models and in their works (UNVR history, website, 2005). These classical writers and poets based their literature on Greek beliefs to cap Roman tradition gaps.
A cross-cultural examination of myths highlights several similarities among them this including theories that talk about gender, marriage, religion, role of human beings. Studies also have shown that there are other similarities and differences between the Australian aboriginal myths and the Pima of India and among the Japanese myths. One major element of contrast is that among the aboriginal myths, references are made to the females, while among the Pima and the Japanese, references are made to the males (Culture and evolution, 2006).
In today’s culture, mythology is illustrated in music and dressing code. In music, mythology is illustrated in the assumption that culturally valuable music composed is influenced by the myths of the long existed legend and heroes. It is also argued that myths have also influenced a lot the structure of music. It is argued that despite the fact that today’s lifestyle and dressing is different from the ancient one, all the clothing has an aspect of culture in them in relation to the culture of a particular country (Brian, 1998).
References
Adams, D (1992). The World of Myth: An anthology, New York: Oxford UPŃŽ
Adams, D & Page, J (1996). Goddess: myths of the female, New York: Oxford UPŃŽ
Armstrong, K, (2006) “A Short History of Myth”. Knopf Canada, 2006.
Australian Aborigine Creation Myth. (2006). Creation Myths. Williams University. Web.
Brian, P (1998) Reading about the world, Washing State University Press.
Culture and evolution (2006). Mongol mythology, Web.
Levine, B., D. (2005). The Historian, Greek Gods, and Human Lives: What We Can Learn from Myths Vol. 67,
Lewis, D. P (2005). Owls in mythology and culture. , Web.