Urdummheit: Primeval Stupidity

This is an adapted and expanded version of an essay I wrote in a personal blog.

Recently I learned a new word thanks to the book Exploring the Northern Tradition by Krasskova and Kaldera. Urdummheit: A German word that means--basically--that those who came before "us" are stupid. That there is a "primeval stupidity." People who believe this theory believe that we--in our enlightened, rational society--are somehow smarter than those who have come before. They believe that they made up myths and legends out of whole cloth and believed those legends literally and exactly, the way modern fundamentalists take the bible literally. It was believed literally by the people--not to be taken as symbol or allegory--because they were wholly ignorant and largely incapable of understanding the world around them.

Read the rest of this essay over on Weaving Wyrd.