Includes bibliographical references and index.

Greek biographical literature -- Judaism and Hellenism -- Low literature from various periods and peoples -- Analogy, not genealogy -- The literary development of the non-canonical Acts, (literary) lives of saints and martyr-acts -- Gospels and biography -- The boundary of literature -- Simple cases of folk-biography -- Methodology -- The multiformity of the framework of the story of Jesus -- German folk-books -- Legends of the saints -- Ancient Christian monastic stories -- The Franciscan legends -- Goethe and the legends of St. Rochus -- The cultic character of legends of saints, Apophthegmata Patrum, and the Gospels.