Yesh, mythology is quite awesome. I often find myself incorperating it into my writing, actually. I like the Norse myths quite a bit, if only because their gods were brave heroes (as opposed to the Greek gods, who were mostly meddling jerks) who mortal heroes could look foward to meeting once they died. Of course, the other funny thing about the Norse gods was that unlike almost any other pantheon you can name, they could die. They didn't age or get sick, but they could be killed in battle-so when they went out and fought evil, there was real courage involved. This whole belief in warrior gods and the rewards for doing battle in the afterlife really served to drive (and as a justification for) the somewhat barberous culture of the Vikings and early norsemen. You learn a lot about their value system by reading about those myths.
They believed, for example, that heroism was not conquering evil, because you could never conquer evil-not completly. Heroism was fighting and never showing fear in a situation you knew was hopeless. This also came from the stories of the Norse Gods, specifically the concept of Ragnarock, the idea that someday, the heroic Gods would engage in a final battle with Loki and his evil Frost Giants-and lose. The end result of this defeat would be the complete destruction of the universe and absolutly everything in it. The Gods knew this was going to happen, and that there was nothing they could do to stop it-nonetheless, they trained everyday (alongside dead heroes who had ascended to Valhalla) for the coming battle they knew they were destined to lose.
This story actually tells us a lot about how the Vikings approached combat. The vikings, while strong, were often outnumbered and outclassed in battle, and stories like these made them fierce opponents who were unafraid to die. Enemy armies found themselves up against enemies that literally had no concept of surrender-the only way to beat them was to kill every last man. Faced with such terrible odds, the Vikings created myths which taught that a noble defeat was the greatest honor. They learned to literally laugh in the face of certain death. It was pretty cool.
I want to learn more about the Shinto pantheon and the beliefs of the old celts and druids, too. There's some great stuff to be had in there.
Oh, and King Arthur-I loves me some King Arthur. I've been a fan of those stories since I was little. They're easily my favorite set of legends-you've got a hard-luck kid with a rags to riches story, a really cool sword, epic battles, evil sorcesses, amazing magical feats, romantic hijinks, Jesus' favorite beer mug, nine guys at a table who were like a medevil Justice League or something, big honking dragons, extramarital affairs, and a tragic ending with a glimmer of hope attached. Awesome, awesome stuff.
Oh, and from what I've read and learned of it, I don't think there was a "real" Arthur-the literary Arthur is a composite based on several actual people, plus a great deal of pure fiction. You could certainly point to the guy from the movie (which is full of historical innacuracies anyway) and say "this guy inspired a PART of the legend," but no one person formed the basis for the legendary Arthur. Most of it was just stories people passed down, and stories tend to change when people pass them down by word of mouth. By the time Sir Thomas Mallory actually went to the trouble of writing them down, they were hundreds of years old, so by then you can bet they were VERY different from how they started-and they probably weren't completly true when they started, either.
