Pierre Grimal, Professor at the Sorbonne, introduces and acts as editor to this volume which aims ""to bring together some of the principles from which one may hope to gain a fairly exact idea of what was, historically speaking, mythical thought in the majority of great human societies."" Twenty-three contributors proceed to aid and abet this aim; their text is accompanied by some 600 photographs, 40 in full color and all excellent. For browsing or reference.