The discussion of function in Greek folk poetry in the last chapter led us to the generalised conclusion that this was the synchronic reflection of cultural values, attitudes and aspirations. We saw that neither in the historical nor in the kleftic songs are events either placed in time or sequentially related. Neither is historical detail often found in the tradition. The whole barrage of facts and contingencies which clearly separate, say, the siege of Rhodes and the siege of Paros in the mind of the historian is absent from the songs. We find songs referring to the loss of cities, to the death, betrayals and acts of defiance of klefts: from a mass of contingency, only those features which have been frequently repeated on different historical occasions have found their way into the tradition. History (not the facts but the telling of facts) when it repeats itself belongs with other stories which are characterised by their ‘timelessness’, namely myths. The tale of a captured city, be it Constantinople, Rhodes, or Malta, shorn of the historical contingencies which, for the historian, make the event unique, is no longer a piece of history, but has taken on the character of myth.

No distinction is to be drawn, therefore, between narrative songs on ‘mythical’ and ‘historical’ subjects, and the importance of ‘myth’, understood in this way, will be evident as we come to consider two problems which have traditionally been of concern to folklorists and anthropologists.