वेदों की प्राचीनता एवं काल-निर्णय / ओरायन (लोकमान्य बाल गंगाधर तिलक - खगोलीय वैदिक शोध)

402 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS. In the Norse literature we are told that Thor, the son of Earth, slays the World-dragon, walks nine paces and dies of the venom of the Serpent.* If the slaying of the dragon be understood, as remarked by Prof. Rhys, to mean the con- quest of the Sun-hero over the powers of darkness, and the death of Thor be taken to represent the sinking of the summer-sun below the horizon, we have here a clear state- ment that Thor, the Sun-hero, walked nine paces during the time that intervened between the end of winter and the end of summer. These nine paces could not be nine days or nine years; and there is therefore no alternative but to hold that the legend refers to the nine months' life of the Sun-god before he succumbed to the powers of darkness. The Avestic story of Vafra, or, according to Spiegel, Vifra Navâza (Yt. V, 61), belongs, I think, to the same class. He is said to have been flung up in the air, in the shape of a bird by Thraêtaona and was flying for three days and three nights towards his own house, but could not turn down. At the end of the third night when the beneficent dawn came dawning up, he prayed unto Ardvi Sûra Anâhita to help him, promising to offer Haomas and meat by the brink of the river Rangha. Ardvi Sûra Anâhita listening to his prayer is then said to have brought him to his house safe and unhurt. Vifra Navâza in this legend is very likely Vipra Navagva of the Ṛig-Veda. We have seen that the Navagvas and seven Vipras are mentioned together in the Ṛig-Veda (VI, 22, 2) and that the Ashvins, who are called Vipra-vâhasâ in (V, 74, 7), are said to have resided for three days and three nights in the distant region. It is not unlikely, therefore, that the story of the Navagvas, who go to help Indra in the world of darkness after completing their sacrificial session of nine months, may have been combined with the story of the Ashvins in the Avestic legend of Vifra Navâza, Sanskrit

• Rhys' Hibbert Lectures, p. 616.