Euhemerus
Proper noun
Meaning
Euhemerus
(historical) An ancient Greek Sicilian Skeptic philosopher, famed for a lost work proposing most or all mythology derived from historical figures and natural events which became supernatural only through retelling.
Examples
Ferguson (1974), p. 50 Clement, like many pre-Nicene fathers, writes favourably about Euhemerus and other rationalist philosophers, on the grounds that they at least saw the flaws in paganism.
This theory is named euhemerism after mythologist Euhemerus (c.320 BC), who suggested that Greek gods developed from legends about human beings.
The Euhemerus presented a theological doctrine of a vastly different type in a mock-simple prose style modelled on the Greek of Euhemerus of Messene and several other theological writers.
The works of Euhemerus himself have not survived, but Christian patristic writers took up the suggestion.