Text — Mythology Registry

Cath Maige Tuired Irish saga of divine battles and sovereignty. Historia Regum Britanniae Geoffrey of Monmouth's "History of the Kings of Britain", the book that gave the world King Arthur as a chronicle fact. Le Morte d'Arthur Thomas Malory's great compilation of Arthurian legend, the book through which the whole Matter of Britain reached the modern world. Lebor Gabála Érenn Irish mythical history of invasions and origins. Mabinogion Welsh tales of heroism, magic, and mythology.

Acallam na Senórach The Colloquy of the Ancients, the great prose epic of the Fenian cycle, told across a winter's night to Saint Patrick. Adventure Tales Voyage and wandering narratives — heroes at sea, over land and through marvels, tested by the world's edges. Aeneid Virgil's national epic of Aeneas's flight from Troy and founding destiny, Rome's answer to Homer. Afterlife Narrative Stories describing the soul’s journey post-death. Analects The collected sayings of Confucius, assembled by his disciples — the foundational text of the East Asian moral tradition. Animal Fables Stories in which animals speak and act as people, so that their moral lands on the reader ungloved. Apocalyptic Visions Revelations of the world's end: the hidden timetable, the final battle, the judgment and the world remade. Atharvaveda The fourth Veda, a collection of spells, charms and healing lore alongside hymns of philosophical speculation. Beowulf Old English heroic epic of the warrior Beowulf and his three great battles, the founding work of English literature. Comedy Myths The humorous side of the sacred: gods who lust, cheat and bungle, and myths that laugh while they teach. Cosmogonic Myth Stories of universe creation and order. Cosmogonic Myths Narratives of universe and world creation. Divine Conflicts The wars of the gods: succession battles, giant-killing campaigns and the order won out of chaos by force. Divine Council The assembly of the gods in session, debating the fates of mortals as one court of heaven. Flood Myths The worldwide story-type in which a flood destroys a wicked generation and a chosen survivor renews humanity. Grettis Saga The saga of Grettir Ásmundarson, Iceland's strongest outlaw, cursed to a long life and a bad end in the highlands. Heroic Saga Tales of heroic deeds and quests. Kalevala The Finnish national epic, compiled by Elias Lönnrot from folk singers' oral poems in the 19th century. King Lists Genealogies that chain rulers back to gods or first ancestors, making political order look like cosmic order. Love Stories Myths of lovers — divine and mortal — whose passion founds cities, causes wars and survives death itself. Metamorphoses Ovid's epic of transformation, weaving some 250 myths from creation to the deification of Caesar into one continuous poem. Miracle Stories Tales of divine or supernatural interventions. Moral Tales Narratives built to teach: virtue rewarded, pride punished, the scales of heaven made visible in a story. Nibelungenlied The Middle High German epic of Siegfried's murder and Kriemhild's vengeance, the German counterpart of the Volsung legend. Njáls Saga The "Burnt Njál", the longest and finest of the Icelandic family sagas, a tragedy of law, honour and fire. Origin Stories Myths explaining the beginnings of cultures or the world. Prophetic Texts Texts foretelling divine or cosmic events. Puranas Indian texts of cosmology, genealogy, and divine tales. Rigveda Ancient Indian hymns of creation and divine praise. Ritual Hymn Chants or songs used in sacred ceremonies. Sacred Quests The quest narrative: a hero sent for an object, a healing or an answer, transformed by the seeking itself. Samaveda The Veda of melodies, the hymnal of the sacrificial chant and the root of Indian sacred music. Shahnameh Abolqasem Ferdowsi's "Book of Kings", the thousand-year-old epic that carries the memory of pre-Islamic Iran. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight The 14th-century alliterative masterpiece in which Gawain's exchanged blows with a green giant become a test of honour. Skáldskaparmál The "Language of Poetry", Snorri Sturluson's handbook of poetic names and the myths behind them. Song of Roland The chanson de geste of Roland's last stand at Roncevaux Pass, the oldest and greatest of the French epics. Táin Bó Cúailnge The Cattle Raid of Cooley, Ireland's great epic, the war of Ulster and Connacht over a prize brown bull. Tao Te Ching The classic of the Way and its power, Laozi's terse poem on acting with the grain of nature. Therigatha The Psalms of the Elder Nuns, the oldest surviving collection of women's religious literature in the world. Tragedy Myths Stories of hubris, fate, and downfall. Trickster Tales Stories of the boundary-breaking trickster, fool and creator at once, whose rule-breaking remakes the world. Underworld Journey The descent narrative: a living hero, goddess or soul travels into the land of the dead and returns with knowledge. Upanishads Indian philosophical texts on spirituality and cosmology. War Epics Narratives of heroic battles and conflicts. Wisdom Literature The international genre of instruction: how to live well, speak prudently, honour parents and fear the gods. Yajurveda The Veda of sacrificial formulae, the handbook of the priests who performed the great rituals.

Kojiki The "Record of Ancient Matters", Japan's oldest surviving book and the founding text of Shinto myth. Nihon Shoki The "Chronicles of Japan", the court's official history in classical Chinese and the second-oldest book of Japan. Saga of the Volsungs The Icelandic Völsunga saga, the great heroic legend of Sigurd the dragon-slayer and the cursed treasure of the Rhine. Zhuangzi The Daoist masterpiece of stories and paradoxes, teaching freedom through the tale of the butterfly's dream.

Atra-Hasis Mesopotamian epic of creation and flood. Book of the Dead Egypt's papyrus guide to the afterlife, the collection of spells the dead needed to reach the Field of Reeds. Coffin Texts The vast funerary corpus of Egypt's Middle Kingdom, painted on coffins to carry the dead through the underworld. Perceval Chrétien de Troyes's unfinished romance of Perceval and the Grail, the poem that set the Grail legend in motion. Pyramid Texts The oldest substantial body of religious writing in the world, carved in the pyramids of Egypt's Old Kingdom kings.

Apollodorus' Library A handbook of Greek mythology, the single most valuable summary of the myths to survive from antiquity. Argonautica Greek epic of Jason and the Argonauts’ quest. Homeric Hymns Greek poems praising gods and their deeds. Iliad Homeric epic of the Trojan War’s final year, foundational text of Greek myth and Western literature. Odyssey Greek epic of Odysseus’s journey and trials. Theogony Hesiod's account of the origins of the gods and the cosmos, the oldest systematic Greek genealogy of divinity. Works and Days Hesiod’s Greek poem on labor, morality, and myth.

Bhagavad Gita The Song of the Lord, Krishna's counsel to the warrior Arjuna on the eve of battle, the most read scripture of Hinduism. Divyavadana Buddhist tales of divine and moral deeds. Jataka Tales The stories of the Buddha's former lives, moral fables in which every tale ends with the Buddha naming himself. Mahabharata The longest epic poem in the world, the war of the Bharata cousins framed by the wisdom of the Bhagavad Gita. Pali Canon The complete scriptures of Theravada Buddhism, preserved in the Pali language as the "Three Baskets", the Tipitaka. Ramayana Valmiki's epic of Rama, Sita and Ravana — the model of duty, devotion and dharma for half a continent. Ramcharitmanas Tulsidas's "Lake of the Deeds of Rama", the Awadhi retelling of the Ramayana that became the most recited book of North India. Theragatha Buddhist verses of monks’ spiritual experiences. Vedas The four oldest scriptures of Hinduism, revealed to the rishis and preserved for millennia by exact oral recitation.

Popol Vuh The K'iche' Maya book of creation and the hero twins, the single most important mythological text of the Americas.

Dumuzi and Inanna Mesopotamian myths of love, death, and rebirth. Enuma Elish Mesopotamian epic of creation and divine conflict. Epic of Gilgamesh Mesopotamian epic of heroism and mortality. Etana Myth The oldest Mesopotamian legend of a king carried to heaven on an eagle's back to win an heir. Myth of Adapa The Mesopotamian tale of the sage who refused the bread and water of life, and so lost immortality for humanity. Nergal and Ereshkigal The Mesopotamian myth of how the god of plague came to rule the underworld beside its queen. Sumerian King List The ancient list that hands kingship down from heaven, mixing antediluvian reigns of tens of thousands of years with verifiable dynasties.

Gylfaginning Prose Edda section narrating Norse creation and cosmology. Hávamál The sayings of the High One — Odin's own wisdom verses on how to live, travel, love and stay shrewd. Heimskringla Snorri Sturluson's chronicle of the kings of Norway, history told through the sagas from Odin's arrival to 1177. Orkneyinga Saga The saga of the Earls of Orkney, the only medieval chronicle devoted to the Norse earldom of the northern isles. Poetic Edda Collection of Norse mythological poems. Völuspá The prophecy of the seeress, the opening poem of the Poetic Edda and the Norse myth of the world from beginning to doom. Younger Edda Prose Edda, a Norse mythological and poetic guide.