j

,.

.:

, ,

CONTRIBUTIONS

TO THK

SCIENCE OF l\1YTHOLOGY·

VOL. II.

r

CONTRIBUTIONS

TO THE

SCIENCE OF l\1YTHOLOG\~

VOL. II.

()'fo,~

HORACE HART, PRU'TER TO TilE USIVER!lITY

CONTRIBUTIONS

TO THE

SCIENCE OF MYTHOLOGY

BY THE

RIGHT HON. PROFESSOR F. MAX MOLLER, K.M.

IIEIIBER OF THE FRENCH INSTITUTE

IN TWO VOLUMES

VOL. II

LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON NEW YORK AND BOMBAY

1897

All rl8111s rlSlJ'Wd

:EL 3/0 I . ~/1'f

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER VI.

VEDIC MYTHOLOGY.

PJ.Il.

In what sense is the Veda primitive? • 427

Lettish Mythology 430

The Sky-tree 434

Jason and the Golden Fleece 436

Antecedents of Vedic Mythology • 440

Composite Character of Mythology 441

Character of Vedic Gods predominantly physical • 444

Age of Vedic Literature • 445

SraddhA 448

Relation between the Vedic and other Aryan Mythologies 45 I

More Modem Ingredients in Vedic Mythology 452

Ceremonial Ideas in Vedic Hymns 452

Sacrifice and Prayer 453

:Magic and Witchcraft . 458

Von !hering's Rationalism 460

Atbarva-veda 461

:Mordvinian and W otjakian Sacrifices 462

Societe Finno-Ougrienne 463

Vedic Deities 472

YAska's Classification of Vedic DevatAs • 472

DevatA. 473

Three Classes of Vedic Deities 473

Triad of Vedic Deities • 475

Number of Gods • 475

The Thirty-three Gods . 475

I. Agni 480

n. Indra 483

vi

CONTENTS.

PAGB

m. Aditya • 485

Vedic Deities not restricted to one Locality 487

Gods by Birth and by Creation 488

The Pantheon of the Rig-veda Hymns . 488

YAska's Pantheon 491

Earlier and Later Gods • 492

The Reign of Dyaus 492

DyAvA·prithivt 493

Parallel Development. Z.vr r.A.""" 499

Limits of Mythological Comparisons 500

:Manifold Character of the Ancient Gods 502

H~N . 504

EurOpe. 506

Kronoe , 507

AJcnon. 507

Kronos. 510

The Wives of Zeus. I. Eurynome 513

2. Zeus, LlIto, Apollon and Artemis 514

3. Zeus, LlIda, Helena 515

4. Zeus, Aigtna, Aiakos 518

5. Zeus, Kallisto, and Arbs 519

6. Zeus, Alkm~ne, and Herakles , 520

7. Zeus and Semele • 520

Twin Deities 521

8. Zeus, Antiope, Amphton and Z~thos 522

9. Zeus, DiOne, Dta • 522

10. Zeus, Protogeneia, A~thli08. . •• 524

II. Zeus, tlektra, Harmonia, Dardanos, and JAsion 524

12. Zeus, Danae, and Perseus 524

Vedic and other Aryan Mythologies 527

Indian Myths 527

D~m~ter. Earth. 530

Gaia and D~m~ter . 533

Doo. Ertnys 537

Varufla. 545

Varufla as Moon 554

Adityas 555

Aditi • 556

Asvinau and other Dual Gods and Heroes 558

The Relations of the Asvins • 558

COllo"TE:\'TS. vii
PAO.
Names and Legends of the Asvins 559
The Dawn 88 the Mother of Twins 562
Yam&, the Twin • 562
Sun and Dawn 88 Horae and Mare 563
SanutyO. 88 the Dawn . 564
lIeaning of the Old :Myth 565
Yama. 566
Yama 88 Agni 566
Yama 88 the Firstborn and the first to die 568
W88 Yama = Adam ? . 569
Greek and Roman Twins 577
Other Names of the Asvins 579
NasatyA 580
Asvins 88 Temporal Gods 583
Achievements of the Asvins . 583
VarlikA 58~
KyavAna 587
Atri 589
Van dana 590
Bhugyu Taugrya 591
VnKa • 591
Kali 591
VispaIA. 592
Panlvrig 593
Rebha. 594
Vimada 595
Vadhrimatl 595
GhoshA 596
&yu 597
Pedu and the Horae Paidva • 597
Serpent-worship in the Veda 598
True and undefined Character of the Asvins . 600
Rudra and the Rudraa 605
Rudra 88 Siva 606
YAska'. Mythology 608
Differences and Similarities 609
The Children of SaranyO. 612
Ht1rakles and iphiklee . 612
Amphitryon • 6 r , ~
Perseus 615 viii CONTENTS.
rAe.
Kama, son of PrithA 616
Labours of Herakles 617
Adversaries of Herakles 623
The Golden Apple 62.
The Hind of Keryneia . 625
Kerberos 627
The Two with the One. 633
Antiope 6.2
Harmonia 6.5
Hahn's Sagwissenschaft 650
Mundilfori 651
Helios • 652
Burya • 653
Rohita. 655 •
Threefold Character of BQrya and Agni . 656
Olympos 657
Poseidon 658
Trit. and Tnt. 661
Trit. in Greek Mythology 668
Hermes and Apollon 673
Hermes. SaramA 673
SArameyau . 675
Cognate Gods 680
Apollon 681
Aphrodite 682
Athene 682
Zeus and Maia 684
Apollon 685
Ilithyia or Eileithyia 696
Greek and Italian Gods 707
Apollon and Mars • 710
Mamurius 71•
Athene 725
Name of Athene 726
Aphrodite = Charla 728
Artemis 732
Indra . "3
Importance of Names 750
Indra in the Vada 751
Andra • 756 CONTENTS.

ix

Indra, an Agent Indra Supreme V ritra, Ahi . DAsas •

Conquest of Cows. Cacus and Hercules Indra, Ushas, &c.

Indra, as Deliverer of Women H~rakles and his Heroines Dawn. Fors

Agni

Agni in India and Persia

The Five Agnis in India and Persia Agni in the Veda .

Fire in other Mythologies H~phaistos. Vulcan Bhuranyu = PhorOneus • Vulcanus. UlkA. F~ronia

H~phaistos and Yavishtlla Fire-totems

Atharvan

Aligiras

BhrigavAna

Prometheus .

Minys, Manu

Manu.

Abstract Deities

Savitri •

Brihaspati and Brahmanaspati

Comparison of Myths in unrelated Languages Belief in another Life

PAGB

757 757 758 760 764 766 769 771 772 774- 780 784 785 786 790 791 796 799 800 801 804 806 806

807 810

813 814 817 819 825 830 831

mu .

CONTRIBUTIONS

TO THB

SCIENCE OF MYTHOLOGY.

CHAPTER VI.

VEDIC MYTHOLOGY.

WE now approach the mythology of the ancient Aryan inhabitants of India, to see whether their mythology and likewise those of the other closely related Aryan nations, particularly the Greeks and Romans, will yield to the same solvents and disclose the same elements which we found without much effort in the mythological language of Mordvinians and Fins, people entirely unconnected by blood or language with the Aryan family of speech.

In what sense is the Veda primitive P

The chief superiority which Vedic mythology may claim over all mythologies consists in the great wealth of traditional literature handed down to us by an a.lmost miraculous process, and dating from a period during which the mythopeeic process was still in full operation. The question of the exact date of Vedic literature, does not concern us here, though I may as well state for the benefit of those

VOL. n. B

42B IN WHAT SENSE IS THE VEDA PRIMITIVE? [CHAP. who accuse me of having exaggerated its antiquity that among Sanskrit scholars I have always beeq blamed for assigning far too modern a date to the Veda, about 1200 B. c., while the late Professor Whitney claimed 1500 B.C., others 2000 or even 5000 B.C. as more likely dates. I have gone even further, and have repeatedly declared that I should be extremely glad to be able to escape from the stringency of my own arguments, and to be able to assign a more recent date to the Vedic age. But whatever the chronological date of the Veda may be, I have always felt that without a knowledge of the period of mythological fermentation which is presented to us in the Vedic hymns and BrA.hmanas, it would have been almost impossible to understand the mythology of any of the Aryan languages, more particularly of the Greeks and Romans. Does any one deny this now 1 Does anyone deny that for catching the faint voices of the most distant Aryan antiquity. we have nothing to place by the side of the Veda 1 We must not exaggerate, and I am afraid that of late the depth to which the shaft of the Veda can lead us, has sometimes been exaggerated. It may enable us to listen 'to the voices of the earthborn sons of Manu,' if such a metaphor is allowed with reference to the original meaning of Manu; but it will hardly enable us to hear the inarticulate shouts of the sons of nature, the N aturvolker, who were supposed to lurk closely behind the backs of the Vedic Rishis. This would be claiming too much for the Veda. We may, for instance, learn from the ancient Sanskrit name of daughter, that daughter, duhitri, meant originally milker. But to discover behind this charming Aryan idyll a still more

n] IN WHAT SENSE IS THE VEDA PRIlrImVE? 429 distant idyll when cows were not yet milked, or, because duhitri is masculine in form, were milked by men only, as the heavenly cows were by Indra, requires a power of vision or imagination that is not given to many. Possibly a future Mannhardt may prove that the daughters of the house were not too proud to milk the cows even in much more recent times, just as unmarried women continue to be called spinsters, even after spinning has long gone out of fashion.

Many things which seem incredible to classical scholars exist as simple facts in the Veda. What from a Greek point of view is a distant past is here placed before us as still actually present. What to the Greek scholar seems wild and fanciful is simply a matter of fact before the eyes of the student of the Vedic hymns. It has been doubted whether Zeus had anything to do with the sky, Apollon with the sun, Athene with the morning, but no one could question that in the Veda Dya.us sprang from the sky, Savitri from the sun, Aha.nA. from the morning light. Some of the greatest horrors of Greek mythology, incestuous relations between sisters and brothers, nay between mothers and sons, betray their physical origin in the Veda, 80 as to exclude any possibility of doubt. We must not imagirfe that Greek and Roman mythology are Vedic mythology in a later stage. There is no such direct continuity between the two, as little as there is between the languages of Greece and India. Greek gods have never been Vedic gods, but both Greek and Vedic gods have started from the same germs, and it is with these germs, not with the fullgrown trees, that Comparative Mythology is chiefly

B2

430 IN WHAT SENSE IS THE VEDA PRIMITIVE? [CHAP. concerned. Looking upon Vedic and Greek mythology as two parallel streams which start from the same source, we can clearly see that the Vedic stream offers an immense advantage by enabling us to follow it much further back, and much nearer to what seems to have been its source than the Greek stream; nay, I should say, so far that in the Veda we sometimes see the stream of mythological thought welling up before our eyes from its true source, the human heart. The merely chronological antiquity of the Veda is therefore of little consequence to us. For what should we gain if we could date the Veda back to 6000 or 4000 B. C. 1 Beyond 2000 B. C. all is tohu va bohu, emptiness and darkness, mere vanity and vexation of spirit, without a ray of light from anywhere. The hallucinations about the Vedic poets being separated by a few generations only from a race of Homines alali, 'who had listened to the music of the morning stars and the shouts of the sons of God,' or who can represent to us man in his most primitive state, as he came direct from the mind and the hands of God, or if we may believe Darwin, from the womb of his Simian mother, if they ever existed among scholars, exist no longer, nor is there any valour in once more slaying the slain. All that can be seriously maintained is that we possess nothing more primitive in Aryan literature than the Veda, and that it would seem useless to look in any other literature for the antecedents of that intellectual world which is opened before us

in the Veda. .

Lettish Mythology.

We should perhaps make one exception in favour of tR~:I!~P~8f roetry of a small branch of the Aryan

VI]

LETl'ISH MYTHOLOGY.

431

family of speech which has hitherto been too little regarded by students of mythology, but the importance of which was pointed out many years ago by Mannhardt-I mean the Lettish. The Lets who with the Lituanians represent an independent division of the Slavonic branch, show, as was pointed out by Bopp and Pott, several remnants of a very primitive character in their grammar, though mixed up with formations of a much later age. These primitive forms preserved in the language of the Lituanians have misled several scholars into a belief that the whole of that language has retained its primitive stamp. This, however, is not the case, and we must guard against committing the same mistake with regard to the mythological elements preserved in the popular songs of the Lets. It cannot be denied, however. that by the side of much that is decidedly modern, full of Christian and even Mohammedan ideas, we meet there at the same time with thoughts and expressions which are not only Vedic in their simplicity, but seem to carry us in some cases to a stage more simple, more primitive, and more intelligible than the mythological phraseology of those ancient hymns. We must not exaggerate, and not knowing much of Lettish myself, I ought to speak with great reserve. It seems to me a very great 1088 that the Collectanea which Mannhardt left. on Lettish and Lituanian mythology, which Dr. Berkholz of Riga undertook to publish (see Quellen und Forschungen, p. xxix), have never appeared. His Lituanian researches would of course be more valuable even than what he has left us on the Lettish Solar Myth, for Lituanian is to Lettish what Old Norse is to Middle High German, and

432

LET1'ISH MYTHOLOGY.

[CHAP.

would probably give us the key to many secrets not only in Lettish, but also in Greek and Roman mythology. A great treasure lies hidden there; will no one lift it? Trusting in Mannhardt's statements, I may at least say so much, that there are cases in which the phraseology of the Veda seems strange or bold to us, but where it is nevertheless supported by the phraseology of Lettish and other Slavonic popular songs, It has been doubted whether when the Vedic poets speak simply of the cow, or the mother of the cows (Rv. IV, 52, 3), we are justified in translating these names by the Dawn; and whether instead of saying 'it is morning,' anybody in his senses could have said, 'the red cow lies among the black cows.' But in Russian songs (see Mannhardt, p. 308), the black cow is simply a name for the night, the day is called the grey or the white ox, and the twilight the grey bull ', The Dawn in the Veda is constantly called Divo duhita, the da.ughter of Dyaus or the Sky. If we could doubt as to the meaning of this name, the Lettish name for the Dawn, Diewodukte, would certainly remove all uncertainty. She is distinctly said to be Saulyte, the sun (i. e. of the morning), or Saules meita. In the Vedawe often hear of many Dawns or Dawn-maidens, and the poets of the Lets speak likewise of many beautiful Sky-daughters or God-daughters, Diewo

I Afanasieff in his Poetisehe Naturanschauungen, I, 659, gives a number of riddles, full of mythological germs, such as: The black cow bas tossed and- killed the people, the white cow has made them alive again; the black cow has imprisoned the people, the white cow has brought them out again; the black cow bas barricaded the door; the grey bull looked through the window, &c. Mannhardt. p. 308, note.

VI]

LET1'ISH llYTHOLOGY.

433

Duktuzeles. It has been doubted whether this daughter of Dyaus, the U shas of the Veda, could be represented in Greece by Charis or Aphrodite. But the Lettish songs tell us of the Dawn brilliant in her golden crown, and holding her golden horses with her golden rays. She has clearly in the eyes of the Lets become a goddess of beauty and love, wooed by the Moon and the God-sons. In the morning, we are told that her fire is lit by the Morning Star, in the evening the Evening Star is said to make her bed. She is also represented as crying over the golden apple that has fallen from the apple-tree, and over the golden boat that has sunk into the sea. These are some of the mythologica.l germs out of which grows in time the rank vegetation of mythology. What the golden boat is that sinks into the sea and is mourned for by the daughter of the sky (No. 33), however doubtful it may be elsewhere, is not to be mistaken in the mythology of the Lets. It is the setting sun which in the Veda has to be saved by the Asvins; it is the golden boat in which Helios and Herakles sail from West to East. Sometimes it is the Sun-daughter herself that is drowned, like Kyavana ill the Veda, and as KyavAna and similar heroes have to be saved in the Veda by the Asvins, the Lets also ca.ll upon the God-sons (dtOCTKOpOt) to row in a boat and save the Sun-daughter (No. 35). All these are only disjointed elements of mythology, but that is their greatest interest; they are still chaotic, but they afterwards gather round a centre and are reduced to some kind of order, regardless often of' their original character and intention. We may observe contradictions between these mythological aphorisms from the very beginning. How

434

LETTISH lIYTHOLOGY.

[CHAP.

could it be otherwise when it was open to every poet to interpret the phenomena of nature according to his own sweet will ~ Thus the Lettish songs tell us that the God-son who woos the Sun-daughter has grey horses. But these grey horses are elsewhere called the horses of the Moon, and ridden by the God-sons when wooing the daughter of the Sun (SftryA.). Then again we are told that the Moon has no horses of his own, or that the Morning and Evening Stars are his horses. In other songs the stars are caned the suitors of the Sun-daughter, and they also seem to carry her off, while the Moon, after having carried her off, seems to have forsaken her, and to have been punished by Perkun for his faithlessness. There are similar contradictions with reference to the suitors of SliryA., the Sun-daughter, in the Veda, and some of these contain the germs of those very tragedies which surprise us in most mythologies. When the Sun had promised her daughter to the God-son, and afterwards given her to the Moon, Perkun, who was invited to the wedding, cut the Moon in pieces and destroyed the great oak-tree. In other songs the Sun is represented as having cut the Moon in pieces because he had taken away the betrothed bride from the Morning Star (No. 716). But after the Moon had wedded the Sun he is said to have fallen in love with the Morning Star, and for that to have been cut in two by Perkun (No. 77).

The Sky-tree.

There is a great oak-tree or apple-tree or rose-tree, often mentioned in the Lettish songs, and there seems to me little doubt that it was meant for an

VI]

THE SKY-TREE.

435

imaginary tree on which every day the sun was supposed to grow up in the East. The sun is called the rose as well as the golden apple, and as a rose or an apple always requires a stem to grow on, an invisible tree was supposed to spring up every morning, to grow higher and higher till noon, and then to come down again or to be cut down in the evening, so that all its branches were scattered about. This would lend some meaning to what has hitherto been a great puzzle to many students of mythology, namely the Weltbaum, of which Kuhn and other scholars speak as if everybody knew what it meant,while it has always seemed to me very difficult to connect any clear idea with that name. If the clouds also were supposed to belong to that tree, it would come very Dear the German Wetterbaum, the tree of the thunderclouds, which seems to have been imagined because the clouds also, like the foliage of a tree, presupposed a support, or a stem from which they could spring and on which they were supposed to rest. If then we accept this Lettish conception of a suntree, whether a rose (No. 84) or an apple-tree or an oak, we shall understand how the Sun-daughter could have been fabled to ascend on the rose-tree to the sky (No. 83), like Jack on the beanstalk, and how the same Sun-daughter should have cried over the apple that fell from the tree (No. 28), that apple being the daily sun which drops in the West, and was supposed to lie there till it could be recovered by some god or powerful hero 1.

1 The Sun-daughter is told not to cry over the apple, because the God-sons will come in the morning to roll the golden apple (No. 29), or to hurl it on high.

THE SKY-TREE.

[CHAP.

Here it seems to me we get an intelligent background for the apple or the apples of the Hesperides, which had to be brought back by Herakles, as the heroic representative of the sun. The story would have been originally no more than that the sun of the morning was the apple that had fallen from the tree in the evening, and which no one could bring back except some powerful hero, some Herakles, himself of solar origin. This outline once given, anything else that we hear of the labours of Herakles in recovering the apple or even the apples of the Hesperides would become more or less intelligible.

JAson and the Golden Fleece.

The same tree as the great oak-tree, watched by dragons, may help us to interpret the exploit of another hero, namely JAson ("IauCIUI). We must of course distinguish, as the Greeks did, between 'ICi.uLwv, the son of Zeus and ~lectra (or Hemera) and brother of Dardanos, who on the thrice-ploughed field begat with Demeter Plouton or Ploutos, and was killed by the thunderbolt of Zeus, and 'Iao-wv, the son of Aison and Polymede, the grandson of Kretheus of J olkos, and the famous conqueror of the golden fleece and of Medeia, the daughter of Aietes. But the names and their varieties are difficult to keep apart, except that 'Ia<Twv, the Argonaut, has short i and long A, while (if I am not mistaken), 'Ia<TLwv, ·Ia<To~, 'la<TLo~, 'Ia<Tro~ have long i and short a, because the name corresponds to Sk. Vivasv;\n, the sun, which transliterated into Greek would become FLFa<TFwv, i. e. 'Ia<Twv or 'Ia<TLwv. The tradition was that J bon had been instructed by Cheiron, and had

VI]

~AsoN AND THE GOLDEN FLEEC&

437

received from him the name of JAson, i. e. the healer, instead of his former name of Diomedes, Here therefore the long a. of lao-Oa., would be right, though it does not follow that 'IC£uCrJJI was originally meant for healer. But the beloved of Demeter who is called not only Jltsion, but Jasoe and Jasios, had originally a short a, and its i was lengthened in order to make the name possible in hexameters. This Jasion then, originally Jason, would be meant for Vivasvan the sun, and who could with Demeter beget the wealth of the fields, if not the sun 1

AB to the other JAson, unless originally he was likewise VivasvAn, the sun, and afterwards misinterpreted as a healer, laTp6c;, he would lend himself readily as the chief actor in several of the adventures of the Argonaut JAson. Let us remember that Phrixos, after losing Helle (another SClrya), had carried the golden fleece to Aia, the country ruled by Aietes, who was the husband of Idyia (the knowing, another name of Hekate), and the father of Medeia (the wise). It is true it is difficult to suggest an etymology for Aia. Even if it could stand for Gaia. that would help us very little. Mimnermos, however, as quoted by Strabo, i, 2, gives us an important hint by telling us that Aia was the country where the rays (ci.IC'Ti:JI£c;) of the swift Helios are kept in a golden chamber on the shore of Okeanos, If this was the popular belief in his time, then Aia was the West where Helios deposits every day his rays, as the Sun-daughter deposits her crown, and where he dwells till he appears again with his rays in the East. Later poets speak of one Aia in the West which they assign to Kirke, and another Aia ill the East which

JASON AND THE GOLDEN FtEECE.

[CHAP.

belongs to the brother ofKirke, Aietes, both children, it should be observed, of Helios and Perse. In the Odyssey Aia is clearly the Aia 1 in the West.

The next question is, what could be meant by the golden fleece ~ It was the fleece of the golden ram on which Helle ann Phrixos, children of N ephele, had crossed. the Hellespont. Helle (Sftrya) was drowned, like the Sun-daughter, while her brother Phrixos (ripple) when arriving in Aia hung the fleece of the ram 2 on which he and his sister had been riding on a great oak-tree which was guarded by a dragon. The Lets seem to know nothing of the dangerous journey of Phrixos and Helle, but they know of a woollen cloth which Maria, here the Sundaughter, had hung on the great oak-tree, and which had been bespattered with the blood of the oak-tree when it was struck down by Perkun (No. 72). This woollen cloth is often mentioned in the Lettish songs, it had to be cleaned, washed, and dried. We have seen already that the great oak-tree which grew in the West is really the same as the sun-tree 3 that springs up in the morning and is cut down every evening. The branches of it were not to be gathered, but the Sun-daughter is said to have carried off' one golden bough (Nos. 45, 82) '. The

1 There is a name of the dark half of the moon which occurs in the Satapatba-bn\hmana VIII, <J, 2, I I, and might be identified with ala, namely agava. But even if phonetically possible, it would not help us for discovering the original conception of the country of Ai6tes.

I Cf. Babr. 93, 7, I(P'0f ~s.lo I/Jp'l(l ,.,nA)'OIl OpSo,fTfJf.

3 Sun-beam= Zounenboom {Willams, Belg. Museum, i, 326}. • The same tree is called in Finnish puu Jumalan, the tree

of God, in Est. Taars tamme, the oak of Taara, planted by the Sun-son, Eaton. Paiwapoega or by Taars's son. When, how-

VI]

.JAsoN AND THE GOLDEN FLEECE.

439

red woollen cloth that was hung on it by the Sundaughter can hardly have been meant for anything but the red of the evening or the setting sun, sometimes called her red cloak. When it is said that this woollen cloth when gathered up was full of silver pieces (No. 37), this can only have been meant for the silver stars which had risen where the red of the evening had been spread out before.

If then we take this red cloth on the oak-tree for the original form of the fleece hung on the oak-tree in Aia, i.e, ill the West, its recovery by some hero would simply be the repetition of the recovery of the golden apple by Herakles, This recovery could only be the work of a solar hero, who brings the next day, and might well have been called Vivasvan or Jason, the sun (not yet Jason, the healer), being the father of the two Asvins, and the husband of Erinys (Saranyft). The fundamental idea of this expedition of Jil.son as of several of the labours of Herakles, such as the fetching of the apples of the Hesperides, the recovery of the girdle of Hippolyte (the Sun-daughter also has her girdle), the chase of the golden-horned Kerynean doe (generally taken for a representative of the moon), seems to have always been the same, the bringing back of the western sun. At first we must suppose that there were ancient sayings among the people such as 'the great oak-tree has been cut down,' 'the red woollen cloth has been spread out,' 'the girdle has been brought back,' 'the golden apple in the West has

ever, it is said that this tree overshadows the whole sky and does not allow sun and moon to shine, it would seem to be the Wetterbaum, thunder-tree, rather than the sun- tree.

440

JASON AND THE GOLDEN FL2ECE.

[CHAP.

been found,' , the gold-horned doe has been caught' -all meaning no more than what we mean when we say the bright sunlight has come back. As this return or recovery could not be achieved by itself, some agent had to be supplied to do the work, and the agent could only be the sun again in his diurnal and half-humanised character. All this may sound very strange, but to the student of ancient language it is so by no means, only we must wait till we get more light from ancient Lituanian sources in addition to what Mannhardt has already obtained from more ~odern Lettish poetry. What with proverbial sayings and popular riddles, mythology would spring up in abundance, and answers would readily be given by imaginative grannies to any questions that might be asked. If, for instance, the old people were asked who made crowns and girdles for the Sun-daughter and the God-sons, they would soon tell of a Heavensmith who makes crowns and girdles and rings and spurs, while they would point to the stars as the sparks that come flying from his smithy, and fall into the great waters 1.

Antecedents of Vedic Mythology.

This must suffice to show in what sense Lettish sagas may be said to allow us a glance into the antecedents even of Vedic mythology. If' that is so, we shall of course be told that the study of the mythology of Tasmanians or Andaman islanders will carry us still further back. This may be quite true, though we must never forget that the Lituanians are Aryas, the Mincoupies are not. But

1 See Mannhardt, Lettische Sonnenmythen, Nos. 36-38.

VI]

ANTECEDENTS OF VEDIC MYTHOLOGY.

441

I have not a word to say against any attempts to find the right key to mythological riddles, wherever it can be found.

I have fully dealt with these speculations and I shall only add here, that what seems to me surprising is that no one who holds those views should have perceived the necessity of first proving that the palaeolithic savages of to-day or yesterday began their life or their historical development on earth one day, nay one hour, later or earlier than the Aryas of India or Lituania. We know from the languages and from some of the complicated customs of uncivilised races that those so-called sons of nature have had many ups and downs before they became what they are now, yet no one has attempted to prove that their ups and downs were exactly the same as the ups and downs of the A.ryas. We must try to think clearly, and must not allow ourselves to be carried away by mere plausibilities. Granted that the Aryas must have been savages, does it really follow that all savages, any more than all civilised races, were alike, or that the Aryan savages in their elaboration of myths and customs acted exactly like other savages 1 Even modern savages differ most characteristically from each other. AB Dr. Bleek has pointed out, the mere fact that the Bantu languages have no masculine and feminine gender, accounts for the poverty of their mythology. Who then is to determine what phase of savagery, Red Indian, African, Tasmanian, or Andaman, underlies, directly or indirectly, the childhood of the Aryas 1

Composite Character of Mythology.

Ancient languages, ancient beliefs and customs

442 COMPOSITE CHARACTER OF MYTHOLOGY. [CHAP. were not formed according to rule. Even if we were to admit that all human beings were born alike, their surroundings have always been very different, and their intellectual productions must have differed in consequence. Mythology is not a thing that is what it is, by necessity. It is determined in its growth by ever so many accidental circumstances, by ever so many known and unknown influences, even by individual poets or sages. When it reaches us, it has passed through ever so many hands. It forms then an immense conglomerate which excludes hardly anything that has ever passed through the mind of man. What should we say if some geologists, after discovering shells or Hakes of Hint in one of their pudding stones, were to say that these conglomerates consisted by necessity of shells and Hints 1 Yet, that is exactly what many of our comparative mythologists have lately been doing. When they had discovered, for instance, that some mythological gods and heroes were historical characters, at once they started a theory that all gods and all heroes were originally real men and women. We saw how the story of Daphne fleeing before Phoibos was explained as the recollection of an adventure, such as might happen any day, of a damsel of the name of Miss Dawn being pursued by a ruffian of the name of Mr. Sun.

When ethnologists saw that reverence was paid by certain tribes to a stone or a shell or the tail of a lion, at once fetishism was made the solvent of all mythological and religious puzzles. The difference that fetishes are objects worshipped, as far as the worshippers are concerned, without any rhyme or reason, while other objects, now often

VI]

COMPOSITE CHARACTER OF MYTHOLOGY.

443

f

classed as fetishes, such as amulets, crosses, relics, palladions, ytlpas, or maypoles, if they are worshipped at all, are worshipped for a very intelligible reason, was completely ignored.

As soon as it became known that in several languages, both ancient and modern, the names of some divine or half-divine beings meant originally lions or bulls, totem ism became the order of the day, and was preached most persuasively as the foundation of all religious and mythological worship. The objection that a totem meant originally a clan-mark was treated as scholastic pedantry, till at last the totemistic epidemic attacked even those who ought to have been proof against this infantile complaint.

It is a well-known and easily understood fact that many nations, both civilised and uncivilised, preserve the memory of their fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers, that they revere their names, and often at their meals and on other occasions honour them with simple offerings.

All this is human, and intelligible, and, in that sense, primitive. If earlier traces of such customs can be found among modern savages, by all means let us have them. Only we must not allow ourselves to be carried away into a blindfolded acceptance of ancestor-worship, as explained by Mr. Herbert Spencer, or of totem ism or fetishism or animism, when used as the solvents of all the problems of religion and mythology.

On the other hand, after we have once understood the comprehensive character of mythology, it would be folly to deny that there may be instances of what by these most ill-defined terms are called fetishism, totemism, and ancestral spiritism in the Veda, ill

VOL. JI. C

e !'

444 COMPOSITE CHARACTER OF MYTHOLOGY. [CHAP. Homer, or even in the Bible; but if there are such, they must be treated each on its own merits. It would be altogether begging the question to say that these isolated instances are remnants or socalled survivals from a complete period of ancient thought and worship, which consisted of nothing but fetishism, totemism, or spiritism, as practised by the ancestors of all the Aryan races, nay of all mankind. It would be easy to produce instances even in our own times of what we are invited to comprehend under these vague terms.

Are there not priests and nuns among us who wear amulets (fetishes) 1 Are there no soldiers ready to die for their colours (totems) 1 Are there no commemorative services in honour of ancestors departed long ago 1 But the truth is that even among the most backward savages we never find a. religion consisting exclusively of a belief in fetishes, in totems, or in ancestral spirits 1. A closer study has always shown that these are ingredients or accretions or excrescences of a more comprehensive and comprehensible faith, and that the influence of natural phenomena is visible in the religious traditions of most, if not of all so-ca1led fetish-worshippers, totemists, and spiritists 2.

Character of Vedio Gods predominantly physioal.

I do not believe, though we have been told so, that any serious students of Vedic literature have ever denied the physical origin of the Vedic gods,

1 Hibbert Lectures, ISi8, p. 107: 'No religion consists of fetishism only.'

I See M. M., Presidential Address at the Anthropological Section of the British Association in 189 r, p. 12.

VI1

VEDIC GODS PHYSICAL.

445

and have joined the ranks of those who represent them as ancestral spirits, as fetishes, or totems. Professor Tiele has strongly protested against the supposition that he had ever joined the school of M. Gaidoz. As to M. Barth, he declares in no uncertain tone: 'Noone contests any longer that myths are from the first the natural and popular expression of very simple facts, that particularly the most ancient have reference to the most common phenomena of nature, and that they depend very closely on language 1 ;' while Professor Oldenberg in his Religion des Veda, p. 53, though he seems to me in some places far too sanguine in his hopes of finding antecedents and explanations of Vedic myths and customs among the lowest of the low, states without hesitation that 'the fundamental stock of Vedic myths may be expected to consist of physical events.' What more can we want? At a later time Professor Oldenberg has guarded himself even more carefully against being supposed to have joined our so-called adversaries. He shows clearly the evolution of Aryan mythology through the three successive historical periods, the IndoEuropean, the Indo-Iranian, and the Vedic, and if' he admits a more distant stage of savagery before the beginning of the Aryan period, this is what no one would deny as a possibility, though as yet it seems outside the sphere of practical politics, and need not disturb us for the present.

A.ge of Vedic Literature.

There are many things which are perfectly understood among Sanskrit scholars, though they are not

I Anthropological Religion, p. 42-4.

C 2

446

AGE OF VEDIC LITERATURE.

[CHAP.

often discussed in public, for the simple reason that there are no definite facts on which these understandings could be shown to rest. We speak, for instance, of the date of Vedic poetry as about I 200 to 1500, but all we mean by this is that we have no authority to enable us to fix on any earlier or later date. But whoever knows the Vedic hymns knows that they presuppose, nay that they necessitate, indefinite periods of intellectual and linguistic growth which no merely chronological plummet can ever fathom. It may be said that children learn quickly to perceive, to conceive, and to speak, and that the same may have been the case in the childhood of our race. But it is not a question of years, it is a question of vast periods of intellectual growth, that must have passed before any noun could be formed and declined, before any verb could have been elaborated and conjugated. As to the growth of religious thought, we can clearly see how in the Vedic hymns a race of old gods, the Asuras, such as Dyaus and Varuna, are vanishing, and the new gods, the Devas, are still uncertain between their physical and their moral meaning. Some of the commonest words, such as yagiia, sacrifice, brahman, word and prayer, 1-ita, law and order, Aditi, the Beyond, have already in the Veda lost their etymological meaning, and leave on us the impression that even their traditional meaning had become very uncertain. The period during which these words spoke, as it were, for themsel ves, lies far beyond the period of the Vedic Rishis. There is besides a whole stream of thought and language in India, which in its literary embodiment is treated and rightly treated as post-Vedic,

AGE OF VEDIC LITERATURE.

447

but which requires antecedents which, as they are not found in Vedic literature, must be allowed to have existed elsewhere, and to have passed through a parallel development, going back to Vedic or even pre -Vedic times. The epic elements collected in the MahAbhArata and RAmAyana required time to grow up before they could have been gathered in these gigantic poems. And the same applies to the laws, and to many popular stories which meet us for the first time in the SAstras of the Brahmans and the GAtakas of the Buddhists, not as recent productions, but as old, or, as what is called Smriti, re-collection, as distinct from Sruti, revelation.

But even this is not all We know that there was a time when the Aryas of India and Persia were not yet separated, and we have historical remains of that period in what the Veda and A vesta share ill common, whether in language, in religion, ceremonial, or mythology. In that period the old name of god, MUm, must have been the recognised name for gods, ahura = asura being the principal element in the name of the supreme deity Ahur6·mazdao, while deva was not used at all as a name of god or gods.

Then again, before that Indo-Iranian period there was that equally real period which preceded the Aryan Separation, and which has its history in the annals of words common to the two great divisions of that family, the Southern and the Northern. If

• we consider the intellectual work assigned to that period, we shall hesitate indeed before assigning to it any definite chronological limits.

And if then we ask ourselves the question whether that Pan-Aryan period could have been immediately preceded by a period of what is called savagery, or

AGE OF VEDIC LITERATURE.

[CHAP.

rather by any special kind of savagery, whether North American or South African, I feel sure that all true scholars will hesitate before committing themselves to any of these fa.r-reaching theories.

SraddhA,

An insta.nce will explain what I mean. I£ we take such a word as faith, or 'to believe,' it may seem to us very simple and natural; but that the idea of believing, as different from seeing, knowing, denying, or doubting, was not so easily elaborated, is best shown by the fact that we look for it in vain in the dictionaries of many un civilised races. Even the Greeks do not say much of faith, though they have the word. What they recommend is EVU'E/JEta, reverence, piety, rather than 1TtU'n~, faith. Mere vague belief, oi"1U't~, was called by Heraclitus i.Epa. vovU'o~, a sacred malady, Now when we find in Sanskrit Srad-da-dhd.mas and in Latin credimus, in Sk. srad-dadhau and in Latin eredidi, in Sk. srad-dhitam and in Latin creditum, we cannot doubt that these words existed before the Brahmans came to India, before the Aryas of India and Persia separated, nay before the original Aryan family broke up into its two branches. And if the word had been elaborated, the idea of faith also, in its simplest form, must have been realised before that early date. But what was meant by this srat in srad-dadhau, i. e. I make or take as srat, a word of which little trace is left in credo for cred-do 1 Darmesteter identified srat or srad with hrid, heart, Lat. cor, Gr. Kap8ta, Goth. bairto, Irish, cride, which would give us the original concept of putting in the heart or taking to heart. But is this the germ of the idea expressed by , to believe' 1 The phonetic

VI] BRADDHA. 449 difficulty of 8 (srat) taking the place of h (hrid) in two contemporaneous words in Sanskrit might possibly be got over, but there is a passage in the Rig-veda, not considered by Darmesteter, which makes it impossible to assign to srat the original meaning of heart. In Rv. VIII, 75, 2 : .mit vlsvA. v6.rya kridhi, 'Make all things wished for, true, 0 Agni.' Here the meaning of heart would be clearly impossible; srat seems to mean true, sratkri to make true, srat-dhA., to hold true. In some passages sraddhs would bear the meaning of promise or troth, for instance, Rv. I, 108, 6 :-

Yat abravam prathamam va.m vrinanah Aym s6mah asuraih nah vihavyah I T«m saty«m sraddham abht « hi yatam Atha s6masya pibatam sutdsya I

, What I said, when first adoring you, "this Soma of ours is to be called for by the gods," on this true promise come near, and then drink of the Soma that has been pressed for you.'

In VI, 26, 6, also, tvam sraddhtbhih mandasanah s6maih, the only sense possible seems to be, 'Thou, rejoicing in our vows and offerings of Soma.' Most frequently both the verb and the substantive are used in the sense of trusting and believing in the gods and in their power, and are construed then with the dative. Rv. I, 55, 5 :-

Adha kana srat dadhati tvishimate Indraya vagram nighanighnate vadham.

'Then indeed men believe in Indra, the fiery warrior who again and again hurls down the thunderbolts.'

In Latin we have already the accusative in 'Alte tonantem credidimus Jovem.' The Vedic poets

450

bT.ADDHA.

[CHAP.

actually appeal to the mighty works of Indra to make people believe in him. Rv. I, 103, 5 :-

Tat asya idam pasyata bhfiri pushzam

Srat Indrasya dhattana virydya.

, Look at this, his great and mighty work, and believe in the power of Indra.' The regular succession of the heavenly phenomena is sometimes pointed out as a warrant for seeing and believing. Rv. I, 102, 2 :

Asme sllryAkandramasA., abhi-kakshe sraddhd kam Indra karatah vitartursm, ' Sun and Moon move on alternately, that we should see and believe.'

In the sense of trusting or relying, sraddha is also construed with the accusative. Rv. I, 103, 3: Sah ga,t<1bharmA sraddadhAnah 6gah purah vibhindan akarat vi dlsih, ' He, the bearer of the thunderbolt, trusting in his strength, moved along, cutting the hostile strongholds to pieces.' I mention all this in order to show through how many successive phases of thought the Aryan mind must have worked its way, before such a concept as faith could have been finished as embodied in one of the oldest Aryan compounds srat+ dhA. And yet all this must have been finished long before the Vedic, long before the Indo-Aryan, long before the end of the Pan-Aryan period, because thus only can we explain the coexistence of sraddhitam in Sanskrit and crsditum in Latin. Into what distant past the history of this Aryan compound carries us would be difficult to say chronologically; psychologically, however, we may be certain that it was a good deal later than what is represented by their period of mere savagery. Before people could be asked to believe in the gods, the gods (whether asuras or de vas) must have been elaborated, nay a period of primitive scepticism must

VI]

SRADDHA.

451

have intervened, before faith could be required and represented almost as a virtue (Rv. 11,26,3; 1,104, 7). The gods whom men were asked to believe in were in the Veda the gods of nature. Noone who knows the Veda can doubt this; no one, even with the greatest tenderness for ethnological speculations, would, I feel sure, ever make the slightest concession on this, the fundamental principle of Comparative Mythology. Our first duty therefore is to try to interpret the Veda. from itsel£ The next step is to look for light in cognate languages and cognate mythologies. If all this fails, it will be time to cast a loving glance at the folklore of unrelated and uncivilised races, though I am bound to say, I know, as yet, of few cases only where Tasmanians, Mincoupies, or Blackfeet have proved half as useful to us as even SAyana's much abused commentary.

Belation between the Vedic and other Aryan :Mythologies.

It has been questioned whether the mythology of the Veda is really so intimately connected with that of other Aryan nations as its language has been proved to be, and whether it is more primitive than all the rest. Here again we must try to come to a clear understanding. That the Aryan mythologies spring from a common source, the one equation of Dyaush-pitar, ZW~ '7Tarrip, and Ju-piter has placed once for all beyond the reach of reasonable doubt. And when we say that Vedic mythology represents a period of thought which had almost entirely passed away before we can conceive the possibility of the Olympian Pantheon, or of the mythological creations of Italy and Germany, we do not speak simply of

452 VEDIC AND OTHER ARYAN MYTHOLOGIES. [CHAP. chronological priority. What chronology is there that could settle the dates of the birth and the death of the Aryan gods? Some myths die soon and are forgotten, while others possess so peculiar a vitality that they survive from age to age in all their freshness and youthfulness, that is, in their intelligibility, or what has been called their transparency. If the Vedic mythology, such as it is, could be proved to have sprung up but yesterday in a desert island or in the moon, its psychological priority and its psychological interest would remain just the same.

Still, however simple in its conceptions Vedic mythology may be, as compared to Greek and Roman mythology, it would not be right to claim for it a primordial character, whatever that may mean.

More Modern Ingredients in Vedic Mythology.

Even the oldest Vedic hymns and the oldest Vedic gods often exhibit a decidedly secondary and tertiary character. As we find here and there in Greek, Latin, or Lituanian grammatical forms more primitive than their corresponding forms in Sanskrit, we find in their mythologies also some names and legends less disturbed than what corresponds to them in the Veda. This has always been admitted by all serious scholars.

Ceremonial Ideas in Vedic Hymns.

But some of them seem to me to have gone a great deal too far in maintaining that all Vedic hymns are productions of a modern or secondary age, compositions in fact of priests, and solely intended as accompaniments to a highly developed

VI]

CEREMONIAL IDEAS IN VEDIC HYMNS.

453

sacrificial ceremonial. The reason of this misconception is that some scholars have formed to themselves a kind of ideal of what primitive poetry ought to be, and starting from this ideal, which has no existence except in their brain, of a pre-adamite or half-angelic childhood of the human race, they declare even the most ancient poems as time-worn and effete. The question is, do we know any Aryan poetry less time-worn and more ancient than that of the Veda? That a considerable portion of our Vedic hymns was preserved simply because they could be fitted into the sacrificial framework of the BrAhmans, no Vedic scholar has ever doubted. But this is very different from asserting that we possess no Vedic poetry, nay that no Vedic poetry existed before the institution of the Vedic ceremonial.

Saorifloe and Prayer.

Some theorists went even further and maintained that by some inward necessity sacrifice everywhere comes first and sacred poetry second. Such general assertions carry little weight. All depends here on what we mean by sacrifice. If, as the Vedic poet says, it is a sacrifice to Agni, the god of fire, to put but one log of wood on the hearth 1, if to bend the knee before the rising sun, or to lift the hands towards heaven during a thunderstorm is to be called worship, then it would certainly be difficult to say which comes first, praise or worship. But if sacrifice means what the Brahmans meant by their Yagiia, a most complicated ceremonial, though presupposed even in many of the hymns, then to suppose that no

I Apast. Stltras II, 9, 21.

454

SACRIFICE AND PRAYER.

[CHAP.

word of prayer or praise did ever proceed in measured cadence from the lips of the Brahmans, till they had . elaborated their minute sacrificial ceremonial, their Srauta sacrifices, is opposed to all we know, whether from psychology or from history. Who is competent to settle who came first, the priest or the poet, if not the priest himself ? Yet the author of Hymn 88 in the tenth Mandala, whether we call him priest or poet, says, Rv. X, 88, 8 :-

StiktavAkam prathamam «t it agnim, At it havfh aganayanta devlh.

I The gods created first the reciter of hymns, then Agni (the sacrificial fire), then the sacrificial offerings.'

This looks almost like an intentional protest against the opposite theory; at all events, it cannot be treated as a merely casual and unimportant remark. There are in the Rig-veda hymns utterly inappropriate for sacrificial purposes, and there are other hymns that had actually to be altered in some minute points (tiha) in order to suit the requirements of a complicated liturgy. If former students of' the Veda neglected the liturgical elements, those who have since called attention to their existence and importance have, as usual, allowed themselves to be carried away much too far in the opposite direction. It is true, no doubt, that in very early times the sacrifice has taken a larger development in India than anywhere else. Only we should be careful. If we are told that karman must be translated by sacrifice, this is true; but the reason is that sacrifice in early times was simply any act that accompanied a prayer. Nor must we imagine, because we translate yagna, kratu, adhvara by

VI]

SACRIFICE AND PRAYER.

455

sacrifice, that therefore the ancient sacrifices in India were the same thing as the sacrifices of which we read among the Jews, Greeks, and Romans, or, it may be, the sacrifices and orgies of uncivilised and savage races. The growth of sacrificial customs has to be studied separately in every country. If' we found the minute sacrificial rules which have been preserved to us in the BrA.hmanas and Sutras in India, repeated in Greece and Rome, or even in the canons of the Christian Church, we should say at once that such rules could only be the result of a long continued, and therefore of a far advanced and very modern civilisation, and that they prove the existence of a long established and powerful priesthood. I pointed out many years ago, 1859, in my History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 493, how perplexing it waS to see the most minute ceremonial distinctions recognised not only in the Brihmanas and Sutras, but already in the hymns of the Rig-veda. I showed how the names of the seven different classes of priests, intended each for their own special sacrificial acts, such as Hotri, Potri, N eshtri, Agnidh, PrasAstri, Adhvaryu, and Brahman, occurred in the hymns, and had become so familiar that some of them had actually been transferred to Agni, the god of the sacrificial fire. I have nothing to retract from what I said then, and I can only repeat that, in order to account for the apparently artificial and modern ideas occurring in these hymns, I should give anything to be able to assign to the final collection of the hymns of the Rig-veda a much later date than what is commonly assigned to it. But I see as yet no chance of escape from my own arguments, and I often wish that those who repeat

SACRIFICE AND PRAYER.

[CHAP.

again and again that Vedic literature has been proved to be much more modern than I supposed it. to be, would give me their proofs. No one would be more grateful for them than I. But as the case stands at present, I am afraid that nothing remains but to try to learn a new lesson, namely that religious acts, and even minute ceremonial rules and distinctions, may under favouring circumstances spring up in a much earlier stage of civilisation than we were led to suppose from a study of the religion of the Jews, the Greeks and Romans, 01' even of savage races. At all events, the fact that many of the Vedic hymns presuppose on the part of the poets a familiarity with senseless ceremonial minutiae, cannot possibly justify the historian of religion in maintaining that in India ceremonial came first, and sacred poetry second, still less, as-has been asserted by some writers who are not Vedic scholars, that there are no hymns in the Rig-veda which were not from the first composed by priests, and exclusively for sacrificial purposes. One cannot well prove what stands written on so many pages of the Rig-veda. If we call every petition addressed to the Devas, every praise of their power and majesty, which was afterwards employed in the course of certain sacrifices, a sacrificial hymn, then no doubt the majority of the poems collected in the Rig-veda may go by that name. If we imagine that no gift of water, honey, milk, butter, or cake could be made to the gods except by a priest, or that every libation at the beginning or end of a meal, every surrender of a valued possession on the funeral pile or on a fresh grave, is a sacrifice, then most of the hymns of the Vedic Rishis, though even then by no means

VI]

SACRIFICE AND PRAYER.

457

a.ll, may be called mere accessories of sacrificial performances. But there are surely recurrent, and more or less solemn acts in the morning and the evening, if consisting only in the stirring and lighting of the fire on the hearth in the morning, and its careful making up in the evening, there is the glory of the full moon, and the return of the new moon which call forth religious feelings, and become an excuse for more 01' less boisterous festivities. There was even a definite practical purpose in the celebration of the return of the seasons, whether three or four or five or six, in the observation of the four stations of the sun at the time of the shortest and the longest days, and, later on, at the vernal and autumnal equinoxes. All this is natural, and indispensable, simply for the sake of keeping time, though it does not presuppose a priesthood or a ceremonial canon. I feel more and more convinced that the true origin of the solemn public sacrifices must be sought for in the necessity of establishing and maintaining a kind of calendar for reckoning days, sennights, fortnights, months, seaSOllS, and years. This would naturally lead to the establishment offestivals on certain days of the year, but these need not have been more at first than gatherings and feastings of families, clans, or villages, with praises of certain gods who are more intimately connected with certain days or seasons, and with friendly recollections of departed members of the family. But when we meet with a fixed number of priests and their various offices, an elaborate construction of' the altars intended for various fires, a large number of sacrificial implements, and the preparation of every kind of sacrificial

458 SACRIFICE AND PRAYER. [CHAP. offering, we feel no doubt that we have reached a new and comparatively modern stage. Only need we suppose that such a stage was never reached, before some poetical expression had been given to the motives which, we cannot doubt, inspired every one of these solemn performances? It is quite possible that such poetical utterances had an intimate relation to such acts as the lighting of the fire in the morning and its protection in the evening; but an expression of gratitude for the genial warmth of the fire on the hearth, or a praise of the sun at the return of spring, need surely not have waited till there was a special priest to perform the act of kindling the fire, till the logs that should be used for such a purpose had been carefully measured and numbered, &c.

I am always most reluctant to differ on questions of this kind from Grimm. Grimm (Kleinere Sehriften, ii, p. 460) admits, as is well known, three successive periods, the first where people sacrificed only, the second where they sacrificed and prayed, the third where they prayed only. I do not see, however, that this was more than a postulate with Grimm, and I doubt whether there are facts to support it.

:Magio and Witchoraft.

It has been said, and I think truly said, that much of the Vedic ceremonial savours of magic and witchcraft, and bears a certain likeness to the sorcery and black art practised by savage races in ancient and modern times. It could hardly be otherwise, for every sacrifice contains the germs of magic within it. Sacrifices even of the simplest

VI]

J[AGIC AND WITCHCRAF'l'.

459

kind were supposed to produce an effect indirectly through the intervention of divine beings. This too may be called superstitious, but at the time and to the persons most concerned, it was not without a. certain logic. Believing in gods as they did, they naturally believed that their gods were accessible to the same arguments and the same bribes which produced an effect on their friends on earth. As soon, however, as these Devas were left out of consideration, sacrifice and prayer by themselves were supposed to exercise a direct and constraining influence on nature in producing the events that were desired. They may then be said to have assumed a magical character. It is difficult to draw a sharp line of demarcation between these two kinds of ceremonies, and between the psychological dispositions that gave rise to them. The very words we use are ill-defined. In German the word commonly used for magic is Zauber, but it is by no means easy to say under what circumstances Zauber comprehends sorcery, witchcraft, enchantment, and black art. If a priest implores the help of the god of rain, or offers presents to Parganya, this would probably be called a sacrifice, but if by his spells and contortions he pretends to force parganya, the raincloud, to send down rain, it would seem at once to become magic or Zauber 1. Still there is clearly a transition between the two. Magic, in fact, seems to stand to sacrifice in the same relation in which superstition stands to faith, or logos to myth, and it may be stated without fear of contradiction, that every sacrificial act, the original purpose of' which

J Oldenberg, L c., pp. 435, 448, 459 seq.

VOL.n. D

llAGIC AND WITCHCRAFr.

[CHAP.

has been forgotten, is very apt to become magical. Or if this seems to be too wide a generalisation, we may say at all events that every magical act which now seems irrational, must originally have had a reason, and that it is the highest object of our studies to discover that reason.

Von Ihering's Rationalism.

In this respect Prof. Ihering has set us a splendid example to follow, showing us how there must be and how there is reason at the bottom of everything, however unreasonable it seems to us, in the customs and laws of the ancient world. What could seem more magical than the auguria taken by an army on its march? Why did they throw grain before the fowls and watch their movements 1 Because originally, as Prof. Ihering has shown, when entering into an unknown country, it was often a question of life and death whether the grain and berries that were found growing wild were poisonous or wholesome. The only way to find this out was to throw some of these grains before the fowls which had been brought on purpose, and to watch the result. As soon as the real purpose was forgotten, this augurium became a purely magical art, kept up by the augurs for their own purposes, but deprived of its original purpose (Zweck). We are told that in some of the islands of the Southern Sea the natives will eat no berries unless some of them have been pecked by the birds.

It is clear that such acts, which had dwindled down to mere superstitions, are far more likely to receive some kind of explanation in countries which possess an ancient literature or tradition

VI]

VON IHERING'S RATIONALISM.

than among African or Australian savages, where we never get beyond the surface of the day. In India, in Greece, in Italy we may catch a glimpse now and then through the twilight of a more or less continuous tradition; in Africa and Australia we move in complete darkness. It is much more likely, therefore, that a study of such works as the Atharvaveda, the Kausika-sutras, the Adbhuta-br!hmana. the Grihya-stltras, &c., may help us to understand the magical practices of Zulus and Red Indians than vice versA, and nothing can be more useful to the anthropologist by profession than a careful study of the Vedic age, with its prayers, its sacrifices, its imprecations and superstitions, if he wishes to understand some of the secret springs of magic and witchcraft as practised by Red Indians or Maoris. A study of the SrAddha sacrifices, of the cult of the Pitris in India, and of the Fravashis of Persia, has helped us to understand for the first time the true meaning of ancestor-worship, so widely spread among civilised and uncivilised races of the present day; why should not more light come from the same quarter in elucidation of Shamanism or Hwang-kiao 1

Atharva-veda..

I know there are many scholars who would protest against studying what they mean by Vedic Religion in such works as the Atharva-veda, the Kausika-slltras, or the Adbhuta-brAhmana, and it is generally agreed that the Atharva-veda is very modern as compared to the Rig-veda. Even those who stand up for the antiquity of the Atharva hymns, would probably admit that they belong to a totally different stratum from that which gave

D2

ATHARVA-VEDA.

[CHAP.

rise to the hymns of the Rig-veda. Still we know of nothing nearer to the other Vedas than the Atharva-veda, and though most scholars would agree that the Atharva-veda should at first be studied by itself, and not be mixed up with the other Vedas, many of the superstitions and purely magical mantras of the AtharvAilgirasas can only be explained by a reference to the Rig-veda, and not by consulting the accounts of travellers among the tribes of Northern Asia and Northern America.

Mordvinian and WotJa.kian Sacrifices.

But though I am not very sanguine of our ever gaining complete light on the origin of sacrificial and magical performances from the lowest of savages, from Bushmen or Australians, I have always been ready to learn a lesson from the ceremonial customs of such races as Mordvines and W otjakes, who possess something like trustworthy traditions of the past, and whose language has been carefully studied by real scholars. We all know how precarious and how perplexing the study of ancient customs is, how rarely we can find competent and trustworthy authorities, and how almost impossible it is to get any historical information extending beyond the present generation, and laying bare the roots from which certain customs have sprung. The explanation given by a native is generally considered as settling such matters, but it is only too well known by those who have trusted to that kind of evidence, how readily a native supplies whatever is wanted, and how innocently he tenders his own private impressions as representing the opinion of a whole clan or a whole people.

SOCIETE FINNO-OUGRIENNE.

Soci6te Finno-Ougrienne.

We ought to be all the more grateful, therefore, to the Societe Finno-Ougrienne for having sent from time to time competent scholars to report not only on the poetry but likewise on the customs, sacrificial or otherwise, of races still in a transition state, and without a sacred literature of their own, and, even when acquainted with and partially converted to Christianity, still performing their pagan sacrifices and worshipping their pagan deities. Such are, for instance, the Mordvinians, scattered in the district of Astrakhan on the upper course of the Volga, as lately described by M. W. Mainof in the fifth volume of the Journal de la Societe FinnoOugrienne, 1889. Such are the Erzjanians, a branch of the Mordvinians, whose prayers, riddles, and incantations have been studied by M. H. Paasonen in the twelfth volume of the same Journal, 1894- And such are the W otjakians, specimens of whose popular and Sacred poetry have been collected and published by M. YIjo Wichmann in the eleventh volume, 1893. These Wotjakians are chiefly found in the governments of Wjatka, Kasan, and Perm.

Among such races, if anywhere, we may hope to learn something of the true origin of' sacrificial acts and sacrificial poetry and of the mutual relation of the two. The authorities which I shall quote are all Finne- U grian scholars, and in their hands we may feel safe against such blunders and misunderstandings as are but too common in the works of casual travellers, and missionaries, even if stationed for years in the same places. Anyhow it will be seen that I have not neglected to study collateral

SOCIETE FINNO-OUGRIENNE.

[CHAP.

evidence, even if taken from non-Aryan races, if only the authorities we have to follow are trustworthy and vouched for by so eminent a body as the Societe Finno-Ougrienne.

We found before how the mythology of these Finne- U grian races offered striking analogies to the mythology of the Veda, and it is possible, therefore, that their sacrificial customs also may exhibit some useful parallels to the early ceremonial of the Vedic priesthood.

In examining the papers published in the Journal de la Societe Finno-Ougrienne we can still catch a few glimpses of the earliest periods of religious thought, and we find there hymns and formulas accompanied by the simplest sacrificial or superstitious acts which often remind us of similar mantras in the Atharva-veda. Thus in the collection of Erzjanian incantations in volume twelve, we read the following lines, intended to cure an illness caused by a fall (p. 5): '0 free light, Darija, the gloaming, and Marija, the dawn, and thou light, N astasija, assist us, help us I Goddess of the Earth, I place before thee bread and salt, and ask for thy grace. Where that man, Andrej, feU, cure him, make him whole, assist him, help him, thou earth-ruling goddess Uljana.

'Thanks to thee that thou gavest help. I have given thee food and drink. I have placed before thee sweet bread and salt, I have offered thee good eggs and cake as a reward for thy help. I scrape together a twokopek piece, I dedicate to thee a pud of silver, a pud of copper, and a hundred roubles of money.'

Here we see a strange mixture. The very name

VI] SOCIETE FINNO-OUGRIENNE. 465 of Andrej, i.e. Andrew, shows the presence of Christianity, the two kopeks are of a still more modern date, but the invocations of the Dawn, the Gloaming, and the Earth as goddesses are pure paganism. The petition was inspired by anxiety for the life of Andrew, and by a belief in the healing power of these pagan deities 1. We sometimes find a cartwheel used by these U grian tribes for healing diseases (p. 182), just as it was in Vedic times and among the Germans. In the offerings of eggs, cake, and money, we may discover germs of sacrificial acts, but we can also clearly perceive that these acts would have been inconceivable without the thoughts contained in the prayer, whether uttered outwardly or felt inwardly. Prayer alone gives significance to the act; we can imagine the prayer without the cake, but hardly the cake without the prayer.

When after a thunderstorm the sky begins to clear, the Erzjanians recite the following words, which might perfectly well have formed part of a hymn of the Yagur-veda, addressed to Indra or to U shas (p. 21): 'Manej, come forth, come forth! I shall give thee a beautiful egg, I shall kill for thee

a. white cock.'

Among the W otjakian linguistic specimens (vol. xi), we find many prayers, most of them accompanied by offerings or what may be called simple sacrificial acts. Some are actually addressed to Christ, others begin with Bismillah (p. 167), but most are addressed to pagan deities such as Inmar, Muziem Mum] (Mother Earth), Sundi-Mumi (Sun-mother), Mother VoZo, &c.

J See Kuhn, Indische und Germanische SegenssprUche, K. Z., xiii, 49·

SOCIETE FINNO-OUGRIENNE.

[CHAP.

Thus we read (p. 122): 'My osto Inmar, my great Inmar, creator Inmar, give a good year, give thy warm rain, give thy warm nights, give thy dew. Hear our prayers. We sacrifice old bread, give us still more of new bread! '

P. 124. ' We place offerings in the lap of the Weat Inmar, the Kiqxd'Zifl, the fertile Sky, the 1)mkiqzd'Zin, the corn-creating Sky, the Mm-kiwdZin, the earth-fertilising Sky, and the Muziem Mum! I, the Mother Earth, that we may have good luck:

Give us a good year, give thy warm nights, give thy warm rain, give thy dew, give thy flowers.

'My Gmdiri-Mum!, Thunder-Mother, and my Sundi-Mum!, Sun-Mother I We remember you with good broth and with bread. Give us warm days, and fair summer, and warm rain.'

Ancestral spirits also are invoked, as in the next prayer (p. 126):-

, There thou hast something. May it fall before thee! We shall give thee a horse. Grandfather, grandmother, father, mother, all members of our family I May the sacrifice fall before you I

'We give a horse to the father, and may it please him. May the other horses prosper. Give good life to the whole herd! Let the whole herd prosper! ' Or again, p. 143, after an invocation of the great deities, the ancestors are invoked: 'And you also, departed fathers and mothers I Do not forsake us

1 May I take this opportunity of repeating once more what I have often said, that the introduction of many diacritical marks makes printing, nay even intelligent reading, almost impossible. We should in writing keep, as much as possible, to broader phonetic categories, and leave the proper pronuneiation to those who know each specfallanguage.

VI]

SOCIETE FINNO-OUGRIENNE.

young people! Bring up our good flock! Make the corn we have sown heavy and good. Protect us against hatred and troubles I'

The great gods also are sometimes addressed as parents, and Inmar is invoked to look down from on high on his children (p, 155).

The Wotjakes in the district of Jelabuga sacrifice to Mardan as their ancestor (p. 130): 'We bring a horse as an offering to thee, Father Mardan, because thou hast given us good children, because thou hast given us good corn and good bread. We thank thee, Fa.ther Mardan.'

Sometimes we find the Rivers invoked as mothers (p. 134), just as in the Veda: 'Of one mind with our good neighbours, we came to thy shore with beer and kumyschka. Tsuptsi and Ptzep, you fertile mothers, give to our people an easy year, luck and well-being in all things I 0 mothers who never run dry, carry off with your waters all sicknesses. 0 my Vu-murt 1 (water spirit), carry our good cattle and our flock well across the stream, across the ford. If thou carry them well across, if thou takest great care of them, there will be something for thee also, something of the sacrifice will be left for thee. You fast-running, fertile mother-streams, give to the grass and to the seed something of your moisture.'

On p. 160 we read: '0 mother V oio ! Do not go away angry. Let thy warm, mild rain pour down on our field I Do not frighten thy people I Do not be angry with us even though we came along noisily! Thou also, Inmar, do not forsake us ! '

All this is full of the spirit of Vedic poetry, and it is very simple and childlike.

1 On Vu-murt, see also p. 163.

SOCIETE FINNQ-OUGRIENliE.

[CHAP.

The W otjakes, even after their conversion, were evidently afraid to leave their old gods altogether, and at the same time they did not wish to offend Christ. Thus we read (p. 141): 'My Christus, do not be angry, though we do not all keep the fast. Guard our good flock, and also ourselves! May the corn we have sown grow well, 0 my Christ!'

Sometimes it was not a simple horse or an ox or a goose that was slaughtered for gods and ancestors, but the victim had to be carefully prepared so as to have silver hoofs, and golden hair (p. 145). Those who sacrificed had to be clean, and after having washed in the bath-room, they had to appear in white shirts and white clothes. The broth had to be put into cups and the cups to be placed on the table in rows of three (p. 145). And when it was scattered on the fir-wood board, invocations like the Vedic nivids had to be used, such as, 'My Inmar, send us warm, mild rain at the right season! '

Nor was the ceremonial always so simple. Sometimes it sufficed that the worshipper should turn towards the rising sun, take his spade and scatter the grain against the wind, saying, '0 Inmar, let the grains sparkle like silver and gold; we ask thee for good luck and well-being.' Sometimes, however, a large number of priests were wanted, as in the V ede, priests of different names and different occupations, and mostly old men who knew how to pray and how to perform the ancient sacrifices. Mistakes at a sacrifice were evidently fatal, and there is one prayer (p. 152) where we read :-

, We young men may say at the beginning what ought to be said at the end. But do thou correct us, 0 Inmar l There are many things which we,

VI]

SOCIETE FINNO-OUGRIENNE.

young people, cannot say and pronounce properly. But even if we say three words only, be thou gracious to us I '

Who does not here remember similar warnings against false pronunciations in the Veda 1

We get much fuller descriptions of the Mordvinian sacrifices in Mainof's paper. There (p. I I) we meet with an account of a horse-sacrifice as seen by Barbaro, an Italian, in the sixteenth century. The horse was fastened by the neck and the four feet to sticks stuck in the earth; the people then killed it with arrows, tore off the skin and ate the flesh, observing most complicated rules. The skin was then stuffed with straw and lifted to the top of a tree to receive the prayers of the multitude. The tree was adorned with rags, ribands, and other offerings, like the sacred trees in India, and like many trees which may be seen even now in Mohammedan countries. Something of this ceremony has been preserved among the Mordvinians to the present day, only that the horse is now represented by two men hidden under the skin of the horse. In the province of Penza people still recollect the sacrifice of a stallion dedicated to Chkai, the god of the sun, and the sacrifice of. a white bull who must have a black mark on the forehead and on the stomach. Other gods, such Chim-Paz (the sun), required a red bull (v, p. 36).

Although the rules of the sacrifice were known to the old people in a village, we are told by the Archimandrite Makarius (Journal, v, p. 24), that he knew a Mordvine, Kouzma by name, who had collected a complete ritual. This took place not more than sixty years ago, and his descendants still

SOCIETE FI~NO-OUGRIE~:XE.

[CHAP.

enjoy considerable veneration, and possess some of the implements used by him, among the rest the stone knife or stone saw which was used at the sacrifice long after steel knives had come into use (v, p. 26). This knife was considered sacred, and drops of water that had been poured over it were given as medicine (p. 38). As in the Vedic sacrifices, we find among the Mord vines also the brewing of an intoxicating beverage, some kind of Soma, containing hops and honey, as an essential part of their sacrificial festivals. Small cakes were baked to be eaten at the same time.

When the victim, whether a horse or a bull, was to be killed, the priests knelt down and said: '0 Bull, our father I be not angry with us and do not complain I Die for us, for the glory of the gods and for our welfare! If thou die, we shall live.' This is supposed to be the survival of a human sacrifice, and there are certainly some traces left of human victims having been immolated in former times. But even apart from that the custom of asking forgiveness of the animals before they were killed was very general. The following is a prayer of women addressed to Angue-Patay: 'Give us benches full of children, and let them be in perfect health! We ought to immolate two women in thy name, and we kill only two sheep.' How old these sacrifices and the hymns which the Mordvinians recited to Mainof must have been, we may gather from the fact that the people confessed they did no longer understand them. ' Ce sont de bonnes paroles,' they said, 'mais nous ne savons plus ce qu'elles veulent dire' (p. 37). Might not the Brahmans even during the Brahmasa period have said the same 't Some of the

VI]

SOCIETE FINNO-OUGRIENNE.

471

invocations are only whispered (upA.msu, like some of the nivids of the Yagur-veda), such as (p. 37):-

'Chim-Paz, Sun-god, 'Vany-Paz, guardian-god, 'Mastorom-Paz I, Earth-god, 'Vanymizton, save us ! ' 'Nichke-Paz, Great god, 'Svet Vernichke, blood-red

light,

We see, therefore, among the half-civilised FinnoU grian tribes many residua, preserved almost to the present day, of a system of sacrifices intelligible in their origin, but in their present form often merely traditional, artificial, complicated, and unintelligible. We see that prayers addressed to the deities of nature were perfectly possible without sacrificial gifts, while sacrificial gifts without prayers, or without some words addressed to those for whom they were intended, are nowhere to be met with. A mute sacrifice is no sacrifice at all, a prayer unaccompanied by any sacrificial demonstrations is perhaps the best, certainly the most natural, and therefore probably the earliest manifestation of religious sentiment.

If, therefore, we may learn some lessons from a comparative study of other religions, and if even Vedic poetry and Vedic sacrifices are not so entirely different from the poetry and the ceremonial of other religions as to withdraw themselves from comparison, we may in future treat the religious poetry of the Veda as antecedent to the ceremonial of the Bri.hmanas, though fully admitting that the priests who employed these hymns, even after they had lost

'Velen-Paz, God of the fields,

'Vanymizton, save us!' 'AnguepatiaY-Paz, Goddess mother,

'Oznymizton, pray for us ! '

I Also Mastor-Paz, p. ,.6, and Mastyr-Paz.

SOCIETE FINNO-OUGlUENNE.

[CHAP.

a perfect understanding of them, modified them, corrupted them, and imitated them without any mlsgivmgs.

We owe much to the Bd.hmana priests. To them, and more particularly to the Hotri priests, who had to learn the whole collection of the hymns by heart in order to recite them at the great sacrifices, we probably owe the almost miraculous preservation of Vedic poetry, but certainly not its first creation. We must be grateful to the sacrificial age, the age of the Brahmaaas, for having preserved by means of a most perfectly organised oral tradition whatever was left at their time of genuine ancient poetry, just as the Mordvines are grateful to Kouzma for having collected a kind of prayer-book and sacrificial guide for their priesthood.

Vedic Deities.

It has sometimes been maintained that whatever the origin of the Vedic gods ma.y have been, the poets of the Veda knew nothing about it, as little as Homer knew the origin of Apollon or Athene.

YAska's Classi1lcation of Vedic DevatAs.

But when we consult YAska, one of the earliest Indian theologians, who lived before PA.nini, and probably before the rise of Buddhism, we find him not only fully aware of the physical character of the Vedic gods, but classifying them at once according to the various places and spheres of activity which each of them occupied in nature. He divides them into three classes, gods of the earth, gods of the air, and gods of the sky.

VI]

DEVATA.

473

DevatA.

In exammmg YA,ska's ancient catalogue of the gods, we must bear in mind that with him deity or devatA means something different from what it means with us. Every object that is praised by a poet in a hymn or even in a single verse, is in his technical language a devatA, a deity. We should simply say it was the object of worship or praise. Thus, if a horse is praised, or a bird, or frogs, or a stone, a chariot, a bow, a bowstring, a whip, or a mortar, they are all put down as devatAs. I wonder that this has not been used as a proof of the existence of fetish-worship among the Vedic Rishis. Would not the existence of stones, chariots, bows, &c., as DevatAs seem to settle once for all the existence of fetish-worship in the Veda? It would certainly be a stronger argument than many that have been produced for that purpose, though we see that the name of devatA, deity, owes its origin simply to a theory of a theological school, and meant with them no more than an object praised, magnified, or sanctified.

The Three Claases of Vedio Deities.

In the arrangement which YAska gives of the principal deities of the Veda, it is not always easy to distinguish between ancient tradition and later theory. If I say later theory, I mean, of course, later in comparison with the Vedic hymns and the Brahmanas. We must always remember that what we call the Nirukta, which is ascribed to YAska, presupposes the Nighantu or the Nighantus, the lists of words of which the Nirukta forms but a kind of commentary.

474 THE THREE CLASSES OF VEDIC DEITIES. [CHAP. N OW these Nighantus are certainly ancient; they are actually inentioned in an important passage of the Dipavansa, V, 62. Here the young Tissa is introduced as asking the Thera Siggava a difficult question concerning the Rig-veda, the Yagur-veda, the Samaveda, and also the Nighantu (not yet the Nirukta), and fifthly the ItihA.sa.. This is supposed to have taken place in 359 B. c. It is true that the Dipavansa cannot be older than the beginning of the fourth century A. D., but it rests on older authorities, particularly on the Atthakatha of the Mahavira fraternity; and the absence of any mention of the Atharva-veda would seem to assign to the statement in question a very considerable antiquity. Anyhow we see from this passage the high authority assigned to the Nighantu even by the early Buddhists, and we may gather from it at all events that the Nighantus were pre-Buddhistic.

Yaska, the author of the Nirukta, quotes representatives of his own theories, the so-called N airuktas, who had lived before his time, and if YA.ska is older than panini, this would bring us to at least 500 B. c. But many of these N airukta theories are based on passages in the Brahmaaas, nay even in the hymns, and would therefore prove a still more remote antiquity for the period in which theological speculation, as represented in the Brahmanas, was rife in India. It can also be proved by independent evidence that the fundamental theory on which Yaska's division of the Vedic deities is based, namely the three localities to which the principal deities are referred, dates certainly from the Brahmana period, nay has, as we shall see, certain warrants even in the hymns.

VI]

TRIAD OF VEDIC DEITIES.

475

Triad of Vedio Deitiea.

Apart from the philosophical doctrine that all gods are only manifestations of the supreme Self, the .Atman, YAska. quotes, 88 we saw, the Nairuktas in support of a. triad of gods, (I) those of the earth, (2) those of the air, and (3) those of the sky. Agni (fire), 88 YAska. says, h88 his place on earth, VAyu (wind) or lndra in the air, and SUrya (sun) in the sky.

]lumber of Gods.

This triad of deities is not YA.ska's invention. It is clearly indicated already in the Bri.hmanas. Thus we read in the Aitareya-brAhmana that PragApati created three greatnesses, Agni, VAyu, Silrya. In the KhAndogya-Upanishad (IV, 17, I) we read: 'PragApati brooded over the worlds, and from them thus brooded over he squeezed out the essences, Agni from the earth, VAyu from the sky, Aditya (the sun) from heaven.'

Even in the hymns this threefold division of earth, air, and sky, or, 88 sometimes translated, earth, sky, and heaven, is well established. Thus we read in Rv. X, 65, 9, of terrestrial gods, pArthiva, of celestial, divya, and of those who dwell in the waters (clouds), ye apsu. Their number is given as thirty-three (Rv. I, 45, I ; III, 6, 9; VIII, 28, I), divided into three classes of eleven each.

The Thirty-three Gods.

This number of thirty-three must be old, for it occurs in the Avesta also. According to another division, however, the gods were not thrice eleven,

VOL n. E

4']6 THE THffiTY-THREE GODS. [CHA.P. but were twelve A.dityas, eleven Rudras, and eight Vasus. The names of these three classes occur in the hymns (I, 45, I), but not their respective numbers, except that of the A.dityas, which in the hymns is given as seven, not yet as twelve. In the Satapatha-brahmana IV, 5, 7, 2, their numbers are given, and Dyaus and Prithivi, or Indra and Praga.pati, are added in order to bring the number up to thirty-three. A similar account is given in the Aitareya-brA.hmana II, 18, where the two additional gods are Pragapati and VashatkAra. There are other classifications of these gods in the hymns of the Rig-veda, such as:-

II, 3, 4, Vasus, Visve Devas, Adityas,

III, 20, 5, I, 45, I, Vasus, Rudras, Adityas, IV, 8, 8, A.dityas, Rudras, Vasus,

VII, 51, 3, A.dityas, Maruts, Devas,

X, 25, I, Rudras, Vasus, Visve.

Sometimes the number of the gods seems to be raised at random, though the number three prevails throughout. Thus in Rv, IV, 9, 9, we read of 3,339 gods who worshipped Agni, while there is a curious passage in the Brihad-!ranyaka-Upanishad III, 9, where the number of the gods is first stated as 3,306, and then, step by step, reduced to thirty-three, to six, to three, to two, to one-and-a-half, and finally to one.

According to Yaska the three principal deities dwelling on earth, in the air, and in the sky, i.e. Agni, Indra, and A.ditya, receive different names according to their different activities which are celebrated by the Vedic poets. They are conceived also as endowed with various forms. The Supreme Self (Atman) at the root of all the gods is, of course,

THE THlR1'Y-THREE GODS.

477

without any form whatever, but the individual deities are supposed to be endowed with form, nay, in many cases with human form. In the case of deities like Fire, Wind, and Sun, the form is indicated by the name; in the case of deities like GAtavedas, Rudra, Indra, Parganya, and Asvinau, who do not exhibit so clearly the visible objects in na.ture from which they sprang, it is clear at least that they are praised as if they were not only sentient, but intelligent also, and capable of understanding what is said to them and of them. They are conceived, in fact, as manlike, and as possessing the ordinary members of human beings. The Vedic poets mention, for instance, the arms of Indra (IV, 31, 3), the fist ofIndra (III, I, 5); they also ascribe to them such things as belong to men only. Thus Indra is said to have a beautiful wife (III, 20, I), and his two horses are the Haria, 2! 4, 6, 8, or loin number. VAyu (wind), too, has his Niyuts (steeds), St1rya (sun) his Harits, Pushan (sun) his Aga.s (goats), Ushas (dawn) her Amnis (reddish horses). The acts, again, which they are said to perform are like the acts of men. They hear and see, they eat and drink, and this not only like animals, but like men who understand, and are conscious of what they are doing.

There have, however, been differences of opinion on this point. Some ancient interpreters of the Veda seem to have argued that the gods, such as Fire, Wind, Sun, Earth, and Moon, were not endowed with a. human form, and that their being addressed as if they were intelligent beings, proves nothing, because rivers, plants, dice, and other things also are addressed in the same way, as if

E2

•

478 THE THIRTY-THREE GODS. [CHAP. performing human acts, and as if possessed of a. human body. This is explained as metaphorical (r11paka) language. Ifa river is addressed as driving on a chariot, it would be impossible to take this literally, and hence it is to be taken as a rnpakapravsda. The prevalent opinion, however, seems to have been that the gods had to be conceived as endowed with a human form, though, from the old Vedanta. point of view, they were various manifestations only of the .Atman or the Supreme Sel£

The classification of the Vedic deities in three classes according to the localities in which they are supposed chiefly to dwell, though very imperfect in its details, deserves nevertheless to be carefully examined as a first attempt at theological speculation.

We shill see that for a. proper understanding of the Vedic gods and their relation to each other, this view of their activity, Ilay of their very essence, as determined by the sphere in which they act, is extremely important and useful. At first sight the idea that there were originally three gods only, Agni, Indra, and .Aditya, representing certain phenomena on earth, in the air, and in the sky, and that these received different names according to the special work assigned to them, seems very artificial, and therefore wrong. And yet there is some truth in it, if we do not take it in too literal a sense. We must not suppose that Agni, after having been named and recognised as a special deity, was afterwards changed into Dravinodas, Tanlinapat, Tvashtri or Slirya, or that Indra was named at a later time Vayu, Rudra, Parganya, or that .Aditya assumed the form of U shas, the Asvinau, of Vishnu or

VI]

THE TBIR'l'Y-THREE GODS.

479

Varuna.. Yet there is truth hidden in Y!ska's theory, namely this, that though Agni may have started from the fire on the hearth, he was not restricted to it, but was recognised in all the manifestations of light on earth and in the sky. Indra, again, though originally the giver of rain, could be recognised not only as the conqueror of the clouds, but as the agent in all that takes place in the air, while Aditya was accepted not simply as the sun, but as the active power in the whole sky. The fault of Y!ska's threefold division is not that it is too general, but that in some cases it is really too narrow, because there are Devat!s who extend their influence over more than one of these three spheres of nature. Agni, for instance, though originally recognised in the house-me, and therefore belonging to the earth, is likewise seen by the Vedic poets as present in the lightning of the air, in the brightness of the sky, nay, according to a very common conception, in the waters also, whether the clouds or the sea, into which he plunges every evening, and from which he rises in the morning. In some cases the names given to the divine agents in the three realms of nature vary according to the special work perfortned by each of them, in others the general names of Agni, Indra, Aditya are retained throughout. In these cases Agni, Indra, and Aditya often overshadow the special gods of their own spheres, nay they encroach even on the spheres not specially their own, and thus produce a confusion which is often very perplexing to those who want to find in the Veda their own views, or those which they have derived from the ilore specialised mythology of other nations.

AGNI.

[CIU.P.

I. Agni.

Following, therefore, the guidance of YAska, we begin with Agni, whether he belongs to the earth or the earth belongs to him. To him, according to YAska, belong also the Morning libation (prAtahsavanam), the spring among the seasons, the GAyatrl among the metres, the Trivrit among the stomas (praises), the Rathantara among the SAmans (songs). Much of this is of course secondary and artificial, but it rests on a true principle. Agni is supposed to have associates and followers (Devaganas), and these are not only gods and goddesses, but likewise a number of objects with which he is thought to be more or less intimately connected. Thus the deities invoked in the A.pri hymns 1, are all supposed to be his, or he is supposed to be connected with every one of them.

First of all, two names of Agni, the god of fire, are given as synonymous, viz. 2. GAtavedas (knowing all things i), and 3. VaisvAnara (belonging to all men). Then follow the names of the Apri deities 8 :-

I ..... Dravinodas (giver of 7. NarAsamsa (man.

wealth). praise).

5. Idhma (fuel). 8. IIa, also called tlitah

6. TantlnapAt (self-born). (implored).

1 Vedic Hymns, S. B.E., voL xlvi, p. 10.

2 With reference to Bv. VI, 15, 13, visvA veda g8nimA gAtavedAh, I translate omniscient, not all-possessor. That vedas does not occur by itself, is no objection, see compounds with goshas, oshas, &c. See, however, Vedic Hymns, vol. xlvi.

• See History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 413 seq.

Modem as these Apr! hymns seem to us, afri hymns are known in the Avesta.

VI]

AGNI.

481 Prithivl, Ill, or BhA.ratl, Ill, SarasvatJ) I. 14. Tvashtri (the carpenter, creator).

15. Vanaspati (the sacrificial tree).

16. SvAhAkritis (the invocations).

g. Barhis (the turf-altar). 10. DvArah (the doors of heaven, the East).

I I. UsbAsAnaktA(dawnand night).

12. DaivyA HotArau (the two divine priests). 13. Tisro Devth (the three goddesses, AgnAyt,

Many of these names refer to various objects invoked by the poets in the so-called Apr! hymns. Agni, if not exactly identified with them, was supposed to be represented by them, and to take cognisance of the invocations addressed to their names. Then follows a long list of other names which are likewise considered as names of objects sacred to Agni, as we should say, and often mentioned in hymns addressed to this deity. Such

are:-

II. I. Asva (the horse).

2. Sakuni (the bird).

3. Mandftka (the frog) • .... Aksha (the dice).

5. GrAvan (stones, sacrificial).

6. NAnlsamsa (panegyric hymn, or the object of it).

7. Ratha (chariot).

8. Dundubhi (drum).

9. !shudhi (quiver).

10. Hastaghna (arm-band-

age).

II. Abh1su (reins).

12. Dhanus (bow).

13. GyA (bowstring).

..... Ishu (arrow).

15. AsvAganl (horse-whip).

16. Ulftkhala (mortar).

17. Vrishabha (bull, a

tool).

18. Drughana (hatchet).

19. Pitu (food).

20. Nadt (rivers).

21. Ap (waters).

22. Oshadhi (shrubs).

23. RAtrl (night).

2 .... AranyAnt (forest-

spirit).

25. SraddhA (faith).

26. PrithiVl (earth).

27. ApvA (disease).

28. AgnAyi (wife of Agni).

I Vedic Hymns, S. B. E., voL xlvi, p. 12.

AGNI.

29. makhala-musale (mortar and pestle).

30. HavirdhAne (waggons for Soma-offerings). 31. Dyav6-prithivt (heaven and earth).

32. VipAtkAutudri (the two rivers, VipAs and Butudrl).

33. !.rtnt (the two ends of a bow).

[CHAP. 3 .... SunAslrau (wind and SUD, or Indra and VAyu).

35. Devt goshtrt (the two loving goddesses). .

36. Devl QrgAhutt (the two food-giving goddesaee, Heaven and Earth, Day and Night, Autumn and Year).

It is clear that these so-called deities were put together by YA.ska without much system. Those from 29 to 36, however, are classed together as Dvandva or dual deities, and some, such as the Three Goddesses (AgnA.yt, Prithivi, and 1lA., or BhA.rati, IlA., and Sarasvatt), are classed together as the wives of Agni.

In what sense these 36 DevatA.s may be regarded as deities may easily be seen from any of the invocations addressed to them. Thus the Artnis, the two ends of a bow, are praised in Rv. VI, 75, 4:-

'The two ends of the bow darting asunder of one accord may strike away the enemies, the fiends.' The bow is praised in the Rv. VI, 75, 2 :-

'Let us win cows with the bow, let us win the race with the bow, let us win hard battles with the bow; the bow does injury to the enemy, let us win all countries with the bow t I

The bowstring is praised in Rv. VI, 75, 3:-

, Like one who is going to whisper she comes near to the ear; like a woman embracing her dear friend she hums, stretched along the bow, helpful in battle.' It is clear that if such addresses were supposed to

change a bow and a bowstring into a deity or into a fetish, there would be no poet even in our days

VI]

AGNI.

who was not an idolator or a fetish-worshipper. But suppose we were to call the bowstring, as addressed by the Vedic poet, a fetish, instead of a poetical fancy, what should we gain ?

The principal activity of Agni consists, according to YAska., in carrying oblations to the gods or bringing the gods to the sacrifice.

There are certain gods who are praised together with Agni, viz. Indra, Soma, Varuna, Parganya, the Ritus (seasons). Vishnu and Pushan, though they share in the same offerings with Agni, were not praised together with him in the same verses I.

n. Indra.

Indra belongs to the air, or the air to Indra.

He and VAyu (wind) are taken by YAska for the same being. His are the Noon-libation (madhyandinasavana), the summer, the Trishtubh-metre, the Pankadasa Stoma, and the Bnbat-SAman. His companions are the Maruts, the Rudras, besides a number of deities recorded in the Nighantu, V, 4, 5. I give them as they are found there :-

m I. VAyu (wind), 2. Varufla (sky). 30 Rudra (storm).

4. Indra (rain-giver).

5. Parganya (cloud).

6. Bn'haapati (lord of speech).

7. BrahmaMspati (lord of prayer).

8. Kshetrasya pati (lord of the land).

9. VAstoshpati (lord of the house).

10. VAkaspati (lord of

speech, breath).

1 I. ApAm napAt (offspring of the water, or

Agni).

12', Yama.

13. Mitra.

14. Ka.

15. Sarasvat.

16. Visvakarman (maker of all things).

17. TArkshya (giver of rain).

I See, however, Rv. X, 17, 3.

INDRA.

[CHAP.

IS. Manyu (anger).

19. Dadhikravan (racer).

20. Savitri (sun).

21. Tvashtri (maker, sun).

22. VAta (wind).

23. Api (fire).

24. Vena.

25. Asunlti (spirit, breath).

26. Rita (right, law).

Another class of gods likewise belonging to the

27. Indu (rain, moon).

2S. PragApati (lord of creatures).

29. Ahi (dragon).

30. Ahirbudhnya (dragon ofthe deep).

31. Supama (bird).

32. PurQravas (a hero).

air are:-

IV. I. Syena (falcon, horse). 16. Aditi· (fem.).

2. Soma (moon or Soma 17. SaramA' (fem.).

plant!). IS. Sarasvatl' (fem.),

3. Kandramas (moon), 19. YAk (Speech, thunder).

4. Mrityu (death). 20. Anumati (moon, when

5. VisvAnara (also Vais- nearly full).

vAnara, belonging to 2 I. RakA (full-moon).

all men). 22. SinlvaI1 (new moon).

6. DhAtri(creator, as rain- 23. Kuh'1l (moon, nearly

giver). invisible).

7. VidhAtri (creator, as 24. Yaml (fem. Ushas).

rain-giver), 25. Urvasl (fem.).

S. Marut (storm-gods) '. 26. Prithivt (fem.).

9. Rudra (storms). 27. Indril.nl(wifeofIndra).

10. R,bhu (the Rtbhus). 2S. Gaurl (fem., cloud 1).

I I. Abgiras (the Ailgiras, 29. Go (cow).

Rishis). 30. Dhenu (cow).

12. Pitri(Fathers, Manes}. 31. AghnyA (cow).

13. Atharvan (the Athar- 32. PathyA (salvation).

vans, Rishis). 33. Svasti (well-being).

14. Bhrigu (the Bhrigus, 34. Ushas (dawn).

Rishis). 35. IlA. (earth).

15. Aptya (Rishis). 36. Rodasl (wife ofRudra).

All these gods and goddesses are said to belong to

1 Haimavato Maugavato va.

I Devaganas, companions of gods. S Wives or companions of Indra.

VI]

INDRA.

the air and to the clouds where Indra performs his principal work in killing V ritra and other demons of darkness, in sending down dew and rain, and in performing other acts of valour. Though all the gods dwelling in the air between earth and heaven are looked upon as his staff, his ganas, companions properly so called, are such bodies as the Maruts, Rudras, &c., while the feminine deities are looked upon as under his protection.

The gods with whom Indra is praised in the same hymns, are Agni, Soma, Varuna, Pushan, Brsheapati, Brahmanaspati, Parvata, Kutsa, Vishnu, and VAyu. Other gods of the middle sphere praised together are, Mitra with Varuna, Soma with Pushan, Soma with Rudra, Pushan with Agni, and Parganya with VAt&.

nI . .1ditya.

Aditya (sun) belongs to yonder world (heaven).

His is the third Savana, the autumn, the 'GA.yatrl metre, the Saptadasa Stoma, and the Vairtipa SAmano

His assistant gods are :V.I. Asvinau (day and

night}',

2. Ushas (dawn).

3. Suryi (sun, fem.).

4. V risbikapAyt (wife of V rishAkap~ the sun).

5. Sarattytl (end of night,

dawn).

6. Tvashtri(lDaker),cf.I.14.

7. Savitri (sun).

8. Bhaga (sun).

9. SQrya (sun).

10. Pushan (sun). II. Vishnu (sun).

12. Visvinara, cf. IV. 5.

13. Varuna, cf. III. 2.

14. Kesin (sol crinttus).

J 5. Keains (three Kesins, Agni, Viyu or Vi· dyut, and Surya).

16. VrishAkapi (sun).

17. Yama, cf.II!. 12.

18. Aga ekapid (sun).

19. Prithivi (earth or sky), cf. II. 26; IV. 26.

I Vwtya, a son of Ushas, p. 608, and Nisatya.

ADITYA. .

[CHAP.

20. Samudra (sea). 26. Dens (the gods',

21. DadhyaIi (Rishi). 27. Visve devah (the All·

22. Atharvan (Rishi). gods'.

23. Manu (Rishi). 28. SAdhyas.

24. Adityas (the sons of 29. Vasua.

Aditi). 30. Vagina.

25. Sapta Rishaya1& (the 31. Devapatnls (the wives

seven Riahis). of the gods).

The chief work of Aditya is the lifting of moisture, and whatever deed is most pre-eminent, may be supposed to be done by him. The gods praised together with him areKandramas,VAyu,Samvatsara(theyear).

Weare also informed that whenever there is any reference in a verse to autumn, when the metre is Anushtubh, the Stoma Ekavimsa, the SAman VairAga, we may conclude that the verse is addressed to Agni.

When the season is winter, the metre Pankti, the Stoma Trinava, and the SAman S:l.kvara, the probability is that the verse is intended for Indra, as dwelling in the air.

When the season is Sisira (spring), the metre Atikkhandas. the Stoma Trayastrimsa, the SA.man Raivata, the verse is supposed to refer to Aditya. as dwelling in the sky. All this is artificial, but interesting, as giving the systematised views of later Brahmanic theologians.

This gives us the following scheme :-

AGNI.

Worlds: Earth Libations: Morning Seasons: Spring

(and Autumn) Metres: GAyatrl

(and Anushtubh) Stomas: Trivrit

(and Ekavimsa)

Air

Sky Third Rains

(and Sisira) Gagatt

(and Atikkhandas) Saptadasa

(and Trayastrimsa)

Noon

Summer

(and Winter) Trishtubh

(and PaIikti) Patikadasa

(and Trinava)

VI]

• ADITYA.

Aon

INDBA.

Brihat

(and Sakvara)

AnITYA.

VairO.pa

(and Raivata)

SAmans: Rathantara (and Vairiga) Attendants :

See Nigh. V, 1-3

Women: ibid.

Work done:

Carrying oblations

V,4-5 ibid.

V,6 ibid.

Giving forth of Taking up moisture moisture

Bringing the gods Killing Vritra Holding moisture

:Making things visible Any powerful act Pre-eminent deeds

Although much in these classifications of Y Aska is clearly modem. yet it is not very far removed from the theology of the BrAhmanas. Whether rightly or wrongly, we cannot doubt that in Yaska's time, let us say 500 B. c., the Vedic gods were looked upon, as he represents them, as residing in the three worlds, earth, air, and sky; that is to say, they were recognised not only as gods of nature in general, but as active beings, each active in his own special sphere.

Vedio Deities not restrioted to one Locality.

But, as I pointed out before, the ancient Hindu theologians knew also that certain gods were not restricted to their own special locality, but that they manifested themselves at the same time on earth, in the air and in the sky. Thus, besides the Agni on earth, who was the principal Agni, they admitted an Agni in the air (madhyama), and another (uttama) in the sky, that is to say, the ordinary fire, the lightning, and the sun. Agni was actually called trimnrdhan, having three heads, possibly occupying three places. The Dawn also was not only a goddess of the sky as a companion of the sun, but likewise

488 DEITIES NOT RESTRlOl'ED TO ONE LOCALITY. [CHAP. a goddess of the air in her connection with the clouds. (Nirukta., ed. Satyavrata, vol. iv, p. 241.)

Gods by Birth and by Creation.

The ancient Hindu theologians knew that some of these deities had been raised to a divine rank (KarmadevatAh) 1, while others were divine by birth (AgA.nadevatAh), and they distinguished between gods who were only celebrated by hymns, and others who were both celebrated by hymns and honoured by oblations (havirbhA.g and stiktAbh&g). All these may be later theological speculations, but they show nevertheless that these Nairuktas had carefully thought about the true character of their gods, far more than, for instance, the Greeks at the time of Sokrates. This is a. lesson which ought not to be neglected. We ought, no doubt, to preserve our own independent judgment, but we ought not to imagine that the ancient authority of the Nairuktas can be lightly set aside in favour of mere a priori theories, bewever ingeniously invented and learnedly defended.

The Pantheon of the Rig-veda Hymns.

The Pantheon set before us by YAska may safely be accepted as the Pantheon of the Bri.hmanas, though not as that of the ancient poets of the Rig-veda,

It is, in fact, almost impossible to speak of the religion of the poets of the Rig-veda as a whole, or to assert anything general about them; and this for a very good reason. Let us accept the date of 1000 B. c. as the time when the SamhitA., the

I See Nirukta, ed. Satyavrata, vol. iv, p, 322, note. Bata· patha-br. XIV, 7, I, 34.

VI] THE PANTHEON OF THE RIG-VEDA BYlINS. 4~ collection of the Vedic hymns, had been completed. Even then there are ever so many periods beyond, during which the Vedic hymns were composed and collected in different families. Attempts have been made by different scholars to establish certain chronological divisions between the ten books of the Rig-veda, but as yet with little success, for we have to contend with two difficulties. The first arises from the individual freedom with which each poet utters his thoughts and feelings. without as yet any restraints, such as arise from tradition or from constituted a.uthorities; the second is due to the long continuance of oral tradition which, though most tenacious of minute niceties, opposes but slight barriers to later changes, and additions or omissions, whenever they seemed useful or desirable. I do not hint at anything like intentional fraud. I only mean that the same free handling which has been observed in our own time among the reciters of Finnish epic poetry, could hardly have been entirely absent in India, That there are modern, middle, and ancient hymns in the Veda, no European scholar would doubt, though few would venture to assign chronological dates to these classes. We know that the ten collections or Mandalas are claimed as their property by different families. Every one of these families, if settled in neighbouring valleys, would soon develop their own poetry, and we must remember that what seems to us more modern or more ancient, may be no more than the result of that individuality which at all times and in all places distinguishes different poets, different families, different clans, and different colonies.

But though it would be difficult to introduce

490 THE PANTHEON OF THE RIG-VEDA HYllN8. [CHAP. chronological order into the collection of hymns which go by the name of the Rig-veda.-SamhitA, there are a few facts, to which I called attention in 1859 in my History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, and which seem to me to show that the ten books or Mandalas of which this collection consists were

. collected according to one and the same system.

Eight out of the ten Mandalas begin with hymns addressed to Agni, and these hymns, with the exception of the tenth Mandala, are invariably followed by hymns addressed to Indra. Afterwards follow hymns to the Visve Devas, and other gods, who are not, however, arranged according to one and the same system. It is not likely that the hymns addressed to Agni and Indra would have occupied this prominent place in every one of these eight Mandalas, unless there had been an understanding between the collectors. Secondly, we find the so'called .A. pri hymns in seven of the ten Mandalas, which proves that each of the principal Vedic families for whom these Mandalas were collected thought it necessary to possess such a hymn in their own private collection. All these hymns are made after one and the same pattern, and this proves again that the compilers of the Mandalas worked according to a common plan.

Thirdly, it is easy to see from the AnukramanikA or Index, that the succession of hymns in each of the Anuv8.ka.s or sections of the Mandalas follow each other according to the number of their verses. This is again a principle followed by the compilers of each Mandala, and requires the admission of' an understanding between them. It is true that this numerical principle is often violated in the collection

VI] THE PANTHEON OF THE RIG-VEDA HYKNS. 491 of the Rig-veda as we possess it, but the principle itself is so clearly established that scholars have felt justified in rearranging the order of the hymns, and removing. later additions by simply carrying out the fundamental principle, such as it must have been conceived originally by all the collectors of the ten Mandalas, namely, to arrange the hymns in each AnuvAka according to the decreasing number of their verses. There is one more point to which I called attention many years ago, and which shows in the clearest way that at the time when the POOa text of the hymns was constituted the SamhitA text existed in its completeness. In that text the iterata in the hymns are not repeated, but are left out (galita), and this according to special rules as detailed in the GaJita-pradipa. From this we learn two things, first, that the SamhitA. was considered at the time as one corpus of Vedic poetry, and secondly that these verbatim iterata affected alike all the Mandalas of the SamhitA., and therefore presupposed the existence of a recognised Samhita. text.

YAaka'. Pantheon.

Though we may accept YAska's Pantheon, not only for his own time, but for the time of the BrAhmanas also, we cannot accept it for the hymns of the Rig-veda, still less for that period which preceded our hymns, and which we may partially reconstruct from what we know of the gods of the Indo-Irsnic and of the Aryan periods. We saw that according to YAska the three principal deities were Agni, Indra, and Aditya, or as they are sometimes called, Rv. 1,158, I ,Agni, VAta, and Sftrya, the unseen powers active in light, in air, and the highest sky.

VOL.n. F

492

EARLIER AND LATER GODS.

[CHAP.

Earlier and Later Gods.

But in the hymns of the Rig-veda we can still discover clear traces of a more ancient supreme deity, namely Dyaus, whom Yaska does not even mention as a separate god, but whose existence is proved by several hymns of the Rig-veda, and by the evidence of Greek, Latin, and Germanic mythology. Perhaps it is hardly fair to charge Yaska with ignorance of this god, for he mentions him at least in the compound names of the deity DyA.vA.prithivyau, Heaven and Earth, DyA.va-bht1mi, the same, and Dyunisau, day and night. It is wrong to say that the Anukramani passes him by; for he is mentioned there once at least as the optional deity of one verse, I, 94, 16, by the side of Agni, with MitrA.-Varunau, Aditi, Sindhu, and Prithivi; and these gods, together with Dyu (or Agni), are said to form six gods.

The Reign of DyaU&

In the hymns of the Rig-veda, however, we can clearly distinguish a period during which Agni or Indra were not yet the principal or representative deities, but when such gods as Dyu (nom. Dyaus) and Varuna occupied a far more important place. That this period was antecedent to the Agni and Indra period we may, I think, conclude from the fact that the names of neither Agni nor Indra, as gods, can be discovered in the mythology of other Aryan nations, while Dyu has retained his place in Greek, Roman, and Teutonic mythology, and Varuna has left clear traces of himself in Persia and Greece. Dyu has long been represented as the supreme god

VI]

THE REIGN OF DYAUS.

493

of the Aryas, and I know of no real argument why he should not. The god of the sky is, according to his very nature, supreme, and is so, as a matter of fact, in most of the ancient religions. He must certainly have existed before the separation of the South-Eastern and N orth- Western branches of the Aryan family, because he exists both in Sanskrit and Greek, and his former superiority over Indra is recognised even in certain of the hymns of the Rigveda J. Besides, if he was not supreme among the other gods, who was 1

DyAvA-prithivt

I have so often discussed the origin and history of this the most ancient of Aryan gods, Dyaush-pitA.(r), Zeus pater, Ju-piter (and Tyr)i, that I need not in this place give more than the salient facts.

In India Dyu, as a masculine deity. is wellnigh forgotten, while in ordinary Sanskrit Dyu has become an appellative, is a feminine, and means sky. For a long time dyu in the Veda also was translated throughout by sky or day, and it was supposed that Dyu hardly deserved a place of his own among the Vedic deities. I believe it is true that in the Veda Dyu is not one of the havirbhAg, sacrifice-receiving deities. But though he receives no special oblations, he receives praise (stomabhAg), and the very highest that could be bestowed on any god. Nor is it quite true that he belongs to a very ancient period only. At all events in the Atharva-veda, which is generally considered as far more modern than the Rig-veda,

1 Science of Language, vol. ii, p. 542. I Ibid. (1891), vol. ii, p. 537.

F2

494

DYAVA-PRITHIVL

[CHAP.

Dyu occurs, and is evidently a familiar and popular deity. Thus we read Ath. VI, 4, 3, in a hymn to various deities: U rushy« na urugmann aprayukkhan Dyaushpttar yAd.ya dukkhunA. y«, 'Protect us, Wide-Ranger, without fail, Heaven-father, remove all disasters.'

I had pointed out many years ago what seemed to me a decisive fact, that when Dyu occurs in the Rig-veda together with other gods, he generally occupies the first place. It should also be remembered that he is represented as the father and grandfather of other gods, even of Indra, who afterwards supplanted his father, so that the father had to bow before his son.

Most frequently, however, Dyu is connected with Prithivi, earth, and, although Heaven and Earth form a divine Dvandva or pair, Dyu is invoked separately also by the side of Prsthivt, e.g.VI, 20, 2:

Namo Dive namah prithivyai nWna 6shadhibhyah, 'Reverence to Dyu, reverence to the earth, reverence to the plants.' Here, no doubt, it might be said that Dyu was meant for the sky, not yet personified, and dyu certainly occurs now and then with this purely local meaning, but in most cases where heaven and earth are similarly invoked, Dyu has clearly a personal and a masculine character. For instance, I, 32, 4: Dive 1:& visvavedase prithivyaf ka. aka.ram namah, 'To the all-knowing Dyu and to the Earth have I paid adoration.'

Here the adjective visvavedase shows that Dyu is taken as a deity, united with, yet independent of, the Earth; just as in other cases the addition of an adjective in the feminine gender forces us to take dyu as a feminine and as an appellative, e.g. VI, 6, 3,

VI]

Dy.iv.i-PRImM.

495

y 6 nak Soma abhid«sa.ti 8lf.nAbhir y6.s ka nfshtyak Apa. tasya bdlam tira mahfva dyanr vadha tmanA, '0 Soma I whoever attacks us, a relation or a stranger, draw thou away his strength, strike him thyself, like the great sky I' Here, no doubt, we expect Dyu 88 a masculine, and both Ludwig and Griffith translate I like the mighty Dyaus.' But maht can only be a feminine, and is 80 intimately connected with dyaus that there is no excuse for changing the text. The true relation between Dyu and P1-ithivt is seen in passages like IX, 10, 12, Rv. 1,164,33:-

Dyaar nak pitA ganitA, nabhir atra, Bandhur no mAtA prithi vr mahfyam.

'Dyu is the father who begat us, our origin is there, this great Earth is our parent mother.'

In the Rig-veda, where DyAvA-prithivt are often celebrated together, there is no hymn addressed to Dyu singly, though there is to Prithivt (V, 84). In the verses addressed to DyAvA-prithivi or to DyAvA (dual) 1 and Prithivt (dual), it is difficult to say why Dyu W88 changed to DyAvA, while it remained unchanged in dyunisau. DyAvA cannot be a feminine formed of Dyu like U shasA of U shas, and in the compound DyAvA-prithivi it certainly represents the sky 88 a male deity and in a dual form. (See PAn. VI, 3, 29.) In the hymns addressed to DyavAprithivi (also Rodasi), Dyu is always spoken of 88 the father, Prithivi 88 the mother, according to a world-wide metaphor which represents heaven and earth 88 the parents of the human race (Rv. I, 159, 2).

I This DyAvA has to be taken as originally a dual of dyu, like Agnt-ehomau, SQryA-mAsA, Bec. In the gen., however, the form Divaa-prithivyoh is found (P .... VL 3, 30).

DY A. v 1-p RITHIVI.

[CHAP.

But they are likewise, like Zeus and Here, looked upon as brother and sister (gA.mf sayoni, Rv. I, 159, 4). A son is mentioned of Heaven and Earth who can hardly be anyone but Stlrya or Agni, the sun, said to be moving along between them (I, 161, I). Still this is not quite clear, particularly as the same son is soon after said to have himself shaped heaven and earth (I, 160, 3), while in other places Indra is called the son of Dyu. Such incongruities, however, do not disturb the Vedic Bishis, on the contrary, they delight in them. The story of the marriage union and of the separation of Heaven and Earth with all its consequences is so widely spread, that the late Professor Munro might well have said: 'From the Veda to the Pervigilium Veneris poets and philosophers have loved to celebrate this union of ether and earth, ether as father descending in showers into the lap of mother earth.'

Though Dyu and Prsthi vi together are addressed as all-powerful and all-embracing, yet in certain places they seem subject to other gods. They are even said to obey the law of Mitra (IV, 56, 7), and the command of Varmm (VI, 76, 1).

The former supreme position of Dyu has indeed faded away almost entirely from the memory of many of the Vedic poets, yet there are passages which leave no doubt that there was a time, less removed from the Aryan Separation than the Veda, when Dyu was supreme, was before Indra, was greater than Indra, was in fact like Zeus, the lord of gods and men. Thus we read in a hymn addressed to Indra (Rv. IV, 17, 4): "Dyu, thy father, was reputed strong, the maker of Indra was mighty in his works; he who begat the heavenly Indra, armed

VI]

Dylvl-PRITHIVi.

497

with the thunderbolt, who, like the earth, is immovable from his seat.' This, considering the whole tenor of the hymn, which is a panegyric of Indra's power, would seem to show that the poet considered the greatness of Dyu as a matter of the past. And this appears even more clearly from ver. 12, where the poet says: 'How much does Indra care for his mother, or for the father that begat him l' Nay, in I, 131, I, we read: 'Before Indra the divine Dyu (masc.) bowed, before Indra bowed the great Earth.' And in I, 6 I, 9, it is said that the greatness of Indra exceeded heaven (dyaus), earth, and sky, while in X, 54, 3, the poet is so overwhelmed by Indra's greatness that he exclaims I: 'What poets living before us have reached the end of all thy greatness? for thou hast indeed begotten thy father and thy mother together from thy own body!' This gives an idea of the floating character of Vedic mythology, when the son may be the father of his parents, nay the lover of his daughters, according as the relations between the phenomena, originally signified by their mythological names, change and present themselves under different aspects to the minds of their worshippers.

Passages like these leave hardly any doubt that there was a time when among the Aryas of India as among the Aryas of Greece, Dyu was supreme among the gods, while such epithets as IV, 17, 13, vibhaAganuh and asanimlln, the destroyer who wields the thunderbolt, place the old Dyu before our eyes as a fighting god, and as a. wielder of the thunderbolt like Indra. and like Zeus.

I M. M" India, p. 161.

DYAVA-PBITHIVi.

[ClUP.

I need not go further into the evidence which supports the original character which I ascribe to Dyu in the ancient, and in the pre-Vedic times of India. I may refer to my former contributions 1 to this, the most important chapter of Comparative Mythology. I believe that the objections which were once raised against the equation of Dyaus and Zeus, on the ground that Dyaus was simply a name of the sky. have now been surrendered. Even the most stubborn opponents of all attempts at tracing Greek and Indian gods back to a common source seem to have yielded an unwilling assent to the relationship between the Greek ZEVi 1Ta.rrJp, the Vedic Dyaush-pitar, the Latin Jupiter, and the Teutonic TYr. But they do not seem to have perceived that in making this concession they have really conceded everything, or at all events the fundamental principle of scientific mythology. If it is once admitted that the Supreme God of the ancient world was known under one and the same name before the ancestors of Hindus, Greeks, Romans. and Germans became permanently separated. and that the ancient Aryan name of that deity has survived in the most ancient literary relics of every one of these nations. it would surely seem to follow that this could not have been the only name which thus survived. If the word for ten is the same in the principal Aryan languages. should we not be surprised to find that all the other numerals were different? If the stem of the pronoun of the first person was identical in Sanskrit and Greek. should we not be surprised if the second person showed

1 'Lesson of Jupiter.' Nineteenth Century, Oct., 181lS.

VI]

DyAVA·PRITHIVt.

499

no similarity whatever? It is true that in Comparative Mythology we must not expect to discover more than the original starting-points from which two or more streams of' mythological fancy took their beginning. We must be satisfied if the root is the same, however much the derivation suffixes may differ, for we know how they vary in Greek itself. When we have once discovered the common startingpoint, as in the case of Dyaush-pitar and ZEV~ 11'arr]p, we ought to be satisfied. What has grown up afterwards on Greek soil or on Indian soil can hardly be expected to be found in the hymns of the Veda; the utmost we can expect is that these parallel developments may sometimes help to explain one another.

Parallel Development. ZfVr rf>"EQ,.,.

We have, for instance, in Greek inscriptions, a ZEV~ rEXl"", J. What can tliis -yEXlllJv mean? Benfey has shown that -yEXE'V, which Hesychius explains by XdP.11'EI.JI, was connected with Sk. gval, to flame, and likewise the accusative -ylXav, which Hesychius explains by a¥1v .qxtov. From the same root comes of course the Gr. -YEXa.V in the sense of laughing, and this laughing must have meant originally beaming. The close connection between these two verbs, beaming and laughing, is brought out very clearly in the Vedic expression (II, 4, 6):

Dyauh iva smayamAnah nabbobhis, Here Agni is compared with Dyu, the sky, when laughing in the clouds, this laughing in the clouds being evidently

J Of. M. H. E. Meier, Die Demen von Attica, nach Inscbriften von Ludwig Ross, 1846; Benfey, Nachrichten der K. Gesellachaft zu Gottingen, Jan. q, 187i.

500

PARAJ.JXT, DEVELOPMENT.

[CHAP.

meant for lightning 1, as Benfey has proved in one of his most ingenious articles on gaghghatiP. (for gakshatis, from has, to laugh) 2. We read, Rv. I. 168. 8, ava smayanta vidyutah prithivyam, 'The lightnings laughed down on the earth:' and in I, 79, 2, siv~hih na smayamAnA.bhih a a.gA.t patanti mfhah stanayanti abhra, ' He came with the smiling (lightnings, fem.), the rain-drops fall, the clouds thunder.'

All this shows that in India at all events lightning was sometimes conceived as laughing, and that therefore the god who held the thunderbolt (Dyaus asaniman) might be conceived as the laughing Dyaus. If then the Greek ZEV~ rEXlclw is, according to Hesychius, the beaming Zeus, we may carry the interpretation a step further and explain the beaming as lightning, and the ZE~ rEXlCdV as ZEV~ 'TE.fnnl(lpavvo~ or I(Epavvoq,a.7}~. This peculiar development of Dyaus· and Zeus probably took place independently in India and Greece, still the tendency was due to a common impulse carried away from the common Aryan home.

Limits of lII[ythological Comparisons.

I should always look upon such a coincidence as between the smiling Dyaus and the Zeus Geleon as really more than we have any right to expect, and it is due to repeated attempts to discover more and more of such very minute coincidences between Vedic and Greek gods that many scholars have withheld their assent even to the far more important fundamental,

I Senart, La Legende du Buddha, pp. 323-4.

S Nachrichten der K. Gesellschaft zu Gottingen, June 28.

I8;6.

VI1 LIMITS OF MYTHOLOGICAL COMPARISONS. 501 but naturally more general similarities which have been pointed out by Vedic scholars. In comparative mythology also there are some things which are too good to be true. We do not expect myths such as we meet with in the Pursnas to have left traces in Greek and Latin, neither should we expect later Greek myths, such as, for instance, the peacock of J uno, to find their counterparts in the Veda. It is evident that both in India and in Greece many myths have sprung up after the Aryan Separation, and any comparison between them would either be an anachronism, or lead us from a genealogical to a purely analogical or psychological study of mythology. When we have discovered in Varuna. and Ouranos the original idea of the covering sky, we have done enough. When we have discovered in the Haritas and Charites the representatives of the brightness of the morning sun, we need go no further. We shall never find the Charites as horses in Homer, nor the Haritas as the Graces in the Veda. If we find in the Veda the seven Haritas assuming a feminine character as maidens or sisters, -we have really gained more than we had any right to expect. There is no SvAn\ in the Veda, no {Jo;;nnf) 1TOrv'a, ·Hp1J, no cow-eyed wife of Dyaus. All we can say is that Here presupposed SvArA., the heavenly, whether recognised as the wife of the sky or not. The germ was in the Veda, but not the flower which grew up under the sky of Greece. Bharanyu in the Veda is not what Phoroneus is in Greece; all we can say is that they started from the same root, bhar, here used in the sense of bearing or being borne along, and applied in both countries to the nimble and swiftly-moving fire. So far they

502 LnlITS OF HYTHOLOGICAL COMPARISONS. [CHAP. had a common origin and growth, but no further. So far they prove the common beginnings of an Aryan mythology before the Aryan Separation. Everything else beyond this should be gratefully accepted whenever it exists, but should not be postulated as a matter of right.

Kanitold Chara.oter ot the Anoient Gods.

We must also bear in mind that in the beginning, before a name grew into the name of a definite deity, it had often been used in a more general and less definite sense. Dyaus, before it became the name of a god, meant sky, but before it meant sky it probably had the even more general meaning of light. And even after Dyaus had become the name of an active and personal power, it or he might be conceived in many various ways.

Dyaus might be conceived as the sublime brightness on high (hoc sublime can dena), and share in the character of serenity, sublimity, and infinity, which distinguish the Greek Zeus in his highest conception. But the sky might also be adored as the giver of rain, as the light of the morning, as the dispeller of darkness, as fighting the night, as hurling the lightning, as tearing the clouds; nay, whatever work can be ascribed to the sun or the moon, to the storms and the seasons, may all directly or indirectly be referred to the representative of the sky, that is, to Dyaus. In India the dramatic character of Dyaus had almost passed away before the hymns of the Veda in which he is mentioned were composed. We only catch some faint reminiscences of his former greatness, but most of the acts that might be ascribed to him, have been transferred to other deities, suoh as lndra., Mitra, Varuna., Vishnu, Pushan, &c.

VI] lIANIFOLD CHARACTER OF THE ANCIENT GODS. 503

In Greece Zeus stands before us not only as the supreme deity, the father of gods and men, but every physical event that can be more or less distantly referred to the sky, is represented as coming within the sphere of his activity. His brothers, Poseidon and Hades, have long been recognised as merely localised repetitions of Zeus, as ZTJJlo1ToO"Et8wJI and Z£v~ "aTax(JOJl'o~ or Z£v~ allo~. And as Zeus is not only the god of all the Hellenes (Pan-Hellenic), but enjoyed also special local worship in ever so many parts of the country, in hills and valleys, near rivers or on the sea-shore, his character took every kind of local colouring, nay he became responsible for many of the adventures that happened in towns and colonies supposed to be under his special protection. Many of these have a character of historical reality, which ought at once to discourage any attempt at mythological analysis.

One side in the character of Zeus is totally absent in the Veda. We can match his physical qualities in these ancient hymns, we may easily translate some of his epithets into Sanskrit, such as VlT'O~, Jupiter pluvius, op.fJp'o~, sender of rain, TpO<PWJl'O~, nourisher, -1C£Aa'JI£<P'ri~, wrapped in dark clouds, K£paVJl'o~, wielding the thunder, JI£c/>£ATJy£plrr]~, cloud-gatherer, alyloxo~, Aigis-bearing and storm-sending, dn;JI£p.o~, serene. But we should look in vain for the moral qualities of Zeus, as expressed in such epithets as 1TlO"Tl.o~, Jupiter Fidius, OpICLO~, protector of oaths, "JI'O~, protector of the rights of hospitality. Ideas such as that of M~tis, wisdom, being the first wife of the god of heaven, or of Themis, Law, acting as his assistant, or of Dike, Justice, being his daughter, were foreign to the Rishis in their praises of Dyaue,

[CHAP.

HAre.

The recognised wife of Zeus in Homer is Here, according to Greek mythology, his sister. Considering the character of her husband she could hardly be anything but either the sky, conceived as a woman, and in that case often specialised as the Dawn, or even the Earth.

Her name of Here, however, leaves little doubt on this point. It is true that it has been connected with lpa., the earth, but there would be both phonetic and material difficulties in the way. She is conceived as sitting on a golden throne (xpVCTO(JpoJlO~), as mother of the Charites, which points to a celestial rather than to a terrestrial being. It is natural therefore to look upon ·HprJ as representing a Sanskrit *SvAd., as a feminine of svar, the sun and the bright sky.

Originally she might have been the bright air between sky and earth, a kind of antarikshaprAh, or sky-pervading goddess, an epithet applied in the Veda to Urvasl (X, 95, 17), 8B a well-known representative of the dawn.

Much might be said, however, for another etymology from the root vas, to shine. From this we have in Greek la.p (vasar) , and ~p, spring, and in her marriage 1 with Zeus (the iEpO~ 'Ya.p.o~) she distinctly shows the character of a vernal goddess. The fact also that Zeus is first united with her, after assuming the form of a. cuckoo, might be interpreted in favour of a spring goddess z. On the other hand, the frequent quarrels between Zeus and

J II. xiv, 152 seq.

2 Hesiod, Op. et Dies, 486.

VI]

5°5

Here find a better explanation in the storms in which the god of the highest heaven seems to be fighting with the clouds. Here, suspended in the sky by Zeus with her hands tied by golden fetters and her feet weighted with anvils, would seem to be a more appropriate image for a cloud, than for a vernal deity or for the earth. TyphA-on, also, the child which she bore by herself, could only have been meant for a hurricane, the offspring of the cloudy atmosphere which is near (op.6fJpollos) to the brilliant sky, but submissive to Zeus. We must be satisfied with these general outlines of Here. It is the identity of the germ which gives us the conviction that the common beginning of Greek and Vedic mythology is a historica.l fact, and it is this historical fact which is of supreme importance to the student of Comparative Mythology, as the beginning of the history of the human mind. If we are able to discover more far-reaching similarities or identities, as Dyaush-pitar and Jupiter, as sardho marutas and ~rfo Martio 1, <lAtho vastinA.m = 8CtJTfjPES l&.CIJlI, we ought to be thankful, but we ought never to forget that our real object is to make the foundation sure, to establish the fact of a. common beginning of mythology, and to fix that beginning as antecedent to the Aryan Separation. The fact therefore that Here does not exist in the Veda as a goddess, called SvA.rA., ought to be no disappointment, particularly if we see how her place is occupied there by other names such as Aditi or U shas or U rvasl, who is ca.lled nf.gasa.h vim«ni, traversing the clouds, like Here traversing the sky on her chariot prepared by

I S. B. E., ,vol. xxxii, p. xxv.

506

[CHAP.

Hebe and by the Horae. The later development of Here, as protectress of marriage, as assisting with Eileithyia at the birth of children, as representing the dignity of married womanhood, all this does not and could not exist in the Veda. Still, if the oak images of Here in the grove of Alalkomena.e, and the wooden statues of Smilis could grow into the Juno Ludovisi, why should not a cloud or air goddess of India, whether called SvA.ra. or U rvasi or any other such name, have supplied the first germs from which the BOcd7r'~ 1TOTV,a, ·HprJ, in all her majesty, descended 1

Eur~pe.

Among the many epithets of Here there is one that sheds more light on her character. If we are right in supposing that names beginning with wpv, wide, are generally names of sun-gods or dawngoddesses, and if in several of the heroines carried off by Zeus, we have recognised ancient representatives of the dawn, we can hardly be wrong in taking Zeus Euryopa, the wide-seeing Zeus, for Zeus in his solar character. and if so, then Eur6pe, the wide-seeing, or wide-shining, carried off by Zeus in the shape of a white bull, as a slightly disguised dawn-goddess. But if that is admitted, it becomes important to observe that Here also is called Europia, and thus betrays her character as originally a matutinal apparition, though afterwards extending her sway through the air (antariksbapra) over heaven and earth. If some scholars maintain that none of these arguments is clinching, and that a mere incredulous smile can dispose of them all, have they never thought what an extraordinary state of things it wouJd be if all these coincidences were the result of