myth Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun a traditional story accepted as history; serves to explain the world view of a people

WordNet

Myth noun
Etymology
Gr. myth, fable, tale, talk, speech: cf. F. mythe.
Definitions
  1. A story of great but unknown age which originally embodied a belief regarding some fact or phenomenon of experience, and in which often the forces of nature and of the soul are personified; an ancient legend of a god, a hero, the origin of a race, etc.; a wonder story of prehistoric origin; a popular fable which is, or has been, received as historical.
  2. A person or thing existing only in imagination, or whose actual existence is not verifiable.
    As for Mrs. Primmins's bones, they had been myths these twenty years. Ld. Lytton.

Webster 1913