Comparatist Mythology

Commentary

Myths go back extremely far in time, before written language It is a natural human instinct to try to personify things that we do not understand, and nature and the beginnings of existence are very difficult to explain. Most ancient peoples may have personified the earth as a a female (bringing new life, things being 'born' out of the ground like trees and rivers etc) People today still describe good nutrient land as 'fertile'.

The sky was mostly male, as people may have personified rain as ejaculation, as the rain always brought 'fertile' land where things grow. In Greek tradition and Hittite, they may have believed that the only way to explain the birth of Gods is not through rain but the ejaculation or castration of other Gods, as rain is not divine enough to bring about the birth of gods.

Similartities do exist between Greek and Hittite mythology, such as castration, swallowing of genitals/embryos, blood/sperm from gods impregnating Earth, infant god concealment, swallowing of stones instead of infant gods as well as various parts of Zeus' battle in his ascent as ruler being similar to Teshub's battles.

This leads us to reconsider the idea of comparitive mythology. Previously we had dismissed such similarities as coincidenses based on the human condition, on the premise that as humans we may have similar ancient mythologies based on our experience of the World. Similarities such as the triadic succession of gods could still be classified as so. But comparative similarities such as mentioned above that are somewhat specific, and such as the importance of Mount Casius, leads me to believe these mythologies did indeed influence one another - or may perhaps both be based on a prior myth.