In Mythology
- The number 38 was especially prominent in Norse mythology. The number was said to represent unnatural bravery, characteristic of the legendary heroes of Norse sagas. Most legendary sagas were divided into 38 chapters, and the number often recurred throughout stories, with the heroes combating giants or other beasts in groups of 38. The number came to be adopted by the Hardrada clan, and was displayed on their crest in the form of 38 ravens set around 38 outward-facing arrows.
- The number was also significant in Egyptian mythology, as it was the characteristic number of Anubis, the jackal-headed god of death and mummification. Egyptian pharaohs were often buried with 38 statues of cat guardians, and their sarcophagi were adorned with 38 ankhs.
Read more about this topic: 38 (number)
Famous quotes containing the word mythology:
“The Anglo-American can indeed cut down, and grub up all this waving forest, and make a stump speech, and vote for Buchanan on its ruins, but he cannot converse with the spirit of the tree he fells, he cannot read the poetry and mythology which retire as he advances. He ignorantly erases mythological tablets in order to print his handbills and town-meeting warrants on them.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“I walk out into a nature such as the old prophets and poets, Menu, Moses, Homer, Chaucer, walked in. You may name it America, but it is not America; neither Americus Vespucius, nor Columbus, nor the rest were the discoverers of it. There is a truer account of it in mythology than in any history of America, so called, that I have seen.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)