mythical, a.
(ˈmɪθɪkəl)
[f. late L. mȳthicus: see prec. and -ical.]
1. Of the nature of, consisting of, or based on a myth or myths.
| 1678 Cudworth Intell. Syst. i. iv. 438 M. Terentius Varro..distinguished Three Kinds of Theology, the First Mythical or Fabulous, the Second Physical or Natural, and the Last Civil or Popular. 1830 Tufnell & Lewis tr. C. O. Müller's Doric Race p. iv, The term mythus, and its derivative mythical, which have been naturalized by the German writers. 1832 Philol. Mus. I. 108 Mythical legends. 1850 Maurice Mor. & Met. Philos. (ed. 2) v. 67 The biography of Zerduscht..is altogether confused and mythical. 1878 Gladstone Prim. Homer 10 A tradition, perhaps true, perhaps mythical, grew up, of Homer's blindness. |
b. transf. Having no foundation in fact; fictitious.
| 1870 Disraeli Lothair xxxii. 169 Her influence is mythical. 1889 Academy 15 June 411 The account of pheasants being captured by poachers lighting sulphur under their roosting-trees appears very mythical. |
2. Of persons or times: Belonging to a period of which the accounts handed down are of the nature of myths; existing only in myth.
| 1678 Cudworth Intell. Syst. i. iv. 712 This is an Old opinion derived down all along from the Heroick times (or, the Mythical Age). 1835 Thirlwall Greece ix. I. 347 He seems to have been a rhetorical historian, who selected this half mythical subject. 1846 Grote Greece i. i. I. 1 The mythical world of the Greeks opens with the gods, anterior as well as superior to man. 1865 Seeley Ecce Homo v. 43 Any theory which would represent them [sc. miracles] as due entirely to the imagination of his followers or of a later age..leaves Christ a personage as mythical as Hercules. 1892 J. Tait Mind in Matter 308 That Jesus Christ was no creature of the imagination or mythical aftergrowth. |
3. Of writers, their methods: Dealing with or involving the use of myths.
| 1874 H. R. Reynolds John Bapt. i. §3. 20 If the narrative were free from all suspicion of mythical handling. 1888 Atlantic Monthly Aug. 211/2 The grave Thucydides, least mythical of historians. |
b. Applied to theories or views which regard narratives of supernatural events as myths.
| 1874 Rogers Orig. Bible i. 36 The theory which attempts to account for their belief [i.e. in miracles] on mythical principles. 1887 Encycl. Brit. XXII. 592/1 The mythical theory that the Christ of the Gospels..was the unintentional creation of the early Christian Messianic expectation. |
Hence ˈmythicalism, attachment to or belief in myths.
| 1896 Fortn. Rev. Apr. 633 All superstition, mythicalism, other-worldism, and all that savours of obscurantism. |