Great book. A lot of interesting trivia, mixed with mithology, which i love. Cannot get any better. ( )

A fine book and full of interesting connections. Sometimes I wonder, though, if the name of the mythical Greek entity was derived from a word for the thing, which then just becomes our word for the thing or something related. Asimov is a little sloppy about this.

He devotes a whole paragraph to the work of Henrietta Leavitt, because her analysis was on Cepheid variables and Cepheus was the father of Andromeda. Here we get to see all Asimov's interests, science, history, words come together. The book was published in 1961, so it's clear that Asimov was familiar with Leavitt's work, and so she was not totally unknown, even then. At the time, Asimov was teaching at Boston University, and Leavitt had worked at the Harvard observatory, so he may have had the advantage of the local connection. ( )

Words From the Myths was apparently written for young adults, but Dr. Asimov made it interesting enough for older adults, too. Even if you already know the myths themselves, the many words included might come as a surprise. To give just one example, I'd never known that the old expression, 'By Jiminy,' was a corruption of 'By Gemini'. The introduction and each chapter has a small illustration that reminds me of photos of ancient Greek pottery.

Almost all of the myths used are Greek, and if they aren't, they're Roman. Norse myths get a brief mention as the source for most of the English names for days of the week. There's a separate index for the myths after the regular index, which is nice. I recommend this book for anyone interested in eponyms (words that come from names), or who just likes to learn new things. ( )