The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets [Paperback]

Barbara G. Walker (Author)

Book Description

Release date: November 30, 1983

Do You Know...

• where the legend of a cat's nine lives comes from?

• why "mama" is a word understood in nearly all languages?

• how the custom of kissing began?

• whether there really was a female pope?

• why Cinderella's glass slipper was so important to the Prince?

The answers to these and countless other intriguing questions are given in this compulsively readable, feminist encyclopedia. Twenty-five years in preparation, this unique, comprehensive sourcebook focuses on mythology anthropology, religion, and sexuality to uncover precisely what other encyclopedias leave out or misrepresent. The Woman's Encyclopedia presents the fascinating stories behind word origins, legends, superstitions, and customs. A browser's delight and an indispensable resource, it offers 1,350 entries on magic, witchcraft, fairies, elves, giants, goddesses, gods, and psychological anomalies such as demonic possession; the mystical meanings of sun, moon, earth, sea, time, and space; ideas of the soul, reincarnation, creation and doomsday; ancient and modern attitudes toward sex, prostitution, romance, rape, warfare, death and sin, and more.

Tracing these concepts to their prepatriarchal origins, Barbara G. Walker explores a "thousand hidden pockets of history and custom in addition to the valuable material recovered by archaeologists, orientalists, and other scholars."

Not only a compendium of fascinating lore and scholarship, The Woman's Encyclopedia is a revolutionary book that offers a rare opportunity for both women and men to see our cultural heritage in a fresh light, and draw upon the past for a more humane future.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This fascinating, scholarly hodgepodge spotlights the feminist underpinnings of myth, religion, and culture. Before being lionized as zaftig Norse angels who guided strong warriors to Valhalla, Valkyries may have offered rebirth through cannibalization. "Little Red Riding Hood" was based on Diana, goddess of the hunt. Marriage was once considered a sin, not a sacred union: St. Bernard once proclaimed "it was easier for a man to bring the dead back to life than to live with a woman without endangering his soul." A few of the other topics expounded upon are the Milky Way, Cinderella, the moon, and males giving birth. While some of the references put a cranky feminist spin on words that might in context have different meaning--St. Paul's oft-quoted "better to marry than to burn," for example--much in this vast tome will dazzle dabblers and intellectuals alike.

About the Author

Barbara G. Walker, author of The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets, The Woman's Dictionary of Symbols and Sacred Objects, and many other books, is a member of the Morris Museum Mineralogical Society and the Trailside Mineral Club of the New Jersey Earth Science Association.

Product Details

• Paperback: 1136 pages
• Publisher: HarperOne; 1 edition (November 30, 1983)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 006250925X
• ISBN-13: 978-0062509253
• Product Dimensions: 6.1 x 1.8 x 9.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (70 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #255,335 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #77 in Books > Education & Reference > Encyclopedias > Religion

More About the Author

Barbara G. Walker, author of The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets, The Woman's Dictionary of Symbols and Sacred Objects, and many other books, is a member of the Morris Museum Mineralogical Society and the Trailside Mineral Club of the New Jersey Earth Science Association.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

219 of 239 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Pagan's Encyclopedia? July 30, 2001

By A Customer

Format:Paperback

When Barbara Walker�s �The Woman�s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets� was published, The Los Angeles Times called it �a feminist-scholar�s gold mine and a browser�s delight.� The San Francisco Chronicle called the book �a mountain of scholarship, a vast mass of supremely documented material.� The praise seems to be well-deserved. After all, Barbara Walker spent over twenty years researching the topic, distilling valuable information and deriving insights from hundreds of books and documents. I am therefore surprised at the very scathing criticisms of the book presented at the Readers� Reviews section of Amazon.com. To understand this, there are at least two possibilities. The first possibility is that the scholarship of the book is genuinely poor(and the LA Times and the San Francisco Chronicle reviewers did not do a professional job). Another possibility is that such negativity is a reflection of the unspeakable anger one feels when one�s long-held beliefs and values are shaken.

Certainly, the encyclopedia does not offer any �orthodox� or �politically correct� views. Barbara Walker is not a crowd-pleaser. She does not have too many complimentary things to say about patriarchy, Christianity or the Church. I see the primary value of this book as a bold and unabridged documentation of the historical struggle between the sexes and between the religion of Goddess and the patriarchal religions. Walker does not shy away from controversial or uncomfortable topics. She does not self-censor. She is not afraid to talk about the darker side of Christian history�its intolerance of other religions, its appropriation of pagan myths into Christian theology, its conversion of pagan festivals into Christian ones and its demonization of Goddess and sex.

I have had the book for a few years now.... I must say that it has really opened my eyes. The book captures so much information�so many facts, speculations, conjectures, myths and legends that one simply cannot find in any other popular encyclopedia. Are there any error, omission or bias in this work? Probably. But no scholar is completely free of criticism. In the several years of owning the book, I have checked its accuracy on quite a few occasions. This book has stimulated me to do my independent research into history, anthropology, the pagan religions and other disciplines. I am happy to report that I have found no major error. More specifically, the general picture that Ms. Walker paints�that of the political struggle between the patriarchal religions and the pagan religions, that of the Church�s role in entrenching sexism in the West, that of the Church�s vilification of the Goddess and the sacredness of sex�is largely accurate.

On the other hand, I have engaged in several dialogues with other readers who are critical of this work, people who believe that Barbara Walker have been erroneous or misrepresenting the facts. I have spent many hours examining disputes and cross-checking for accuracy or factuality. What I find is that these critics are often much less knowledgeable of the subject matter than Ms. Walker and that their criticism is often a result of their ignorance or ideological bias.

I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in mythology, women study and the history of religion. Yes, this book, just like others, has imperfections. But as long as we read with a critical mind, this book can be invaluable source of information and research tool for Christians and pagans alike. Read more ›

65 of 73 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars this book introduced me to freedom January 15, 2002

By R. Guiliani

Format:Paperback

this is the book that I first read about 7 years ago when I was hopelessly entrenched in a Christian Fundamentalist Cult and did not have a clue. I don't care if her footnotes and bibliography are accurate- it started me thinking. It was my first forbidden taste of feminism and paganism. It freed me from three generations of bondage and 34 years of personal slavery. Since reading her book I have found happiness, wisdom and liberty. Even if she happens to be biased or non-scholarly as some critics claim- it does not matter! Her information was fresh and life-affirming and it started the ball rolling for me! I have never again just taken someone's word for anything--I check everything now and I KNOW what I believe now with the ammunition of knowledge to defend it if I must. I could not do that before. I did not even want to! Her book changed my life, really it SAVED my life. If you read it only to prove her incorrect, read it! You will never think about things in the same way again...but beware! you will never think about things in the same way again.(or in other words--do you want to swallow the red pill or the blue pill?)
Ravyn

173 of 214 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars More fantasy than fact October 23, 2003

By D. Norder

Format:Paperback

There are a lot of people who want to believe this book is an accurate source of information about mythology and history. Wishing does not make it so. Some of the reviewers claim that the only reason people say bad things about it is that they are trying to defend Christianity and are closed-minded because of their faith. I am an atheist and mythology scholar who has no faith to defend, and I still think this book is pure nonsense. It appears to me that Walker's supporters are the ones doing it out of faith and dogma and refusing to face facts.

As others have pointed out, all you need to do is follow her footnotes. It may look impressive when she makes three statements in a paragraph and cites three references to back her up, but it's a lot less impressive when you actually have those books and they don't say at all what she claims they do. I've done it (I have a large library of mythology books), but so can you. Go to a library and pick a few to look up. You'll probably be shocked at the differences in what she claims those sources say and what they really do. The only ones that I have found so far that seem to be at all similar are a handful of others also in the neo-pagan movement (Graves, Stone and Gimbutas being the main three).

Here is just the highlights of a few of many errors in just one entry:
"Mara
Exceedingly ancient name of the Goddess-as-Crone"

The first sentence isn't even done yet and already it's got the crone theory that she tries to push on everything (none of the figures of Mara have anything to do with crones) and capitalizes the term for religious purposes. And, to top it off, all but the relatively recent (last 500 years or so) references to characters named Mara say that Mara is a male figure, not female.... So this exceedingly ancient name isn't a crone and isn't even a goddess.

Then we have: "The gypsies, with their traditions rooted in Hinduism, knew Mara to be the death goddess who trapped the soul of the Enchanted Huntsman in a mirror and caused his death--" I bought the book she references, guess what... Mara in this relatively recent fairy tale is a gypsy girl, not a goddess. The one doing the magic is the Devil (called as such, the typical Christian male one). Mara loved the huntsman and didn't want him to die. Walker's summary of it doesn't accurately describe the tale at all. Her description of it ends: "a myth that paralleled ancient Pelasgian stories of the death of Dionysus" (in another reference in the book she outright calls Mara's huntsman "Dionysus" and doesn't claim it's a parallel but the exact figure even though it's more than a thousands years later and the wrong country -- the book isn't even internally self-consistent). If you look up the Dionysus myth that she conflates the gypsy folklore with, you'll find that they aren't related at all, except by the loosest of wishful thinking interpretations.

And then later in this entry she references supposed related goddesses like Mari, etc. that *no other source anywhere* (excepting those who borrowed from this book) has any records or even hints at. A lot of the entries are like this, in that they talk about feminine names that were never thought of as goddesses by any source out there, but she assumes they must have been because of her bias and a lot of twisting and misunderstanding of linguistics.

And that's just one entry. Researching the other things she writes about turns up just as many errors and outright distortions. She'll mention a specific moon goddess, reference an obscure 100-year old book in her footnote to support it, but looking it up shows that the original author was talking about a moon god, not a goddess. She'll talk about a trinity of Egyptian goddesses but actual research shows that they weren't thought of as such. It's so bad that I have not yet found a single entry in the entire book that doesn't have at least one major error, and it's usually several per paragraph.

I have nothing against pagan beliefs, and I think they are probably one of the most healthy religious faiths that exist. Pointing out that this book is horrible isn't attacking a belief system, it's attacking incredibly flawed and biased research. There are enough real historical goddess beliefs that nobody should have to make them up if they want to look to them for personal growth and religious faith. It's too bad that Walker was so insecure that she felt the need to twist everything all around, and it's even more of a shame that some people feel the need to defend her. Walker was wrong, which doesn't make paganism or feminism any weaker. You are only weak if you insist upon basing your own personal self-image upon the delusions of a highly discredited author. Read more ›

37 of 43 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Future feminist scholars, beware! January 18, 2002

By A Customer

Format:Paperback

I picked up this book in 1987, and was quite excited at first. My own research, however, quickly proved "The Encyclopedia" to be highly unreliable as a jumping-off point of feminist/pagan scholarship. A small amount of digging into B. Walker's sources will immediately prove how little research actually went into this work. The actual sources cited in Walker's footnotes frequently don't support her suppositions, and her etymology is just plain fanciful. She seems to feel that, if one word sounds like another word, they must necessarily be related. Ouch!

Check this out for yourself. Pick a few entries, then look up all of the footnotes in your local university library. How many of Walker's sources have ANYTHING to do with the subject in question, let alone support her theories? It's a disappointing, but necessary, exercise for anyone determined to see "The Encyclopedia" honestly.

Enjoy this book for its empowering (and fun) ideas, but don't place any weight on its "scholarship". It's a house of cards.