Demythtification: Difference between revisions

{{trope|wppage=Euhemerism}}

Filmmakers sometimes [[SturgeonsSturgeon's Law|forget this second part]]. In particular, the onus is on the writer to make the "imagined" historical events at least as interesting as whatever actually inspired the legend (and the actual events sometimes weren't).

Expect the hero to become [[Famed in Story]], thereby [[Historical in In-Joke|setting the stage]] for the rest of the story to become [[Shrouded in Myth]].

Incidentally, theThe technical term for this technique is [[''Euhemerism]]'', named after a 4th-century BCE Greek, making the trope [[Older Than Feudalism]]. Sometimes coupled with a less than subtle [[Take That]] against religion, particularly [[Anvilicious]] writers will give the characters [[Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions|anachronistically agnostic attitudes towards the gods]].

[[Magical Realism]] can take the form of [['''Demythtification]]''' in a more contemporary setting, or vice versa, especially if your Retroactive Realism involves one or two elements (often the most beloved elements) that are left [[Shrug of God|purposefully]] ambiguous as to [[Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane|whether or not the supernatural is in play]].

When a writer intentionally does this as a way of drawing out what historians "really think" inspired the legends, it is ''this'' trope. When a writer makes stuff up by way of [[Literary Agent Hypothesis]] in order to [[Twice -Told Tale|rewrite an existing legend]], it is an [[External Retcon]], which is a sister trope.

When stripping away the fantastic happens ''within'' the same fictional universe that had the fantastic elements in the first place, that's [[Doing inIn Thethe Wizard]], which is another, related sister trope.

When a writer takes ''historical'' accounts and reimagines what actually happened, it is [[Historical Fiction]] (or [[Alternate History]] if the changes are great enough). When a writer makes a subtle reference to actual history in a work of fiction, it is a [[Historical in In-Joke]].

See also [[Oral Tradition]], [[Twice -Told Tale]].

=== Arthurian Legend ===

=== [[ComicsFilm]] ===

** The waters get muddy in the third book. There are some [[Contrived Coincidence|Contrived Coincidences]]s where genuine magic is also plausible: Ceinwyn's illness just ''happens'' to take place at the same time that {{spoiler|Nimue}} curses her, and that she briefly gets better while {{spoiler|Nimue}} demonstrates her power to influence her health from afar. And then there's the [[Grand Finale]], where Merlin's magic stone apparently summons magic mist out of thin air.

* Mary Stewart's ''Merlin Trilogy'', although Merlin is ''sorta'' magical and is teased to be the [[Half -Human Hybrid|son of an incubus]] in the first book. After that, it's made pretty clear who his father is.

* [[Mark Twain]]'s ''[[A Connecticut Yankee in King ArthursArthur's Court]]'' portrays the magic in the Arthurian legend as fraudsters (including the title character) fooling the ignorant. Also subverted, when said title character falls unconscious for 1500 years so that he can personally deliver the story to Twain.

=== [[Live -Action TV]] ===

* ''[[Arthur of the Britons (TV)|Arthur of the Britons]]''

* In ''[[Doctor Who (TV)|Doctor Who]]'', the [[Sufficiently Advanced Alien]] Doctor's apparently Merlin.

=== Abrahamic Religions ===

=== [[Literature]] ===

* In Zora Neale Hurston's [[Moses, Man of the Mountain]], some of the famous miracles Moses performs in [[The Bible (Literature)|The Bible]] while leading the Hebrews out of Egypt are really tricks he learned from his first trip into Midian: he crosses the Red Sea because of his knowledge of tides and strikes water from a stone by finding a spring he had once encountered. However, some of his miracles are still as fantastic as the biblical version, and from Moses's perspective there is no difference between them: they're all just applications of his vast knowledge of nature.

* ''Gospel of Afranius'' by the Russian author Kirill Yeskov presents the [[The Bible (Literature)|four canonical Gospels]] as [[Rashomon Style|honest but one-sided eyewitness accounts]] of "[[False -Flag Operation|Operation Pisces]]" by the Roman secret service to undermine right-wing militia support in Judea. While not denying (or supporting) the claim of [[Jesus]]' (who is shown as an unwitting (?) victim of the Romans) divine nature, it explains most of his miracles with actions of the [[Double Reverse Quadruple Agent]] Judas and his posthumous appearances, with various impostors (one of whom went on to write the Q document).

=== [[Video Games]] ===

=== Fairy Tales ===

=== [[FilmLiterature]] ===

* ''[[EverJust After]]Ella'' doesby thisMargaret forPeterson theHaddix also retells "[[Cinderella (Literaturenovel)|Cinderella]]" fairytale. Among other things, the "fairy godmother" is actually [[Leonardo Da Vinci]].

** The novels and short stories of ''[[The Witcher]]'' series often take obvious [[Expy|Expys]]s of common fairytales and throw everything ''fairy'' in them out of the window, often to show a cynical or amusing explanation for the actual plot. It's played with though, since magic and other usual trappings of Geralt's fantasy world still remain, they're more often some sort of [[Magitek]] or clever imitations of it than anything else.

=== [[Theatre]] ===

* Rossini's opera ''La Cenerentola'' tells the story of [[Cinderella (Literaturenovel)|Cinderella]] minus the magical elements.

=== [[Greek Mythology]] ===

=== [[Comic BooksFilm]] ===

=== [[Literature]] ===

* Dares Phryx (5th or 6th c. CE) and Dictys Cretensis (2nd or 3d c. CE) both wrote more-or-less realistic narratives of the [[Trojan War]], with a strong sense that this is the later-corrupted "real story" (both authors' pseudonyms are names used in Homer -- theyHomer—they're presented as eyewitness accounts by Trojan War veterans); e.g., in Dares, rather than using a giant wooden horse, the Greeks enter Troy through a gate decorated with a picture of a horse.

* A [[Footnote Fever|footnote]] in ''[[House of Leaves]]'', containing an idea that a character in the book thought up and then abandoned, explains the Minotaur as King Minos' deformed son -- theson—the body of a man, the head "of a bull"- who was born so ugly that Minos would publicly accuse his wife of bestiality rather than [[Beauty Equals Goodness|accept his son as an heir.]] The labyrinth was a prison so complex, with the Minotaur himself being [[The Grotesque|"gentle and misunderstood,"]] that the Athenians who were "fed" to the Minotaur died mostly of starvation. Guess what the author of that idea (and, hypothetically, King Minos) [[Ugly Hero, Good -Looking Villain|thinks]] [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero|of]] [[Ron the Death Eater|Theseus.]]

* [[CSC. LewisS. (Creator)Lewis|CS Lewis]]'s ''[[Till We Have Faces]]'' is a retelling of the myth of Cupid and Psyche. The jealousy of Ungit (Venus) for Istra (Psyche)'s beauty is presented as the jealousy of the priest of Ungit for drawing away worshipers. Psyche's "marriage" to the god of the Grey Mountain (Cupid) is being chained to a tree on the side of a mountain as a sacrifice. Orual later finds Istra living on the mountainside, clearly insane and claiming to live in a palace that Orual cannot see. {{spoiler|Turns out to be a subversion, as Orual later sees the god with her own eyes}}.

=== [[Live -Action TV]] ===

* Hallmark's miniseries ''Hercules'' (2005). The existence of the Gods made rather ambiguous (Hercules being fathered by an escaped prisoner of war with a lightning tattoo), but they do throw in mythical creatures of [[Ancient Greece]]. It's heavily arbitrary on when to dismiss the fantastic. In addition, Hercules' [[Super Strength]] and fighting prowess is explained as a [[Charles Atlas Superpower]] brought on by [[Training Fromfrom Hell]].

=== [[Anime]] &and [[Manga]] ===

* [[Osamu Tezuka]]'s ''[[Phoenix]]'' series often features this, despite the title character being an immortal god-bird. Many characters in the earlier historical chapters are gods and other figures from [[Japanese Mythology]] re-imagined as ordinary humans and ''Strange Beings'' & ''Robe of Feathers'' imply that various mythical creatures are actually aliens or time travelers. Tezuka dispensed with this as time went on, however, with the final completed volume, ''Sun'' featuring such oddities as battles between [[Youkai|Youkais]]s and Bodhisattvas and retconning the alien angle out of the aforementioned ''Strange Beings''.

=== [[Film]] ===

* ''[[The 13 th13th Warrior]]'' / ''Eaters of the Dead'', which combines the story of ''[[Beowulf (Literature)|Beowulf]]'' with Ahmed ibn Fadlan's 10th century travelogue of Europe. In this story, ibn Fadlan joins a Norse rescue mission to face a seemingly supernatural enemy. Instead of Grendel, the enemy is a {{spoiler|tribe of cannibalistic Neanderthals}}. Grendel's mother is replaced by the {{spoiler|tribe's}} matriarch. The dragon is just an optical illusion created by {{spoiler|Neanderthal raiders carrying torches}} as they stream down from their mountain lair. However, the story does dabble in some standard wise woman prophecy and mysticism.

=== [[Literature]] ===

* ''[[Baudolino (Literature)|Baudolino]]'' by [[Umberto Eco]] does this with the "conspiracy" version of the various Grail and Templar legends surrounding the Crusades - the same material that Eco dealt with earlier in ''[[Foucaults Pendulum|Foucault's Pendulum]]''. The historical conspiracy is replaced by two petty criminals and forgers trying to make a profit by selling fake relics. Although it's clearly fiction, and the way that these two characters come up with nearly all the Dan Brown stuff on their own without planning is meant as a joke, the gist of it must be closer to reality than the organised, large-scale conspiracy version.

* [[Snorri Sturluson (Creator)|Snorri Sturluson]]'s ''Prose Edda'', one of the major sources for [[Norse Mythology]], uses this technique in the prologue. As a 13th century Christian, Snorri advanced the theory that the Norse gods were warriors who left [[The Trojan War|Troy]] after it was destroyed, travelling to Northern Europe where their advanced knowledge meant they became chieftains. After they died, hero cults arose around their tombs, which eventually led to them being worshipped as gods. The same outlook is also presented in another work attributed to Snorri, "Ynglinga Saga", the first section of ''[[Heimskringla (Literature)|Heimskringla]]'', but here, the Aesir are not identified with surviving Trojans, but an unrelated people whose home city Asgard was located somewhere in southern Russia or the Caucasus, and who migrated northwards to evade [[Ancient Rome|Roman]] imperialism (about a millennium after the destruction of Troy). As ''Heimskringla'' is about a decade younger than the ''Prose Edda'', it seems Snorri eventually dismissed the identity of the Norse gods with the Trojans.

=== [[Live-Action TV]] ===

* ''[[Doctor Who (TV)|Doctor Who]]'' does this occasionally. One of the BBC post-series novels featured the Doctor and Ace wandering into the middle of ''[[The Epic of Gilgamesh]]''. Enkidu is a neanderthal, Gilgamesh is a perfectly human [[Boisterous Bruiser]]... and Utnapishtim is an alien starship captain, his flood-defying ark is a spacecraft, and the Scorpion Men are robots with lasers. Oh, and Ishtar is being impersonated by an alien criminal who Utnapishtim is trying to hunt down.

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