German

Alternative forms

• Mythus (rare; dated)
• Mythe (rare; dated)

Noun

Mythos m ‎(genitive Mythos, plural Mythen)

1. myth, mythos (narrative of importance to a particular group or culture)

   Der Holocaust ist der wichtigste Mythos der deutschen Nachkriegsgesellschaft.

   The Holocaust is the most important mythos of the German post-war society.

2. (informal) myth (something invented or made up)

   Es steht unter Strafe, den Holocaust als reinen Mythos zu bezeichnen.

   It is punishable to call the Holocaust a mere myth.

Declension

Derived terms

• mythenumwoben
• mythisch

English

Noun

mythos ‎(plural mythoi or mythoses)

1. A story or set of stories relevant to or having a significant truth or meaning for a particular culture, religion, society, or other group.
2. Anything delivered by word of mouth: a word, speech, conversation, or similar; a story, tale, or legend, especially a poetic tale.
3. A tale, story, or narrative, usually verbally transmitted, or otherwise recorded into the written form from an alleged secondary source.

Usage notes

• An analysis of the comparative frequency of the plural forms mythoi and mythoses in four corpora revealed that in the two of them that had either plural form, mythoi was rare and mythoses was non-existent.^[1][2][3][4] Moreover, of ten other dictionaries, seven list mythoi as the only valid plural,^{[5][6][7][8][9][10][11]} the other three are tacit regarding the matter,^[12][13][14] but none of them mention mythoses.

Related terms

See also

• logos

Translations

References

1. ↑ The British National Corpus (BYU–BNC): mythoi (0) vs. mythoses (0)
2. ↑ The Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA): mythoi (1) vs. mythoses (0)
3. ↑ BYU–OED: The Oxford English Dictionary: mythoi (4) vs. mythoses (0)
4. ↑ The TIME Magazine Corpus of American English: mythoi (0) vs. mythoses (0)
5. ↑ “mythos” listed in the American Heritage^® Dictionary of the English Language [4^th Ed.]
6. ↑ “mythos” defined by Dictionary.com Unabridged
7. ↑ “mythos” defined by the Encarta^® World English Dictionary [North American Ed.]
8. ↑ “mythos” defined by the Free Online Dictionary
9. ↑ “mythos” defined by Merriam–Webster’s Online Dictionary
10. ↑ “mythos, n.” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary [draft revision; June 2008]
11. ↑ “mythos” defined by the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © 1997 Random House, Inc., on Infoplease
12. ↑ “mythos” listed in Garth Kemerling’s Dictionary of Philosophical Terms and Names [2001]
13. ↑ “mythos” defined by Wordsmyth
14. ↑ “mythos” defined by YourDictionary.com

Anagrams

• thymos

French

Noun

mythos m

1. plural of mytho

Latin

Etymology

From Ancient Greek.

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈmyː.tʰos/, [ˈmyː.tʰɔs]

Noun

mȳthos m ‎(genitive mȳthī); second declension

1. a myth

Inflection

Second declension, Greek type.

Synonyms

• (myth): fabula

Related terms

References

• mythos in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press