Mythoi

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A collection of myths or narratives that convey a culture's beliefs and values
2. Compiled stories representative of a particular tradition, illustrating historical events and figures through allegory
3. A set of interconnected tales that embody the moral and philosophical lessons of a society

Etymology: "Mythoi" is the plural of "mythos," the Ancient Greek word from which English borrowed the term. In Greek, "mŷthos" originally meant a spoken word, speech, or story, and only later came to suggest a tale that was not literally true. Greek writers used the plural "mŷthoi" for collections of such tales, and English took the form over directly as a learned borrowing, keeping the Greek plural rather than adding an English "-s." The word therefore carries its Greek shape into English: a plural noun for a body of stories rather than a single narrative. Its meaning in the sense given here, a compiled set of stories that stand for a tradition and encode history through allegory, follows that older Greek sense of traditional tale.

Synonyms: myths, legends, fables, tales, stories

Antonyms: facts, truths, realities