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of myths; esp., the collective myths which describe the gods of a heathen people; as, the mythology of the Greeks.

A shield or protective armor; -- applied in mythology to the shield of Jupiter which he gave to Minerva. Also fig.: A shield; a protection.

In the old Norse mythology, the gods Odin, Thor, Loki, Balder, Frigg, and the others. Their home was called Asgard.

A discourse on angels, or a body of doctrines in regard to angels. The same mythology commanded the general consent; the same angelology, demonology. Milman.

That which goes before in time; that which precedes. South. The Homeric mythology, as well as the Homeric language, has surely its antecedents. Max Miller.

of the sea; sea devil; -- a term used by sailors. This same Davy Jones, according to the mythology of sailors, is the fiend that presides over all the evil spirits of the deep, and is seen in various shapes warning the devoted wretch of death and woe. Smollett. Davy Jones's Locker, the ocean, or bottom of the ocean.…

A spirit, or immaterial being, holding a middle place between men and deities in pagan mythology. The demon kind is of an inSydenham.

A personification, in German and Scandinavian mythology, of a spirit natural power supposed to work mischief and ruin, esp. to children.

The theory, held by Euhemerus, that the gods of mythology were but deified mortals, and their deeds only the amplification in imagination of human acts.

To interpret (mythology) on the theory of euhemerism.

One who favor or practices any from of exclusiveness or exclusivism. The field of Greek mythology . . . the favorite sporting ground of the exclusivists of the solar theory. Gladstone.

The nether world (according to classical mythology, the abode of the shades, ruled over by Hades or Pluto); the invisible world; the grave. And death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them. Rev. xx. 13 (Rev. Ver. ). Neither was he left in Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption. Acts ii. 31 (Rev. Ver.). And in H…

The god of the sun; in the later mythology identified with Apollo, and distinguished for his beauty. So excellent a king; that was, to this, Hyperion to a satyr. Shak.

A kind of domestic spirit in German mythology, corresponding to the Scottish brownie and the English Robin Goodfellow.

Of or pertaining to mythology or to myths; mythical; fabulous. -- Myth`o*log"ic*al*ly, adv.

One versed in, or who writes on, mythology or myths.

In German mythology, the children of the mist, a race of dwarfs or demonic beings, the original possessors of the famous hoard and ring won by Siegfrid; also, the Burgundian kings in the Nibelungenlied.

A monstrous bird of Arabian mythology. [Written also rock, and rukh.] Brande & C.

A fabulous creature, half horse and half fish, represented in classic mythology as driven by sea dogs or ridden by the Nereids. It is also depicted in heraldry. See Hippocampus.

Anything given to pacify; -- so called from the sop given to Cerberus, as related in mythology. All nature is cured with a sop. L'Estrange.