Lord Kames and the Study of Comparative Mythology

Abstract

HENRY HOME, Lord Kames (1696-1782), was an important literary critic of the eighteenth century who developed a rather complex comparative method for analyzing literature and mythology. In certain ways, he was a philosophical precursor of later anthropological surveys which examined a variety of primitive mythologies in the field. However, to a large extent, Kames was only dealing with classical Greek, Scandinavian, and Celtic epic, or simply comparative literature containing mythological allusions. Regardless, he employed a broad 'melting pot' system consisting of four overlapping boundaries cutting across different eras, various literary genres (e.g. epic and drama), mixed traditions (oral versus written), and a multitude of cultures. Most of the previous and contemporary critics limited themselves along much narrower, more traditional lines.