The Origins of the World's Mythologies [E.J. Michael Witzel]
The Origins of the World's Mythologies [E.J. Michael Witzel]
[Biggest Questions] [Big Books] [Occult]
The Origins of the World's Mythologies
E.J. Michael Witzel
Oxford University Press, New York. 2012. Paperback. Some creasing to spine and cover, otherwise unmarked.
From the publisher:
"This remarkable book is the most ambitious work on mythology since that of the renowned Mircea Eliade, who all but single-handedly invented the modern study of myth and religion. Focusing on the oldest available texts, buttressed by data from archeology, comparative linguistics and human population genetics, Michael Witzel reconstructs a single original African source for our collective myths, dating back some 100,000 years."
The Origins... is a singularly fascinating attempt to thread all of humanities stories together into one narrative, with a discreet origin. Utterly fascinating for those of us who wondered what life may have been like at the earliest spark of human cognition. Further, the case made here, of a total, almost genetic interconnectedness, has serious implications to the occultist approach to the "great chain of being". Highly recommended, very academic.