The Probert Encyclopaedia of Other Mythology

GABRIEL

In Christian mythology, Gabriel is the angel who announced to Zacharias the birth of John, and to Mary the birth of Jesus.

In Jewish mythology he is one of the seven archangels. The rabbins say he is the angel of death for the Israelites, and according to the Talmud he is a prince of fire, who presides over thunder and the ripening of fruits.

In Islamic mythology he is one of the four angels employed in writing the divine decrees, and the angel of revelation, in which capacity he dictated the Koran to Mohammed.
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GALLICENAE

In Gallic mythology, the Gallicenae were nine virgin priestesses who, by their charms, could raise the wind and waves, turn themselves into any animal they wished, cure wounds and disease, and predict the future.
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GAUNA

In the mythology of the Bushpeople of Botswana, Gauna (Gawa, Gawama) was death, leader of spirits. He lived in the underworld, and was forever roaming in the Upper World to snatch away mortals and carry them below. His people were miserable and restless under the earth, and always tried to escape and take over the Upper World. During the time when Kaang lived on Earth, he kept Gauna in check, and in particular taught human beings a series of rituals and taboos which, rigorously observed, would keep the ghosts in their graves and stop Gauna from taking over the Upper World.
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GAUTAMA

In the mythology of Burma, Gautama is the chief deity. His favourite offering is a paper umbrella.
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GAYOMART

In Zoroastrianism, Gayomart was the first man, whose seed was buried in the earth for 40 years and then produced the first human couple.
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GEUSH URVAN

In Persian mythology, Geush Urvan was the power of Mother Earth given form as a bull. For the 3000 years it lived on Earth, all the strength of the universe was located there. Then Mithras killed it, and its energy was transferred to the sky, where universal strength ever afterwards belonged to the gods. The decaying corpse, however, remained on Earth, and the last scraps of Geush Urvan's power were reformed into every species of animal and plant.
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GIANT

Giants are people of extraordinary stature. History, both sacred and profane, makes mention of giants, and even of races of giants, but this in general occurs only at an early stage of civilization when the national mind is apt to exaggerate anything unusual. Hence the Cyclopes and Laestrygones of the ancients and the Cornish and Welsh giants of English folk-lore.

The first mention of giants in Jewish mythology is in the Bible in Genesis VI 4, where the Hebrew word used is nephilim, a word which occurs in only one other passage, where it is applied to the sons of Anab, who dwelt about Hebron, and who were described by the terrified spies as of such size that compared with them they appeared in their own sight as grasshoppers. A race of giants called the Rephaim is frequently mentioned in the Bible, and in Genesis XIV and XV appear as a distinct tribe, of whom Og, king of Bashan, is said to have been the last. Other races of giants are mentioned, such as the Emim, the Zuzim, and the Zamzummim.

The giants of old Greek or of Norse mythology similarly of course, have merely a symbolic existence, representing benignant or adverse forces of nature on which man might count in his struggle to reduce the world around him into some kind of order.

The tales of old writers regarding gigantic human skeletons have no importance, it being known from the late 19th century that these bones do not belong to giants, but to animals of the primitive world which, from ignorance of anatomy, were formerly taken for human bones.

Notable deviations from average height are not at all uncommon, especially among the Teutonic peoples. The following are amongst some celebrated authentic instances, ancient and modern, of persons who attained to the stature of giants: The Toman Emperor Maximin, a Thracian, nearly 9 feet high; Queen Elizabeth's Flemish porter, 7 feet 6 inches; C. Munster, a yeoman of the guard in Hanover, who died in 1676, 8 feet 6 inches high; Cajanus, a Swedish giant, about 9 feet high, exhibited in London in 1742; Byrne, who died in 1783, attained the height of 8 feet 4 inches; Patrick Cotter O'Brien, who lived about the same time, was 8 feet 7.75 inches; a Swede in the celebrated grenadier guard of Frederick William I of Prussia stood 8.5 feet. In 1884 died Pauline Wedde (called Marian), over 8 feet 2 inches at the age of eighteen. Anna Swan, a native of Nova Scotia, stood above 8 feet high; her husband, Captain Bates, a native of Kentucky, of the same height; Chang-wu-gon, the Chinese giant, 7 feet 9 inches high, Zeng Jinlian, a Chinese woman who was 8 feet 1 inch tall when she died in 1982, Jane Bunford, an English woman who was 7 feet 7 inches tall when she died, despite having curvature of the spine, Robert Wadlow who stood 8 feet 11.1 inches in 1940. Until the 20th century very tall people were frequently displayed in freak shows.
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GIKUYU

Gikuyu and Mumbi were the spiritual ancestors of all the Kikuyu people. They had nine daughters. For the daughters, Gikuyu found nine husbands beneath a large fig tree at Murang'a for the daughters. These husbands then became the ancestors of the nine Kikuyu clans.
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GNOMES

In Rosicrucian mythology, Gnomes are elemental spirits that inhabit the inner parts of the earth where they are guardians of mines and quarries and the such-like.
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GOO-GOO

In the mythology of Principe, Goo-goo are lucky goblin-like creatures that live deep in the forest. The story goes that if you catch one, and feed it well it will bring great wealth to you.
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GRACE

In Christian mythology (theology), grace is the supposed divine influence or the influence of the Holy Spirit in renewing the heart and restraining from sin; or, that supernatural 'gift' to man whereby he is enabled to take to himself the salvation provided and offered through Christ (special or saving grace). Before the fifth century little attention was paid to the dogmatic question of grace and its effects.

Pelagius, a native of Britain, having used some free expressions, which seemed to attribute too little to the assistance of divine grace in the renovation of the heart of man, and too much to his own ability to do good, Augustine undertook an accurate investigation of this doctrine. He came to the opinion, which has since been so much discussed, that god, of his own free-will, has foreordained some to eternal felicity and others to irrevocable and eternal misery. In accordance with this view of Augustine, is the doctrine of predestination. The majority of those who were considered Catholic or Orthodox coincided with Augustine, and, with him, pronounced the Pelagians heretics, for holding that human nature is still as pure as it was at its first creation, that all the corruption which prevails is the effect of the influence of bad example, and that, consequently, man being sufficient for his own purification, has no need, at least, of preventing grace.

The Abbot Cassianus, of Marseilles, adopted a middle course, in order to reconcile the operations of grace and free-will in man's renovation, by a milder and more scriptural mode. He considered the predestination of god, in respect to man's salvation, as a conditional one, resting upon his own conduct. His followers were named semi- or half-Pelagians, though the Catholic Church did not immediately declare them heretics. Subsequently a gradual change of sides was exhibited.

During the middle ages the scholastic theologians so perverted the doctrines of Augustine as to make them easily reconcilable with those of the Pelagians. But at the Reformation Calvin and Beza, and the great body of their followers, returned to the fundamental principles of Augustine. In the meantime, however, the Catholics had not come to a final agreement concerning this dogma. This appears from the quarrels of the Dominicans and Jesuits, and from the case of the Jesuit Lewis Molina, in 1588, from whom the Molinistic disputes in the Netherlands received their name. In the seventeenth century, also, two new parties, which had their origin in the dispute concerning the doctrine of predestination, sprang up in the Netherlands, namely the Arminians or Remonstrants, among the Protestants, and the Jansenists among the Catholics. From that time the members of the Christian church have continued to differ upon this subject.
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GU

In Fon mythology, Gu was a blacksmith-god who took not human form but the shape of a tool. At the beginning of creation his parent, Mawu-Lisa, made him in the form of a trowel, using him to mould human beings from the celestial dung-heap. When mortals were establishing themselves on earth. Mawu-Lisa changed Gu's shape to that of a metal blade embedded in a rock, and sent him to earth to teach humans how to make and use tools of their own.
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GUABANCEX

In Taino mythology, Guabancex is the goddess of hurricanes.
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GUAN DI

In Chinese mythology, Guan Di or Guang Gong was the god of martial arts, law, and of the diplomacy which prevents or puts an end to fighting. His wisdom came partly from his courteous manner, partly from his knowledge of literature, and partly from knowledge of the future.
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GUANYIN

In Chinese mythology, Guanyin is the goddess of mercy.
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GUATRIGAKWITL

In Wishok mythology, Guatrigakwitl is the creator who made all things.
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GUEBRES

The Guebres were Persian fire worshippers.
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GUECUFU

In the myths of the Araucanian people of Chile, Guecufu was the king of demons and arch-enemy of Guinechen. He was always sending plagues, floods and other disasters to wipe out Guinechen's mortal creations, and Guinechen' s interventions - and therefore die war between the two supernatural beings - guaranteed not only dissension in die universe, but also its continuity.
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GUINECHEN

In Araucanian mythology, Guinechen or Guienapun ensured the continuation of life in the universe. He was perpetually at war with Pillan the thunder-god and with Guecufu king of the demons. Their struggle kept the universe in equilibrium, and the myth forecast that when that struggle was disturbed, the world would end.
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GYTRASH

In north-eastern English mythology, a Gytrash is a spirit which takes the form of a horse, mule or large dog and haunts solitary ways and sometimes comes upon belated travellers.
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