The collaborative volume, whose contributors from 9 European and North American countries include Jean Bessiere (La Sorbonne Nouvelle), Vita Fortunati (Bologna) and Aleida Assmann (Konstanz), is the output of the EU research project ACUME focused on European cultural memory. It analyzes selected myths and mythologies of European cultural history, seeks to address the present and past functions of foundation texts and reconsiders the functionalist approach of Benedict Anderson to “imagined communities”.