origin myth
Beginning tale told
An origin myth is a traditional story explaining how something came to be—the world, a people, a custom, or a natural phenomenon.
Most cultures have origin myths accounting for creation or ancestral beginnings.
The term extends to founding narratives of institutions or movements: The garage startup is Silicon Valley's favorite origin myth.
Unlike "origin story," the word myth suggests the account may be embellished or untrue.
- in the beginningAt the start
- creationMaking something exist
- creation storyAccount of existence's origin
- genesisPoint of creation
- cosmologyStudy of universal structure
cosmic egg · gods · ancestors · primordial · chaos · flood · serpent · garden · forbidden · paradise · beginning · sacred · tribal · storytelling · ritual · trickster figure · dreamtime · oral tradition
- originsbeginning, birth, creation, source, roots
- anthropologyanthropology, fieldwork, ethnography, social anthropology, cultural anthropology
- historical recordsdiary, census record, annual reviews, letter, government records
- myth analysisstructuralism, functionalism, archetype, archetypes, monomyth
origin mythhistorical record
Preserved account of past
scientific explanation · empirical evidence · archaeological record · archaeological evidence · historiography
origin mytheschatology
Study of ultimate destiny
end-times prophecy · doomsday prophecy · apocalyptic vision · end of days · final judgment
origin mythcurrent events
Recent notable happenings
epitaph · news report · eulogy · obituary · elegy
origin, myth, origins, original, originally, originality, originate, origination, originator