Page:Norse mythology or, the religion of our forefathers, containing all the myths of the Eddas, systematized and interpreted with an introduction, vocabulary and index.djvu/31



The word mythology ([Greek: mythologia], from [Greek: mythos], word, tale, fable, and [Greek: logos], speech, discourse,) is of Greek origin, and our vernacular tongue has become so adulterated with Latin and Greek words; we have studied Latin and Greek in place of English, Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Gothic so long that we are always in a quandary (qu'en dirai-je?), always tongue-tied when we attempt to speak of something outside or above the daily returning cares of life. Our own good old English words have been crowded out by foreign ones; this is our besetting sin. But, as the venerable Professor George Stephens remarks in his elaborate work on Runic Monuments, we have watered our mother tongue long enough with bastard Latin; let us now brace and steel it with the life-water of our own sweet and soft and rich and shining and clear-ringing and manly and world-ranging, ever-dearest .

Mythology is a system of myths; a collection of popular legends, fables, tales, or stories, relating to the gods, heroes, demons or other beings whose names have been preserved in popular belief. Such tales are not found in the traditions of the ancient Greeks, Hindoos