/lit/ - Literature

Use basic creativity. Take two pantheons and find ways to do put them together. I would always apply your own experience in living (assuming you aren’t fucking 20) to the myths of your characters.

The Greek gods didn’t appear out of thin air. I believe some of these myths may even predate the earliest Nile civilization in Egypt such as the theft of fire. I think a lot of these stories originate with real people who become deified in the obscurity of time and word of mouth. Their stories contain morals that contribute to shared knowledge of the people, I’d assume these pop up right as Homo sapiens frontal lobe expands and we can put imagination or fear into these stories. In a sense, the pantheons are just the oldest stories of the people, twisted and rearranged to suit the new people. You go from Ra to Zeus to Jupiter and so on.

I also wonder if any of the fantastical creatures from myths were based on extinct animals or the cousins of Homo sapiens we killed or bred out all the way back to the upper Paleolithic. That date also coincides with the latest time (50,000 yrs) it’s believed humans began to speak to one another.

What’s that all mean? Take it to its core. What’s the moral? What use was the story to these people? How could a new people adopt that and twist it for their own use? Most important, what is the story you’re trying to tell.

Ez mode could just be take the 7 sins and 7 virtues then put them onto characters. Your Zeus is diligent, but envious. Your Athena has humility, but is wrathful.

Keep in mind most morals are about the becoming of one for us because it birthed civilization. Putting down the personal for the collective. Morals of these deities should lead toward that, assuming you aren’t writing a fantasy race separate from humans. You better not be.