Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine - Softcover

Spence, Lewis

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9780486288703: Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0486288706 ISBN 13: 9780486288703

Publisher: Dover Publications, 2011

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Steeped in mystery and romance, guarded by great medieval castles perched high above its broad waters, the Rhine is one of the most storied and evocative rivers in Europe. For this volume, noted mythologist Lewis Spence has combed through the abundant literature written about the Rhine and its legends and chosen a rich selection of the best, most characteristic tales.
Arranged to correspond with a journey along the Rhine from sea to source, the tales recount the lives and deeds of a host of mythic figures — Odin the All-father and Brunhild; Lorelei, a siren whose singing lured sailors to death on the rocks; Lohengrin, a knight of the Holy Grail; Siegfried; the Jester of Heidelberg; Sigurd; Venus and Tannh�user; and many more. Twenty-four atmospheric illustrations capture the enchanted mood of these stories as well as providing views of such famous landmarks as Heidelberg Castle, Oppenheim Abbey, the Castle of Cleves, cathedrals in Cologne, Worms, and Strasbourg, and other sites.
In addition, Mr. Spence has supplied an informative introduction dealing with the historical development, folklore, poetry, and art of the Rhine. Readers interested in mythology and folklore in general, and Teutonic mythology in particular, will find here a splendid sampling of time-honored tales.

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About the Author:

About the Author:

"James Lewis Thomas Chalmbers Spence (November 25, 1874 - March 3, 1955) was a Scottish journalist, folklorist, poet and occult scholar.

A prolific writer, Spence has been credited in reviving the study of Scottish folklore. After an early career in Scotland as a journalist, about 1906 he began to take a keen interest folklore and mythology. He wrote about Brythonic rites and traditions in The Mysteries of Britain (1905). In this book, Spence theorized that the original Britons were descendants of a people that migrated from Northwest Africa and were probably related to the Berbers and the Basques-this claim is being supported by recent DNA studies.

He then turned to ancient Mexican and Central American mythology. In 1908, he published The Popul Vuh, the sacred book of the Quiche Mayas. This was followed by A Dictionary of Mythology in 1910 and numerous additional volumes.

Spence's researches into the mythology and culture of the New World, together with his examination of the cultures of western Europe and north-west Africa, led him almost inevitably onto the question of Atlantis. During the 1920s he published a series of books which sought to rescue the topic from the occultists who had more or less brought it into disrepute. These works, amongst which were The Problem of Atlantis (1924) and History of Atlantis (1927), continued the line of research inaugurated by Ignatius Donnelly and looked at the lost island as a Bronze Age civilization, a civilization which formed a cultural link with the New World, and which was invoked by him (as also by Donnelly earlier) as an explanation for the striking parallels between the early civilizations of the Old and New Worlds. Spence's erudition and scholarship was impressive; yet the conclusions he reached have been almost universally rejected by mainstream scholarship. Nevertheless, he seems to have had some influence upon the ideas of controversial author Immanuel Velikovsky, whose work continues to cause intense argument and rancorous debate.

Spence's 1940 book Occult Causes of the Present War seems to have been the first book in the field of Nazi occultism.

Over his long career, he published more than forty books, many of which remain in print to this day. Spence was also the founder of the Scottish National..." (Quote from wikipedia.org)

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