This would make a great academic reference, if not for the fact that the author's analysis of the myths is pretty much completely pulled out of his ass. I've done some research and most experts seem to concur that there is no archaeological or any other kind of evidence for his claims. He's fixated on unifying ALL the myths as allegories for some system of pre-Hellenic matriarchy that was replaced by Aryan patriarchy, but really, it becomes ridiculous as he tries without a hint of irony, to fuse every symbol -- by the end of it, there's a weird laundry list of the characteristics of the 'Sacred Kings', including hiding in jars, ceremonially dying in chariot races, ceremonially being gashed in the thigh by boars, sacrificing children, and gradually usurping power from their matriarchal counterparts who hitherto had held all the power.

It's a bizarre, alternate history kind of thing (I think another review on this book compared it to Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos), and I have no idea how Penguin even let him publish this. I stopped reading the footnotes after about 300 pages, because they're all made up and I couldn't be bothered.

Anyway, there are some good bits and some detailing of myths which I had only known about very generally. The first 200 pages or so are actually really riveting, dealing with the Theogony and the various dealings of the gods, which are always the best part of Greek mythology -- but the middle 400 pages of this colossal volume just deals with the foundation myths of each and every city state, which is important in its way but really quite dull. It reads like the Bible. There are some really funny parts, like how Hercules sleeps with 50 women in one night (I don't remember that in the Disney cartoon) and the explanation of why Athenians have small butts.

With some judicious editing, this could actually be very enjoyable, but as it is, it's not very well done. In a lot of later editions they just cut out the ridiculous footnotes altogether, and I think that's probably for the best.