  Over the past three decades the established view of a nearly homogeneuous,
featureless Universe on scales larger than a few Megaparsec has been completely
overhauled. In particular through the advent of ever larger galaxy redshift
surveys we were revealed a galaxy distribution displaying an intriguing
cellular pattern in which filamentary and wall-like structures, as well as huge
regions devoid of galaxies, are amongst the most conspicuous morphological
elements. In this contribution we will provide an overview of the present
observational state of affairs concerning the distribution of galaxies and the
structure traced out by the matter distribution in our Universe. In conjunction
with the insight on the dynamics of the structure formation process obtained
through the mapping of the peculiar velocities of galaxies in our local
Universe and the information on the embryonic circumstances that prevailed at
the epoch of Recombination yielded by the various Cosmic Microwave Background
experiments, we seek to arrive at a more or less compelling theoretical
framework of structure formation.The main aspects of this framework of the rise
of structure through gravitational instability can probably be most readily
appreciated through illustrative examples of various scenarios, as for instance
provided by some current state-of-the-art N-body simulations. We will
subsequently wrap up the observational and theoretical evidence for the
emergence and evolution of structure in the Universe by sketching the stage for
the ultimate Holy Grail of late 20th century astrophysics, understanding the
saga of the formation of what arguably are the most prominent and at the same
time intoxicatingly beautiful and intriguing denizens of our Cosmos, the {\it
galaxies}.
