[Main Blog Post] [Book] Thoughts on Comparative Mythology

[jprussell]

I at last got around to reading and writing up my thoughts on Jaan Puhvel's Comparative Mythology, a book that I'm ashamed to admit I didn't know about a few months ago. If you're interested in the myths of folks who speak/spoke Indo-European languages, and most of all if you're interested in what we might be able to work out about the ancestral myths told by those who spoke the Proto-Indo-European mother tongue, you'll find lots to like here.

Comments

[k_a_nitz]

FWIW in German the word for Indo-European is still indogermanisch (Indo-Germanic).

The chief god in different Indo European pantheons

[illyria2001]

Something I've often wondered about is why the chief god in most IE pantheons is the Skyfather/Thunderer archetype (e.g. Zeus), but in the Norse it's Odin, who was more often compared to Hermes or Mercury. What was different in Germanic cultures that led to his rise in importance over Tyr?

Indo - European

[moser99]

When I got my American Heritage Dictionary 55 years ago, I was curious about their language tree inside the cover. English came from Indo-European? I met a Frisian back in the 1980s.

Thanks for writing this. This is as close to a follow-up as I've gotten!

(I had to replace the dictionary. It physically wore out. In the 1970s, college kids entertained themselves looking up naughty words. You would not see them in print anywhere else. Laughter until your eyes watered. The world was a more innocent place.)