神话起源:世界范围的历史性比较研究

The Origins of the World′s Mythologies:A Worldwide Historical and Comparative Study

世界范围内,不同民族的神话之间往往存在着许多相似性。过去的研究一贯用扩散传播或者人类共同心理特质来解释。而劳亚古陆假说则超越了上述解释,因为它涉及到整个神话体系,尤其是从创世到灭世的整个过程,是以叙事线为特征的神话。这一神话的传播依靠的不是扩散,而是人类的不断迁徙。作者从追溯一个童谣的起源入手,逐步阐述了神话的定义、神话研究的历史、世界神话的主要类型及其差异、比较神话的意义及方法等一系列重要内容。通过语言学、基因学、考古学、体质人类学等多学科的研究成果佐证,作者提出了世界神话共有一个源头的见解。

Worldwide,there are often many similarities between individual myths of different peoples.They are habitually explained by diffusion or common human psychological traits.However,the current Laurasian proposal supersedes these approaches as it involves a whole system of myths,notably one characterized by a narrative story line from the creation of the world to its end.This mythology has been spread not by diffusion,but above all,by the constant migration of humans.Starting from tracing the origin of a nursery rhyme,the author gradually expounds a series of important contents such as the definition of mythology,the history of mythology research,the main types of world′s myths and their differences,and the significance and methodologies of comparative mythology.Through a multidisciplinary research involving linguistics,genetics,archaeology,physical anthropology and other disciplines,the insight that there is a common origin of world myths is proposed.