world egg
English
Pronunciation
- (US) IPA(key): /wɜːld ˌɛɡ/
Noun
world egg (plural world eggs)
- (mythology) A mythological motif, found in the creation myths of many cultures and civilizations, of an egg from which the universe or some primordial being is "hatched".
- 2009, David A. Leeming, Kathryn Madden, Stanton Marlan, Encyclopedia of Psychology and Religion: L-Z, page 183:
- 1868, Johann Peter Lange, Genesis, Or, the First Book of Moses, page 181:
- With this shaping of chaos into a world-egg, or earth-sphere, arises then, according to the representation of these cosmogonies, the first being, the 'first-born,' or the first man.
- In Africa a Dogon myth says that in the beginning, a world egg divided into two birth sacs, containing sets of twins fathered by the creator god, Amma, on the maternal egg.
- 2010, David Adams Leeming, Creation Myths of the World: Parts I-II, page 313:
- The Mande people say that in the beginning the creator placed various kinds of seed in the world egg.
Synonyms
- cosmic egg
Translations
mythological motif
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