I don’t have a religion – I have a mythology.

Indeed, I have a top ten of them. As much as I enjoy mythology, not all mythologies are equal. Arguably not even the same mythology, as like the proverbial river of Heraclitus, you cannot step into the same mythology twice, as it is constantly evolving, with many variants, often inconsistent with each other. Some mythologies just resonate better with me than others.

Hence this is my top ten ranking of mythology – or perhaps top ten mythologies? Mythos – or mythoi? My myths and sacred mysteries? Whatever. They are not ranked by the extent to which they still form part of an active religion, their duration or number of adherents, or by their cultural impact or influence, but by my personal interest in them – although this tends to overlap with one or more of the previous criteria, particularly my top two entries, which are the standouts both to me and for Western culture in general.

Just some further notes – I have some ratings within each entry:

 

SACRED SPACES & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

Rating mythologies by their mythic worlds within and beyond our own, particularly that most common chthonic denominator – their underworlds (and afterlifes in general).

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

Rating mythologies by their apocalypses – that is, their eschatology to use the technical term, or their apocalyptic myths of “the end of the present age, human history, or the world itself”. No prizes for guessing the mythology in the top apocalyptic spot – that provides its own title of apocalypse to this rating. Ironically, apocalypses also tend to include positive or redemptive transformation – the millennium, whether of millennialism or millenarianism, or what Tolkien dubbed the eucatastrophe.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

Rating mythologies by their goddesses – or more precisely the importance or significance of goddesses or female figures as compared to those of gods or male figures within their pantheon. Perhaps on a sliding scale from goddesses gone wild to a divine sausage party?

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

Rating mythologies by how much they lend themselves to divine comedy, particularly comic or trickster figures.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

No, not a repetition of rating mythologies by their apocalypses but more metaphorically in terms of their decline or persistence, particularly as actual or active religious belief, whether in duration or number of adherents,  but also in their enduring cultural impact or influence.

 

So that said, these are my Top 10 Mythologies. You know the rules – this is one of my deep dive top tens, counting down from tenth to first place and looking at individual entries in some depth or detail of themselves.

But wait – there’s more! The subject is prolific enough for my usual twenty special mentions per top ten and for honorable mentions beyond that.

Finally, note on the visual images used in this top ten. Given the copyright in visual images, I use visual images of one of the three following types to avoid infringing copyright – images from the public domain or free images, images licensed for use with attribution, and images as fair use for the purposes of comment, criticism, reaction or review.

 

 

A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

 

 

 

(10) AFRO-AMERICAN – VOODOO

 

Perhaps the newest entry in my top ten, as well as a mythology that is part of an active religion – or more broadly the family of Afro-American or African diaspora religions.

While I find it fascinating, it is a mythology or mythologies of which I only have superficial knowledge – and perhaps like popular culture, I am most familiar with the Louisiana variant actually titled voodoo and the Haitian variant that is titled vodou.

For Louisiana voodoo, it is primarily the ritual or magical practices that are associated with voodoo in popular culture or ‘Hollywood voodoo’ – charms or amulets such as voodoo dolls, ‘gris gris’ bags and of course mojo. O yes – and voodoo queens, such as Marie Laveau. I also find it intriguing how early followers of voodoo as slaves disguised their traditional gods as Catholic saints in a form of subversive syncretism.

For Haitian vodou, it is the divine entities, the loa or ‘divine horsemen’ that possess their followers – particularly the distinctive trinity of Papa Legba, Erzulie, and of course Baron Samedi, not least from his cinematic incarnation in the James Bond film, Live and Let Die. Again, I find it intriguing that the loa go by many names, which represent different personalities or traits – with the two most significant being the more positive ‘Rada’ form and the darker ‘Petro’ form, the latter representing the angry dark side of the loa, usually linked to the dark side of slavery in the Afro-American historical experience.

 

SACRED SPACES & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

To be honest, I don’t know too much about the mythic worlds of Afro-American mythologies or voodoo within and beyond our own. I was not surprised to learn upon looking it up that there is a realm of ancestral spirits – but I was surprised to learn that Haitian vodou does have its holy sites of pilgrimage that overlap with Christian sites in Haiti.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

I don’t know too much about any apocalyptic myths of Afro-American mythologies – apart from Rastafarianism – but they strike me as post-apocalyptic mythology, in this case the apocalypse of slavery and the slave trade. Haiti seems locked into a permanent post-apocalyptic state.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

Voodoo and Afro-American mythologies certainly have their divine female figures which seem to be in reasonable balance with its male ones – with perhaps the most prominent figure in voodoo as female, Marie Laveau.

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

The loa seem to enjoy humor, often of a crude nature.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

One of the most notable mythologies in my top ten persisting in religious belief as well as in cultural influence. The African diaspora religions may well rank among the major world religions in number of adherents but it is difficult to tell since those adherents are often disguised or hidden within Christianity.

 

RATING:
A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

 

 

(9) NATIVE AMERICAN – LAKOTA

 

“The Great Spirit has given to you a red day and a red road” – Black Elk

A mythology that is part of an active religion – or mythologies and religions, as native American mythology at its broadest can be very broad indeed. The description of native American mythology can extend to mythology throughout the pre-Columbian Americas. Even if we confine ourselves to the geographic northern continent, that still is incredibly diverse – including the more lurid central American or meso-American mythologies, of which the most famous appears in the next entry in my top ten.

This entry is intended to be representative of the native American mythologies in the area of the present United States. Of course, this remains as diverse as the people themselves in this area, but if I have to nominate any in particular, it would be those of the Great Plains in general or the Lakota (or Sioux) in particular.

This is because of my familiarity with Lakota ‘holy man’ Black Elk, through his own words as narrated in Black Elk Speaks (narrated to John Neihardt) and through the apparent focus his work gave to Huston Smith in the latter’s study of primal religions. I have a particular soft spot for Wakan Tanka, the overarching Great Mysterious that resides in everything – also the Ghost Dance.

 

SACRED SPACE & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

I don’t know much about the mythic worlds of Native American mythology other than references to their belief in an afterlife in the happy hunting ground that is attributed to them, although that probably originated in the British settlers interpreting their description – apparently the phrase first appeared “in 1823 in The Pioneers by James Fenimore Cooper”.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

Lakota mythology indeed has its apocalypse and one of the most famous at that, albeit it may have been influenced by Christian millenarianism (and was strangely parallel to the contemporaneous millenarianism of the Boxer Rebellion) – the Ghost Dance. While it certainly was to be an apocalypse for the United States, it was more in the nature of a positive millenarian transformation or eucatastrophe for the Lakota.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

Lakota mythology has at least one messianic female figure – White Buffalo Calf Woman.

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

More broadly, Native American mythologies have quite the divine comedy of recurring trickster figures – Coyote and Raven.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

Another mythology in my top ten that persists in religious belief among Native Americans – and in cultural impact beyond that. Indeed, enough so that Huston Smith included a chapter on the primal religions among major religions in his book The World’s Religions – and with the Lakota religion featuring prominently.

 

RATING:
A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

 

(8) MESO-AMERICAN – AZTEC

 

I can’t resist featuring Aztec mythology through the lens of its lurid image in popular culture – that is to say, the closest mythology comes to a horror film or the Cthulhu mythos, both of itself and of its ritual practice of human sacrifice. Yes – I know that is unfair to the nuances of Aztec mythology, particularly in the context of just how horrific other mythologies can be. I mean – have you read the Bible? Some of that stuff’s straight out of slasher horror.

However, it is hard to resist seeing Aztec mythology as horror film mythology. For one thing, there’s its deities with their tongue-twisting Scrabble-winning names. The messianic plumed serpent Quetzalcoatl might be one of the few good guys and I have always have a soft spot for love goddesses like Xochiquetzal, but then you have gods like Xipe Totec, the flayed god – whose priests would flay the skin from a sacrificial victim and dance around for days wearing it. Although admittedly I’d go to church to see that.

For another thing, you have its ritual practice, infamous for human sacrifice on a grand scale – with the archetypal image of hearts being torn beating from the chests of thousands of victims on stepped pyramids slippery with blood on sacrificial days.

And finally for yet another thing, there’s that Aztec mythology is a post-apocalyptic mythology – with the present world being the fifth such world, after the apocalyptic destruction of four previous worlds. Indeed, one might even call it a zombie apocalyptic mythology – with the gods continuously, to the point of constantly dying and returning to life, giving their blood and their hearts to power the sun (fuelled in turn by the literal blood and hearts of human sacrifice), while they literally grew humans from bones smuggled out of the underworld. Or one of many underworlds, since the Aztecs had nine levels of its underworld (and thirteen heavens).

Also, I sometimes like to joke my middle initial Q stands for Quetzalcoatl.

 

SACRED SPACES & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

One of the most chthonic mythologies, since the Aztecs had those nine levels of its underworld known as Mictlan. Although it sometimes seems hard to distinguish the Aztec underworld from the Aztec world, what with those pyramids slippery with blood and hearts from human sacrifice.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

And how!

As I said, Aztec mythology is a post-apocalyptic mythology – or post-post-post-post-apocalyptic mythology, with the present world being the fifth such world, after the apocalyptic destruction of four previous worlds. Or indeed, a zombie apocalyptic mythology – with the gods continuously, to the point of constantly dying and returning to life, giving their blood and their hearts to power the sun (fuelled in turn by the literal blood and hearts of human sacrifice)

 

EQUAL RITES

 

While the male deities tended to steal the sacrificial limelight, Aztec mythology had its share of goddesses – like its love goddess Xochiquetzal.

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

Well, perhaps comedy horror along the lines of the Evil Dead franchise – or splatterpunk

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

Yes and no – although in fairness you can’t say the Aztec gods faded away into twilight but were burnt out thrashing and screaming by the Spanish conquest.

Although I suspect that Meso-American religious belief persisted whether absorbed into Catholicism (in the style of classical or Roman paganism absorbed by the early Church), disguised or hidden within it (in the style of the Afro-American religions), or just existing parallel or juxtaposed to it – and the cultural influence or impact of Aztec mythology would seem to have persisted well beyond any religious belief.

 

RATING:
A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

 

 

(7) HINDU

 

Another mythology as part of an active religion – indeed, the third largest religion, although it might be more accurately described as mythologies or religions, given the diversity of Hinduism.

It is perhaps the most cheerfully and flamboyantly polytheistic of modern religions, with all its gods and their avatars, although Hinduism itself can be polytheistic, pantheistic, panentheistic, pandeistic, henotheistic, monotheistic, monistic, agnostic, atheistic or humanist – depending on how philosophical one is towards it.

The classifications vary, but modern Hinduism is often classified into four major denominations by primary deity – Vaishnavism by Vishnu (or his avatars, often Krisha or Rama), Shaivism by Shiva, Shaktism by Devi (or manifestations of the supreme goddess) or Smartism by a combination of five deities. Of which I obviously prefer Shaktism for worship of the goddess – she is the goddess and this is her body, o yes!

However, it is a mythology or mythologies of which I have only the most basic knowledge – primarily of their literally colorful deities with all their arms, avatars and trinities. The trinity of Brahma the creator, Vishnu the preserver and Shiva the destroyer. The supreme goddess Devi or Shakti in all her forms and trinities – most commonly Saraswati, Laskshmi and Parvati, with Kali perhaps as the most distinctive form of Parvati known outside Hinduism. And of course Ganesha, because I have a soft spot for animal-headed deities.

 

SACRED SPACE & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

Hindu mythology has its sacred spaces and mythic worlds, including a number that would be described as hells or underworlds but without widespread name recognition beyond Hinduism. For that matter, the heavens and hells of Hinduism seem somewhat abstract – and the world itself seems mythic in Hindu mythology, with the world as “maya” or illusion (personified as the goddess Durga).

 

Or “lila” – a way of describing all reality, including the cosmos, as divine play.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

Hindu mythology has its apocalypse as part of its cyclical cosmology – and again one of the most famous, the Kali Yuga, “the fourth, shortest, and worst of the four yugas” or world ages, ending in cosmic cataclysm and rebirth.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

Hindu mythology ranks highly for equal rites. One of the major denominations within Hinduism is Shaktism, based around Shakti, the divine feminine as supreme principle or power and symbolized as the Mahadevi or Great Goddess.

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

A mythology that alternatively proposes reality as maya or illusion, and lila or divine play, is clearly one that features divine comedy and trickster figures.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

My top ten mythology entry that is going strongest against the twilight of its gods, not just in its ongoing cultural impact and influence but its continuity as a major religion – indeed as the worlds’ third largest religion, with approximately 1.2 billion followers.

 

RATING
A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

 

 

(6) MIDDLE EASTERN – BABYLO-SUMERIAN

 

Dare I say it – the ur-mythology!

The mythology, that is, of the long-standing and predominant civilization in the ancient Middle East that shaped so much of their successors in civilization and mythology, particularly the states of Mesopotamia.

By the states of Mesopotamia, I am referring to the fluctuating city-states or states collectively best known to history as Sumer and Babylon, with the latter’s imperial franchise having at least one reboot as the neo-Babylonian empire. That also includes the other empires that bubbled up from that area such as the Akkadian empire and Assyrian empire (which also rebooted itself as neo-Assyrian empire). The political history is long and messy, although much of the mythology or religion stays the same, albeit with different names – what might be called the classical mythology of the region, which I’ll dub Babylo-Sumerian. Yes I know Sumer preceded Babylon, but Babylo-Sumerian just sounds better.

Indeed, this entry is intended to be representative of ancient Middle Eastern mythologies in general, including the various so-called Canaanite mythologies which we mostly know as the bad guys in the Bible (although the Assyrians and Babylonians also feature prominently as bad guys there, particularly the latter)

But to return to the selection of Sumerian and Babylonian mythology for this entry. Yes – it’s not quite as funky as a certain other neighboring mythology with its animal-headed gods, but it does have some interesting features – two in particular. The first is the epic of Gilgamesh and his quest for eternal life, notable as the first epic of a mythic hero in writing. The second is the slinky goddess to rival other slinky goddesses in mythology – Ishtar, Babylonian goddess of love and war (or her Sumerian counterpart Inanna) and her most famous myth, her epic strip-teasing descent into the underworld.

There are also other features of interest – various other deities (Marduk in our feature image for example), Tiamat the primordial goddess-dragon of chaos (best known to Dungeons and Dragons players as a supreme evil dragon goddess) and various stories recycled in the Bible, notably the Flood (and the Sumerian Noah, Utnapishtim, who features in the epic of Gilgamesh).

Oh – and a certain god who became the demon antagonist of The Exorcist film, which I know better than to name here (or anywhere) because that’s just tempting fate.

 

SACRED SPACE & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

When the concept and very word of paradise itself originates from the ancient Middle East – Persia in particular – then you know its mythology ranks highly for sacred spaces and mythic worlds, even more so for its enduring influence for the paradises and underworlds of other mythologies.

Speaking of underworlds, the Mesopotamian underworld was equally as influential as Persian paradise, not least for the descent of Inanna or Ishtar into it.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

Middle Eastern mythology – particularly Persian mythology – had an apocalypse, the final triumph of the supreme good divine being Ahura Mazda over the evil destructive divine force Angra Mainyu, that was highly influential on the apocalypse of other mythologies, especially my top mythology.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

Middle Eastern mythology seems mostly masculine with one fundamental exception – Inanna or Ishtar, a divine female figure that influenced or inspired similar divine female figures throughout the ancient Middle East and beyond, extending to my two top entries.

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

There’s some divine comedy or tricksters but Middle Eastern mythology seems mostly serious.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

Sadly, we’ve now moved to a mythology or mythologies which mostly faded away in the twilight of their gods, but for their cultural impact or influence, mostly on other mythologies.

 

RATING:
A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

 

 

(5) EGYPTIAN

 

“I am a cowboy in the boat of Ra…
“Who was that
dog-faced man? they asked, the day I rode
from town”…
Go get my eyelids of red paint.
Hand me my shadow
I’m going into town after Set”

One of two things I lament about Christianity is the decline of the Egyptian pantheon. If only the Roman Empire could have gone the way of the ankh instead of the cross. Or if only the Egyptian gods had returned out of the desert, as opposed to Islam and swept Christianity out of Egypt!

What’s not to love about those funky animal-headed gods and those slinky goddesses? Especially the goddesses – lithe and svelte in their form-fitting dresses, with their golden skin and painted eyes, they would not look out of place as supermodels on a modern catwalk. Of course, Egypt was, quite frankly, the s€xiest ancient civilization – admittedly perhaps not for its population’s vast majority of peasants who farmed the Nile or worked on those useless tombstones known as pyramids, but certainly for its elite, who pretty much invented style. You know it’s true – just look at the figures in their art!

Or what’s not to love how the gods kept shifting and swapping out with each other as they rose and fell within the pantheon? My personal favorite trinity of Egyptian mythology (well apart from Anubis, one of my favorite dog gods of mythology) – Osiris, Isis and Horus as they square off against their adversary Set. O yes – Isis. Goddess of magic who seduced the secret name from the sun god Ra and lover of Osiris who resurrected him after he was dismembered by his evil adversary Set to conceive the divine hero Horus (who then avenges Osiris)

Or what’s not to love about its different and contradictory creation myths? Particularly the one where the god Atum (who swapped out as supreme god from time to time) created the world by, ahem, mastrbating it into existence. Now that’s creationism! Indeed, Egyptian mythology could get downright kinky. Isis essentially s€xes up all her magic, including that briefly reviving Osiris to conceive Horus. Or how Set and Horus essentially strive to, ahem, out-ejculate each other…

 

SACRED SPACE & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

Egyptian mythology may well be the most chthonic of mythologies – albeit not so much in the name recognition of its underworld (Duat) and more in terms of the afterlife in general. Indeed, ancient Egypt almost seems a necropolis, with its religion and ritual predominated by preparation for the afterlife – and its monumental statues or architecture as portals to it, such that Egypt itself appears as its own sacred space.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

Somewhat surprisingly for its focus on the afterlife, Egyptian mythology is somewhat devoid of any apocalypse to popular recognition, although it did have its cosmic battles between good and evil.

However, like voodoo and meso-American mythology, I sometimes tend to see ancient Egypt itself as post-apocalyptic in mindset – a civilization huddled around the Nile with the apocalypse of the desert surrounding it on all sides. And while the Nile was reliably fertile, when it did fail it could be apocalyptic – those Biblical plagues had some basis in the historical reality of how apocalyptic it could get.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

Perhaps not quite as highly as Hindu mythology, Egyptian mythology does rank highly for equal rites in the prominence of its divine female figures (and pharaonic figures) – with Isis in particular, so much so that she came closest of any divine female figure to becoming a universal monotheistic Goddess during the Roman Empire (and was a major inspiration for the veneration of Mary within Christianity).

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

There would seem to be little room for the laughter of the gods in a mythology between the desert and the deep blue sea, but surprisingly Egyptian mythology does come to the party with some divine comedy, albeit some of it would seem unintentional and more to modern readers – as well as working blue. There’s the creation myth, admittedly one of many, of a god literally mast*rbating the cosmos into existence – or of the sacred scarab or dung beetle rolling the sun like dung. And the less said about Horus’s special sauce in his salad dressing the better, although I presume that must have been intended as a dirty joke.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

Sadly, one of the mythologies where the divine figures have mostly faded away in the twilight of the gods, apart from their tiny revival within neo-paganism – although they remain far more within popular imagination (and name recognition) as compared to other ancient Middle Eastern mythologies, mainly due to the enduring fascination with their visual depiction within Egyptian art and sculpture.

 

RATING:
A-TIER (TOP-TIER)

 

 

 

(4) CELTIC – ARTHURIAN

 

For mine is the grail quest –
round table & siege perilous
fisher king & waste land
bleeding lance & dolorous stroke
adventurous bed & questing beast

This entry is essentially for the whole of Celtic mythology in all its diversity, reflecting the diversity of the Celts themselves. The Celts extended through time, from at least the sixth century BCE through various survivals to the present day, and even more substantially through geographical space – from their original homeland in central Europe throughout Europe, most notably to the British isles. The Celts even extended into modern Turkey (where they were known as Galatians) and perhaps most famously as the Gauls threatening Rome in its infancy (before being conquered by Rome in turn).

And I find all Celtic mythology fascinating.

The mythology of Gaul – which I particularly know from the gods invoked in Asterix comics by Toutatis! – is mostly from surviving names and images, cited by Roman writers inclined to “transmit any bizarre and negative” information about the people they conquered.

The Wicker Man. Druids. The mysterious horned god Cernunnos and other Gallic gods or goddesses.

Of course, the Celtic mythology that survived most in literary form (mostly as recorded by Christian monks) were for those Celts who maintained their identities – in Brittany or coastal France, in Britain and above all in Ireland with its various mythological cycles. The Tuatha de Danann or the gods of Ireland. The Ulster Cycle and its great hero Cu Chulainn. The Fenian Cycle as well as its great hero Fionn Mac Cumhaill (sometimes awesomely translated as Finn McCool) and his Fianna warrior band. And the Cycle of Kings of historical legend. Much of this mythology in Ireland, Britain and elsewhere was recycled into the fairy folklore of Europe.

However, if I’m to pick the one strand of Celtic mythology that is foremost in familiarity and fascination for me, it’s that strand that moved through to folklore and above all to historical legend – the legend of King Arthur, as part of the so-called Matter of Britain or legendary history of the Kings of Britain.

Arthur Pendragon himself, the once and future king. His father Uther. The wizard Merlin. The Lady in the Lake. The sword in the stone or Excalibur. His queen Guinevere. The enchantress Morgan Le Fay (often conflated with another character, Morgause, as the mother of usurper Mordred). The knights of the Round Table – most famously Lancelot but also Gawain, Galahad, Perceval and Bedivere. The Holy Grail. Avalon – and so on.

And of course its ongoing adaptations – which essentially started from its very inception with medieval literature – including its cinematic adaptations, of which two films remain my favorite, Excalibur, and Monty Python and The Holy Grail (which funnily enough still remains one of the most faithful adaptations to Arthurian legend).

 

SACRED SPACE & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

Now we’re getting to the big guns of mythology, particularly when it comes to sacred space or mythic worlds. The Celtic Otherworld is perhaps one of the best known and most definitive concepts of the otherworld in mythology – that realm of the deities or the dead, often overlapping, although the Celtic Otherworld “is more usually described as paradisal fairyland than a frightening place”, more fey than infernal.

The Otherworld looms large in Arthurian legend in various guises – a recurring numinous presence depicted well in the film Excalibur. One guise is as Fairyland but perhaps even more so as that mystical place with some of the highest name recognition among mythic worlds – Avalon, which overlaps with the underworld as King Arthur’s final resting place.

Celtic mythology in general and Arthurian legend in particular also has their distinctive mythic geography in our world, particularly in Britain with its historical sites as identified with locations in myth or legend.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

Arthurian legend has its apocalyptic battle between good and evil, indeed one of the better known ones at that – the Battle of Camlann, the legendary final battle between Arthur and his son Mordred as usurper. Like another apocalypse of a mythology in a higher place to come in this top ten, it ends not so much in triumph but mutually assured destruction, after which the old world fades away with the birth of a new – although one of more popular legend in Arthurian legend is that Arthur remains as sleeper under the hill with his knights, awaiting England’s greatest hour of need to rise again and do battle against its enemies.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

While Celtic mythology may rival even Hindu mythology for the equal rites of its goddesses, particularly in more matriarchal interpretations of it, Arthurian legend seems less so for the equal rites of its maidens as against its knights and above all its king as central figure.

That said, it has some of the most distinctive female figures in Western culture – foremost among them Morgan Le Fay and Guinevere but also Elaine (or more precisely a number of figures named Elaine), Igraine as Arthur’s mother, Morgause (often conflated with Morgan Le Fay), Iseult, the Lady of the Lake, Nimue, and the Nine Sorceresses. So much so that there’s arguably something of a cottage industry in revisions of Arthurian legend focusing on them, with the foremost example as The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley.

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

While Arthurian legend might seem very earnest, it has quite the comedic streak to it, often linked to the Otherworld or Fairyland.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

Not quite the twilight of the gods but not far from it, as the figures of Arthurian legend fade away after the Battle of Camlann, although they have remained as vivid presences in Western culture ever since.

 

RATING:
A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

 

 

(3) NORSE

 

“We come from the land of the ice and snow
From the midnight sun where the hot springs flow
The hammer of the gods
Will drive our ships to new lands
To fight the horde, sing and cry
Valhalla, I am coming”

And now we come to a mythology that is one of the best known, even outside its European continent of origin, thanks to Thor in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the days of the week still named in English for the Norse gods. It is also arguably one of the most hardcore mythologies, with imagery worthy of a metal album cover.

I mean, what else can you say of a mythology that features a ship made entirely of fingernails and toenails (of the dead)? Or its creation myth, in which the world was created from the corpse of a giant. No fluffy let there be light here. Or that the gods are essentially locked into a perpetual cold war (heh) against the giants – complicated by the trickster Loki in their presence, who alternates between getting them into compromising or difficult situations before getting them out of those situations (until he goes one trick too far). And like the historical cold war, the gods are planning for mutually assured destruction – famously gathering slain warriors in Valhalla – when the war turns hot at the end of the world. Or rather, when it turns ice cold at Ragnarok – or Gotterdamerung, the twilight of the gods (in the Fimbulwinter or endless winter).

Of course, Norse is something of a misnomer, as it was a Germanic or Scandinavian mythology that extended throughout much of northern Europe, although it is most identified with Norway and Iceland (and Vikings!) – also the source of its surviving texts

“The source texts mention numerous gods, such as the hammer-wielding, humanity-protecting thunder-god Thor, who relentlessly fights his foes; the one-eyed, raven-flanked god Odin, who craftily pursues knowledge throughout the worlds and bestowed among humanity the runic alphabet; the beautiful, seer-working, feathered cloak-clad goddess Freyja who rides to battle to choose among the slain; the vengeful, skiing goddess Skadi, who prefers the wolf howls of the winter mountains to the seashore; the powerful god Njord, who may calm both sea and fire and grant wealth and land; the god Freyr, whose weather and farming associations bring peace and pleasure to humanity; the goddess Idunn who keeps apples that grant eternal youthfulness; the mysterious god Heimdall, who is born of nine mothers, can hear grass grow, has gold teeth, and possesses a resounding horn” and of course “Loki, who brings tragedy to the gods by engineering the death of the goddess Frigg’s beautiful son Baldur”

Nordic mythology is distinctive in that its gods are not only fallible (even the wily Odin), but also all mortal. They can and do die. And die aplenty on its version of the apocalypse. No foreordained triumph of the gods here – on this day, all gods die, taking their enemies down with them. Well, not all of them, as there are some key survivors to renew the world, but that phrase just has a good ring to it.

That doesn’t stop the Norse gods from being hardcore – from plucking one’s eye out as Odin did for wisdom, or losing one’s hand as security deposit as Tyr did, putting his hand in the mouth of the Fenris Wolf. Which of course brings me to their fearsome adversaries, not just frost and fire giants, led by Loki, but also his three terrible children – the goddess Hel leading the dishonorable dead, the Fenris Wolf leading other monstrous wolves, and the World-Serpent.

Hardcore.

 

SACRED SPACE & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

From the big guns of Celtic mythology, we move to the even bigger guns of Norse mythology, which has one of the best known of all mythic cosmologies. Celtic mythology may have its famous Otherworld – Norse mythology famously has its Nine Worlds. One of those is of course our own mortal world Midgard, which lent itself to one of the most famous fantasy worlds, Tolkien’s Middle Earth.

However, while there is reference to the Nine Worlds in the original texts of Norse mythology, it is never clearly identified what those Nine Worlds are. Instead, scholars speculate from references to various realms as they occur elsewhere – Midgard or the realm of humanity, the realm or realms of elves and dwarves, the realm of giants, and the realms of fire and ice.

The most famous mythic realm in Norse mythology is Asgard, the realm of the gods (or more precisely one of two realms of the two families or tribes of gods in Norse mythology, the Aesir and the Vanir, with Asgard as the realm of the Aesir) – with the even more famous Valhalla as afterlife abode of the heroic dead.

As for chthonic blues, Norse mythology also has one of the most famous underworlds (sometimes reckoned as one of the Nine Worlds or as part of the mythic realm of ice) – the one named for the goddess of the dead and that lent its name to (or came from the same source as) that of an even more famous underworld, Hel.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

Norse mythology has one of the most famous or iconic apocalypses of mythology, exceeded by only one other entry in this top ten – Ragnarok or Gotterdamerung, heralded by Fimbulwinter. Interestingly, unlike the most famous or iconic apocalypse, it is not so much the victory of good over evil as it is the mutually assured destruction of both.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

While Norse mythology leans heavily into its warrior male ethos for its theos, it remains that it does have its strong female figures that are among the best known of mythology – Freya foremost of course but also Idun and Sif.

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

For a mythology of icy warrior gods holding the line against chaos before being swallowed up by it (literally in the case of Odin), Norse mythology is surprisingly comedic. Part of that comes from the prevalence of tricksters within it, including the head of its pantheon Odin – who always reminds me of a compulsive gambler trying to string out one trick after another to hold off the house.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

The trope namer – since that is what Gotterdamerung literally translates as – but ironically not quite the definitive example of how I am using that phrase here, the persistence or decline of its deities in religious belief or cultural imagination.

Sure, it ranks highly in decline of religious beliefs, as the Norse deities have faded from active religious belief by all but the tiny slither of population that is neo-pagan or “heathen” (and even then I query how much of that is genuine religious belief). However, they continue to loom large in culture and popular imagination, second to none but one other mythology in this top ten list when it comes to European pantheons.

 

RATING:
A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

S-TIER (GOD TIER)

 

 

 

(2) CLASSICAL

 

“What men or gods are these? What maidens loath?
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy!”

I believe in all the gods – especially the goddesses!

And I’m into classical mythology for the nymphs.

Or pining for them. As I said for Egyptian mythology, one of two things I lament about Christianity is the decline of the Egyptian pantheon, but the other thing – indeed the foremost thing – is the decline of classical paganism. It’s all I can do to stop myself yelling “This isn’t over! Pan isn’t dead! Julian the Apostate was right!” in churches.

“What ailed us, O gods, to desert you
For creeds that refuse and restrain?
Come down and redeem us from virtue”

If only we continued to follow the gods of classical paganism! If there is any mythology that tempts to me to actual religion within the deepest levels of my psyche, it’s classical mythology. I can see myself as a devotee of Aphrodite or Dionysus.

Classical mythology is of course the combination of Greek mythology and Roman mythology in ancient Greece as well as the Roman Republic and Roman Empire. Even as mythology rather than religion, it is one of the major survivals of ‘Greco-Roman’ culture that in turn is one of the two predominant cultural influences in what is often termed as Western civilization. Of course, many devotees prefer to refer to it simply as Greek mythology, seeing Roman mythology as Greek mythology with the serial numbers filed off. Which is somewhat ironic, as prior to the so-called Greek revival of the nineteenth century, Europeans primarily referred to names from classical mythology in their Latinized form. It is also a little unfair, as Roman mythology was not entirely derivative of Greek mythology – more a continuity reboot in the words of TV Tropes.

Anyway, you know it – or should. The gods and goddesses, primarily the twelve Olympian gods, but all the other deities as well as the demi-semi-hemi-gods that pop up because the gods can’t keep it in their pants. There are the heroes – a concept that in its very name actually comes from Greek mythology – primarily the heroes of the Trojan cycle. And there’s all the other beings, notably the various monsters that represent all the chaotic or chthonic forces in classical mythology.

And of course there’s the nymphs…

 

SACRED SPACE & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

What it lacks in the same extent of mythic cosmology as the Nine Worlds of Norse mythology, classical mythology more than makes up in the enduring iconic nature of its mythic geography.

I say geography, because the mythic geography or sacred space of classical mythology tended to be actual locations in historical geography, particularly within Greece, albeit transformed with a heroic or numinous nature. Troy is perhaps the most famous such location, although both its location and historicity remained uncertain before its modern rediscovery.

Even the realm of the gods had its portal in the historical geography of Greece with Mount Olympus.

Best of all, you have classical mythology’s recurring tendency to populate virtually every geographic feature with a hot nymph – now that’s sacred space!

As for chthonic blues, there’s the enduring iconic nature of classical mythology’s underworld – with most of its features being adapted wholesale by its successor for most prevalent imagery of the underworld in Western culture and imagination.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

In contrast to its sacred space and chthonic blues second to my mythology in top spot, classical mythology is the least apocalyptic mythology in my top ten. Apocalyptic eschatology is not entirely absent from classical mythology.

There are hints that the supreme Olympian god Zeus will fall to the same sort of revolt against him as he led against his own father Cronus to rise to power (with Cronus in turn having risen to power by the same means against his father Uranus).

It’s one of the variant versions told of why Prometheus is chained to a rock with an eagle perpetually eating his liver – that he knew the secret of Zeus’ downfall, according to Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus, albeit Prometheus ultimately reconciled with Zeus by confessing the secret. (The secret being that the nymph Thetis would have a son greater than his father, which obviously posed a problem for Zeus as one of her suitors – so instead he arranged for Thetis to marry a mortal Peleus, conceiving Achilles).

There was a similar prophecy for the goddess Metis, except here the problem was that Zeus had already impregnated her – so Zeus pulled the same stunt as his own father and swallowed her, only for his daughter Athena to be born fully grown (and armed) from his head. She was famously one of classical mythology’s virgin goddesses, which I’ve always presumed was in part to avoid any fulfilment of the prophecy through her.

Apart from those hints of the future dethronement of Zeus, there were other revolts against Zeus, invoking the patricidal revolts by Zeus himself against his father Cronus and Cronus before him against Uranus – the primal cosmic battles or war in the heavens of classical mythology encapsulated as the Titanomachy. One is the war of the giants against the gods – the Gigantomachy to match the Titanomachy – and the other, more dangerously, is the attack by the monstrous Typhon on the gods, putting them to flight and even maiming Zeus himself. There’s even at least one coup attempt by other gods, including Zeus’ wife Hera – as told in the Iliad.

But for the most part, the apocalypse of the Olympian gods is more a matter of fading away in the twilight of any active religion or ritual for them. Or even dying, as was famously reported for Pan – “Pan is dead!”

Although ironically, as the argument does, Pan was the one Olympian god who did not die, being reborn with his goat-hooved and goat-halved form as the guise of the Christian Devil – better to reign in a Christian hell than to serve in an Olympian heaven I suppose. Sadly, it seems that argument is overstated but I prefer to believe it.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

Classical mythology has a prolific number of goddesses and divine (or semi-divine) female figures, such that it may seem to rival even Hindu mythology for the equal rites of its goddesses, particularly as the twelve Olympians were evenly divided between gods and goddesses – at least unless (or until) Dionysus substitutes for Hestia.

However, classical mythology seems to stop short of a supreme divine female figure (like that of Shaktism within Hindu mythology). As iconic as the divine female figures of classical mythology are, they tend to be subordinate to the divine male figures – particularly the supreme divine male figure of Zeus.

And yet there are hints or at least revisionist interpretations of the original or ultimate predominance of its goddesses or divine female figures. One of the most famous for the latter was by Robert Graves in his study of classical mythology, The Greek Myths (and popping up again in his poetic creed of the goddess, The White Goddess), although my favorite remains that of Barbara Walker in The Women’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets. As for Celtic mythology and Arthurian legend, there is something of a cottage publishing industry in revisions of classical mythology focusing on its distinctive female figures.

Whatever the truth of such hints or interpretations, classical mythology has to rank highly for equal rites if only for both the prolific number of its female figures and their enduring iconic nature.

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

As for the equal rites of its goddesses or female figures, classical mythology has to rank highly for its divine comedy – in the prolific number and enduring iconic nature of myths with comedic elements or trickster figures. Arguably the Odyssey is one long trickster’s tale. Indeed, the origins of dramatic comedy is in Greek theater or drama, which tended to revolve around the tales, themes or tropes of classical mythology.

Of course, as like to quip, life is the laughter of the gods but sometimes they have a black sense of humor.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

“What ailed us, gods, to desert you?”

Alas, I can’t deny the twilight of the gods of classical mythology – or that it is the one I feel most acutely.

Like Norse mythology, the gods of classical mythology have faded from religious belief and ritual by all but a tiny neo-pagan following. However, they loom even larger than those of Norse mythology in being adapted by their successor or within culture and popular imagination.

 

RATING: 5 STARS*****
S-TIER (GOD-TIER)

 

 

(1) BIBLICAL

 

Or as I like to call it – Babylon and the Beast.

This is it. This is the big one – genesis and apocalypse, alpha and omega, allelujah and amen!

Of course, Biblical mythology is helped into top spot in that for many people it is not just mythology but religion, in contrast to classical mythology or other ‘pagan’ mythologies it largely replaced.

However, I read the Bible as mythology rather than religion – or as poetry rather than history. That is, as literature for its literary quality. Or in other words, like virtually everyone reads classical mythology or any other mythology shorn of religious belief. And as mythology, it has an enduring resonance – of symbolic narratives that ring true at an emotional level or with the power of story, characters that resonate with us as flawed human protagonists (and that’s including God, who is all too human in his characterization) and language that in its best passages has an enduring lyrical or poetic quality.

And when you look at the mythology under the religious hood, that’s when things become much more interesting with layers of subtext, sex and violence as well as hints or insinuations of competing mythologies

Born again in Babylon and torn apart in Jerusalem…

 

SACRED SPACE & CHTHONIC BLUES

 

Biblical mythology outranks other mythologies with the enduring iconic nature of its mythic geography.

Again, I say geography because, like classical mythology, the mythic geography or sacred space of Biblical mythology tended to be actual locations in historical geography, particularly within the ancient Middle East, albeit transformed as numinous locations – with perhaps the most prominent being the opposing “poles” (for good and evil respectively) of Jerusalem and Babylon.

Some locations are more mythic than others – with again perhaps the most prominent representing opposing “poles”, this time at the beginning and end of the world, Eden and Armageddon, albeit the latter is often conflated with the apocalypse in which it appears.

As for chthonic blues, there’s the enduring iconic nature of Biblical mythology’s underworld, Hell (as well as Limbo and Purgatory) – or indeed its afterlife in general when you add Heaven.

 

APOCALYPSE HOW

 

The most definitive and iconic apocalypse in mythology, again outranking other mythologies, not surprisingly since it is the source of the very name for apocalypse.

 

EQUAL RITES

 

You’d think it wouldn’t rank too high given its masculine monotheism, even with the Trinity (unless you throw in Mary as well), but you’d be surprised.

Firstly, it has a prolific number of female figures, also among the most famous or iconic female figures in mythology.

Secondly, there are hints or at least revisionist interpretations of divine female figures – goddesses even or at least the divine feminine nature of God – to be found in the Bible and its female characters.

 

DIVINE COMEDY

 

Again you’d be surprised by the Bible when it comes to its divine comedy and trickster figures.

What’s more, much of that is intentional, although arguably even more of its comedy is black comedy or unintentional by its writers.

What is neither black nor unintentional is the argument that the Gospels are ultimately comedic in nature, essentially along the lines of its eucatastrophe or happy ending in triumph over tragedy.

Taking that a bit further to less serious interpretations, I’ve always been struck by the similarity in style between parables and jokes. And you can’t deny that Jesus had a gift for a snappy one-liner, particularly to hecklers – even when those hecklers include the Devil himself.

 

TWILIGHT OF THE GODS

 

What can I say? For sheer persistence as well as scale for endurance not only of cultural influence but active religious belief, Biblical mythology outranks all others in my top ten – indeed, probably all of them combined in terms of scale.

 

RATING: 5 STARS*****
S-TIER (GOD-TIER – WHAT ELSE?)

 

 

 

MYTHOLOGY – TOP 10 MYTHOLOGIES (TIER LIST)

 

S-TIER (GOD TIER)

(1) BIBLICAL

(2) CLASSICAL

 

If Biblical mythology is my Old Testament of mythologies, then classical mythology is my New Testament. Yes, yes – I know that in a literal sense Biblical mythology is both Old Testament and New Testament but this is my schtick I do for god tier.

 

A-TIER (TOP TIER)

(3) NORSE

(4) CELTIC – ARTHURIAN

(5) EGYPTIAN

(6) MIDDLE EASTERN – BABYLO-SUMERIAN

(7) HINDU

(8) AZTEC

(9) NATIVE AMERICAN – LAKOTA

(10) AFRO-AMERICAN – VOODOO

 

You can return to or find more top tens in my indexed page for top tens of mythology.