DAN MEYER
Symbolism and Mythology
Engraved portrait of Friedrich Creuzer as a young man, with dark tousled hair and a high white collar
FRIEDRICH CREUZER
After the Portrait by Carl Roux

SYMBOLISM and MYTHOLOGY of the ANCIENT PEOPLES, especially the GREEKS

In Lectures and Sketches.

ByFRIEDRICH CREUZER,Court Councillor and Professor of Ancient Literature at Heidelberg.

The First Volume.

Translated from the German Edition of 1810,
with Notes, by Dan Meyer.

ὁ ἄναξ, οὗ τὸ μαντεῖόν ἐστι τὸ ἐν Δελφοῖς, οὔτε λέγει οὔτε κρύπτει ἀλλὰ σημαίνει.

Heraclitus, in Plutarch, De Pyth. Orac. 404 D.

PITTSBURGH, PA:Published by DAN MEYER in the YearMMXXVI.

Contents

  1. A Note on this Translation
  2. Preface

Book OneGeneral Description of the Symbolic and Mythic Circle

  1. I. The Teaching Needs and Mode of Teaching of the Primeval World§§. 1–11
  2. II. Grammatical Foundation§§. 12–25
  3. III. Ideas toward a Physics of the Symbol and of Myth§§. 26–42
  4. IV. On the Kinds and Stages of Symbols and Allegories§§. 43–53
  5. V. Outline of the Kinds of Belief and of Worship, Especially the Polytheistic§§. 54–59
  6. VI. Historical Survey of the Periods of Older and Newer Symbolism and Mythology§§. 60–76

Book TwoConsideration of the Deities and of the Worship of the Gods

  1. I. On the Origin of the Greek Religious Institutions§§. 1–2
  2. II. Survey of Egyptian Symbolism and Mythology§§. 3–18
  3. III. Egyptian Fundamental Concepts in Their Connection with Asiatic and Greek Religious Ideas and Symbols§§. 19–28
  1. Copperplates to the First and Second Parts, and List of Illustrations
  2. Glossary of Renderings

THE PAPERBACK EDITION

The paperback’s front cover: the title in red and black capitals, the red engraving of two sphinxes, and Friedrich Creuzer’s name

In 1810 Friedrich Creuzer, professor of ancient literature at Heidelberg, published the first volume of Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Völker, besonders der Griechen. It became one of the most influential and most fiercely contested books of German Romantic scholarship. Known to English readers until now only by reputation and in brief excerpts, its first volume appears here complete, with Creuzer’s full apparatus of notes.

The paperback sets Creuzer’s notes at the foot of the page and the translator’s apart, gives the pages of 1810 in the margin, and adds a glossary of his key terms with the page where each first appears. It is set in the IM Fell types, after the printed books of Creuzer’s own era, with Carl Roux’s portrait of the author as frontispiece.

Five by eight inches; 320 pages. ISBN 9798167944862.

To be had of amazon.com

The translation, notes, and glossary are © 2026 Dan Meyer. All rights reserved.
Friedrich Creuzer’s text of 1810 is in the public domain.