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The justification for utilizing the methods and results of psychoanalysis for the comprehension of the origin, variation and significance of mythical traditions is founded on the fact that in that kind of investigation, the boundaries of the true psychoanalytic domain are not in the least overstepped. Aside from the fact that the myth has always been considered as needing interpretation, it is scarcely to be denied that in the mythical and legendary tales of primitive and cultured peoples, independently of whatever meaning and content these may have, we are dealing with the products of pure phantasy; this conception affords us surety for the justified and necessary share of psychological consideration in the investigation of myths. It is in the illumination of the human phantasy life and its productions that psychoanalysis has accomplished its greatest achievement: namely, the discovery of the powerful unconscious instinctive forces which impel to phantasy formation, the elucidation of the mental mechanisms which have shared in the origin of this phantasy life and in the comprehension of the predominant symbolic forms of expression which came to be employed.
The first incitement to psychoanalytic labors in attempting to understand myth formation and myth significance proceeded from the insight into the origin and meaning of dreams, for which we are indebted to Freud. Of course, psychoanalysis was not the first to call attention to the relations between dream and myth; the extraordinary importance of dream life for poetry and myth has been recognized at all times, as P. Ehrenreich10 points out. Not only may dreams have been the only source of myth formation among peoples according to their own statements, but well-known mythologists, such as Daistner, Mannhardt, Roscher and recently Wundt, have deeply appreciated the significance of dream life, especially