Myth, Ritual and Religion was published by Longmans, Green in 1887 in two volumes. It was Lang’s most ambitious scholarly work — a comprehensive survey of religious beliefs, rituals, and myths across human cultures, from the totemic systems of Australian Aboriginal peoples to the sophisticated theologies of Greece and Rome. The argument, extending the line of Custom and Myth, was that comparative anthropology revealed universal patterns in human religious thought that philological analysis (studying the roots of god-names) could not explain.
Lang’s command of ethnographic material was formidable. He drew on reports from missionaries, colonial administrators, and professional ethnographers working across Africa, Australia, the Americas, and Asia, synthesizing this material into a coherent narrative about the development of religious thought.
The book was substantially revised for a second edition in 1899, in which Lang modified some of his earlier positions in response to criticism from both the solar-mythology school and fellow anthropologists.
Collecting Myth, Ritual and Religion
First edition (Longmans, Green, London, 1887): Two volumes, cloth binding.
Market values (two-volume set):
- Fine condition: $300–$700
- Very good: $100–$300
- Good: $40–$100
Projected values (2026–2036): Moderate appreciation. Lang’s major scholarly work.
A Global Survey
This two-volume work (1887) is Lang’s most ambitious scholarly production: a systematic survey of religious beliefs and rituals across cultures, from Australia and North America to ancient Greece and India. Lang argues that the irrational elements common to all mythologies — transformation, descent to the underworld, the trickster figure — point to a shared “savage” substratum of human belief that persists in modified form within “civilized” religions. The work was controversial but influential.
Frequently Asked Questions
How does Lang’s work relate to modern anthropology? Lang was a transitional figure between the armchair anthropology of his generation and the fieldwork-based discipline that followed. His comparative method — drawing parallels across cultures from published sources — has been superseded, but his insistence on taking non-European beliefs seriously and his challenge to Eurocentric theories of cultural evolution anticipated later developments in the field.