Comprehensive Book on Deities

[Valerie]

Is there a book that focuses on the many deities that people believe in? Something like a deity encyclopedia, if you will, with bios, history, relativity, things like that. I ask because there have been several deities that I've wanted to study, but have had trouble finding comprehensive information about them.


-Aries-

[morrigan]

the book i have is by D.J Conway called 'magick of the gods and goddesses -- invoking the power of the ancient gods' I have found it to be a very good one.. Blessed be ~Morrigan~

[Ben Gruagach]

I have a copy of Patricia Turner & Charles Russell Coulter's "Encyclopedia of Ancient Deities" which is exactly what you have described. It provides lots of good capsule descriptions with lots of cross referencing and covers deities from a wide variety of cultures around the world. It's one of the most comprehensive books like this that I've seen.

It's also a relatively recent book. It was published in 2000. It's available as a paperback tome. I often see it in the mythology sections of bookstores, and I'm sure you can order it on the web through sites like Amazon.com.

There are other books like it too but this is one that I have myself and can recommend as good.

[Ben Gruagach]

Oh, and be sure to check out the free collection at http://www.sacred-texts.com/index.htm

They have a huge amount of public-domain texts on religion and mythology from aroundd the world. Be sure to do a search there for the specific deities you're looking for, or browse through the topic links along the lefts side fo the page to find all sorts of stuff.

Some other websites that could be helpful as well are:

http://www.mythsearch.com/

http://www.mythology.com/

http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/folktexts.html (this last one is more about folk and fairy tales but it might be helpful too.)

[MorningDove030202]

I have found the Wordsworth Dictionary of Mythology is a good place to start, because it has more than a paragraph on each diety, it has lots of pictures, and historical info as well. It's also a very cheap book, which is a plus!

Dove

[Valerie]

Thank you everyone for you replies, they are extremely helpful. :)


-Aries-