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In this and other studies of the heroes of Greek mythology, we have attempted to reconstruct from the hero's story and fate a schema of the community's unconscious attitudes that determined the hero's motivations. In a study of the myth of Orestes,1 it was concluded that his actions were the expressions of a community's repressed attitudes toward parents, and that his ultimate trial was a dramatic representation of the communal rationalization for the guilt attendant on these attitudes. It was further concluded that the creation of Orestes originated from a shift in the collective unconscious attitude represented by the legend of Oedipus. This reasoning led us to place Orestes after Oedipus chronologically, and to relate the Oedipal legend directly to the establishment of the totem and taboo after the murder of the primal father. This does not mean that the myth of Oedipus sprang from a particular instance of parricide. Of the many objections to Freud's elaboration of the Darwin-Atkinson 'primal father' theory, the main contention is based on the justifiable absurdity of ascribing such a powerful, universal cultural force to an isolated act of destroying an 'original' father.
It is unfortunate that Freud did not spell out the intent of his theory and obviate much irrelevant opposition to this important contribution which, in its proper perspective, has facilitated anthropological and sociological scientific investigations. Dr. Róheim has stated it most sensibly.
The father stands for generations of fathers, and 'the brothers' for generations of brothers—such, at least, is the meaning I have always attributed to these terms. The essence of the