Dragneva, D.V.; (2006) Conceptions of decay in Czech and Bulgarian national mythology. Doctoral thesis , University of London.

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Abstract

Degeneration is an explanatory instrument that helps disperse and sustain fear.1 Nineteenth-century national mythopoeia, the Czech and Bulgarian included. was focused on the creation of a sense of national belonging in other words, it had to posit mythologies of generation. The idea that something needs to be created and preserved as a defence against others, for example other nations. however, suggests an immanent threat that it could be or had been subjected to infection, decay - or death. In this thesis I will focus on the employment of ideas of degeneration in the generation of the new myth of bclonyiiis t the Czech or Bulgarian nation. Notions of generation are dependent on notions of femininity, the conception, birth and preservation of the offspring my argument is that femininity has always played the major role for generation and for degeneration, from the Book of Genesis (which provides a myth not only of generation but also of degeneration, fall and decay) onwards and that this had a profound impact on National Revivals.

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