been a girl called Daphne.[3]


[1] See Mythology in Encyclop. Brit. and in La Mythologie (A. L.),
Paris, 1886, where Mr. Max Muller's system is criticised. See also
Custom and Myth and Modern Mythology.

[2] That a considerable number of myths, chiefly myths of place
names, arise from popular etymologies is certain: what is objected
to is the vast proportion given to this element in myths.

[3] Max Muller, Nineteenth Century, December, 1885; "Solar Myths,"
January, 1886; Myths and Mythologists (A. L). Whitney, Mannhardt,
Bergaigne, and others dispute the etymology. Or. and Ling.
Studies, 1874, p. 160; Mannhardt, Antike Wald und Feld Kultus
(Berlin, 1877), p. xx.; Bergaigne, La Religion Vedique, iii. 293;
nor does Curtius like it much, Principles of Greek Etymology,
English trans., ii. 92, 93; Modern Mythology (A. L.), 1897.


This system chiefly rests on comparison between the Sanskrit names
in the Rig-Veda and the mythic names in Greek, German, Slavonic,
and other Aryan legends. The attempt is made to prove that, in the
common speech of the undivided Aryan race, many words for splendid
or glowing natural phenomena existed, and that natural processes
were described in a figurative style. As the various Aryan
families separated, the sense of the old words and names became
dim, the nomina developed into numina, the names into gods, the
descriptions of elemental processes into myths. As this system has
already been criticised by us elsewhere with minute attention, a