U.s. Founding fathers

[Thorne]

But stories were carried from area to area over the trade routes. Everyone has a creation myth, and nearly everyone has a story of a catastrophic flood.

And all of those stories, while having some points in common, have far more differences than similarities. That's how you can tell that they have been "tainted" with the myths of other cultures. The stories of the Bible, for instance, were borrowed (to be polite) from the Babylonians, Egyptians and even the Far Eastern cultures. They were modified to fit the cultures of the Hebrew tribes. And then those cultures spread their myths and stories far and wide, too.