Introduction
The prominent civilized nations, such as the Babylonians, Egyptians, Hebrews, and Hindoos, the inhabitants of Iran and of Persia, the Greeks and the Romans as well as the Teutons and others, all began at an early stage to glorify their heroes, mythical princes and kings, founders of religions, dynasties, empires or cities, in brief their national heroes, in a number of poetic tales and legends. The history of the birth and of the early life of these personalities came to be especially invested with fantastic features, which in different nations even though widely separated by space and entirely independent of each other present a baffling similarity, or in part a literal correspondence. Many investigators have long been impressed with this fact, and one of the chief problems of mythical research still consists in the elucidation of the reason for the extensive analogies in the fundamental outlines of mythical tales, which are rendered still more enigmatical by the unanimity in certain details, and their reappearance in most of the mythical groupings.[1]
The mythological theories, aiming at the explanation of these remarkable phenomena, are, in a general way, as follows:
(1) The “Idea of the People,” propounded by Adolf Bastian[2][1868]. This theory assumes the existence of elementary thoughts, so that the unanimity of the myths is a necessary sequence of the uniform disposition of the human mind, and the manner of its manifestation, which within certain limits is identical at all times and in all places. This interpretation was urgently advocated by Adolf Bauer[3] [1882], as accounting for the wide distribution of the hero myths.
(2) The explanation by original community, first applied by Th. Benfey [Pantschatantra, 1859] to the widely distributed parallel forms of folklore and fairy tales. Originating in a favorable locality [India] these tales were first accepted by the primarily related [namely the Indo-Germanic] peoples, then continued to grow while retaining the common primary traits, and ultimately radiated over the entire earth. This mode of explanation was first adapted to the wide distribution of the hero myths by Rudolf Schubert[4] [1890].
(3) The modern theory of migration, or borrowing, according to which the individual myths originate from definite peoples [especially the Babylonians], and are accepted by other peoples through oral tradition [commerce and traffic], or through literary influences.[5]
The modern theory of migration and borrowing can be readily shown to be merely a modification of Benfey’s theory, necessitated by newly discovered and irreconcilable material. The profound and extensive research of modern investigations has shown that not India, but rather Babylonia, may be regarded as the first home of the myths. Moreover the mythic tales presumably did not radiate from a single point, but travelled over and across the entire inhabited globe. This brings into prominence the idea of the interdependence of mythical structures, an idea which was generalized by Braun[6] [1864], as the basic law of the nature of the human mind: Nothing new is ever discovered as long as it is possible to copy. The theory of the elementary thoughts, so strenuously advocated by Bauer over a quarter of a century ago, is unconditionally declined by the most recent investigators [Winckler,[7] Stucken], who maintain the migration and purloining theory.
There is really no such sharp contrast between the various theories, and their advocates, for the theory of the elementary thoughts does not interfere with the claims of the primary common possessions and the migration. Furthermore, the ultimate problem is not whence and how the material reached a certain people; but the question is, where did it come from to begin with? All these theories would only explain the variability and distribution, but not the origin of the myths. Even Schubert, the most inveterate opponent of Bauer’s view, acknowledges this truth, by stating that all these manifold sagas date back to a single very ancient prototype. But he is unable to tell us anything of the origin of this prototype. Bauer likewise inclines to this mediating[8] view and points out repeatedly that in spite of the multiple origin of independent tales, it is necessary to concede a most extensive and ramified purloining, as well as an original community of the concepts, in related peoples. The same conciliatory attitude is maintained by Lessmann, in a recent publication[9] [1908], in which he rejects the assumption of the elementary thoughts, but admits that primary relationship and purloining do not exclude one another. As pointed out by Wundt, it must be kept in mind, however, that the appropriation of mythical contents always represents at the same time an independent mythical construction; because only that can be permanently retained which corresponds to the purloiner’s stage of mythological ideation. The faint recollections of preceding narratives would hardly suffice for the re-figuration of the same material, without the persistent presence of the underlying motives; but precisely for this reason, such motives may produce new contents, which agree in their fundamental motives, also in the absence of similar associations. (Völker-Psychologie, II Vol., 3 Part, 1909).
Leaving aside for the present the enquiry as to the mode of distribution of these myths, the origin of the hero myth in general is now to be investigated, fully anticipating that migration, or borrowing, will prove to be directly and fairly positively demonstrable, in a number of the cases. When this is not feasible, other view points will have to be conceded, at least for the present, rather than barricade the way to further progress by the somewhat unscientific attitude of Winckler,[10] who says: When human beings and products, exactly corresponding to each other, are found at remote parts of the earth, we must conclude that they have wandered thither; whether we have knowledge of the how or when makes no difference in the assumption of the fact itself. Even granting the migration of all myths, the provenance of the first myth would still have to be explained.[11]
Investigations along these lines will necessarily help to provide a deeper insight into the contents of the myths. Nearly all authors who have hitherto been engaged upon the interpretation of the myths of the birth of heroes find therein a personification of the processes of nature, following the dominant mode of natural mythological interpretation. The new born hero is the young sun rising from the waters, first confronted by lowering clouds, but finally triumphing over all obstacles [Brodbeck, Zoroaster, Leipzig, 1893, p. 138]. The taking of all natural, chiefly the atmospheric phenomena into consideration, as was done by the first representatives of this method of myth interpretation;[12] or the regarding of the myths in a more restricted sense, as astral myths [Stucken, Winckler and others]—is not so essentially distinct, as the followers of each individual direction believe to be the case. Nor does it seem to be an essential progress when the purely solar interpretation as advocated especially by Frobenius[13] was no longer accepted and the view was held that all myths were originally lunar myths, as done by G. Hüsing, in his “Contributions to the Kyros Myth” [Berlin, 1906], following out the suggestion of Siecke, who [1908][14] claims this view as the only legitimate obvious interpretation also for the birth myths of the heroes, and it is beginning to gain popularity.[15]