mythographical

Mythographical is an adjective describing matters related to mythography, the scholarly practice of recording, describing, and analyzing myths. The term is typically used in academic contexts to refer to the methods, conventions, and sources by which myths are compiled and interpreted, rather than to the myths themselves as narrative content.

Etymology and scope: Mythographical derives from mythos (myth) and graphia (writing), through Latin mythographia, with the English suffix -ical. It denotes not the phenomena of myth, but the study and presentation of myths in organized form—such as catalogues, summaries, and comparative discussions that trace variations, origins, and interrelations of mythic material.

Historical usage: Mythography has ancient roots in Greek and Roman scholarship, where compendia aimed to collect and systematize myth cycles. Later medieval and Renaissance scholars produced mythographical dictionaries and encyclopedic works that catalogued versions, etiologies, and genealogies. In modern scholarship, mythographical methods persist as part of classical philology, folklore studies, and comparative mythology, often contrasted with the creative or thematic aspects of myth (mythology) or with direct literary depiction.

Relation to related terms: Mythographical is distinct from mythological, the latter describing myths as subjects or content. It also complements terms such as mythography and mythographer, which denote the discipline and its practitioners. In contemporary usage, the adjective appears in discussions of scholarly corpora, reference works, and methodological approaches that organize myths for analysis rather than narrate them.