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

COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY. 403 Vipra being changed into Avestic Vîfra and Navagva into Navâza. The above legends from the Greek, Celtic and Norse literatures show that a long winter-darkness was not un- known to the ancestors of the Aryan races in Europe, who have preserved distinct reminiscences of a year of ten or six months' sun-shine, and that the Navagvas and the Dasha- gvas of the Ṛig-Veda have again their parallels in the mytho- logy of other Aryan races, though the resemblance may not be as obvious in the one as in the other case. A year of six months' or ten months' sunshine necessarily implies a long continuous day and a long continuous night, and distinct references to these Arctic characteristics of day and night are found in Norse and Slavonic legends. Thus the Norse Sun-god Balder is said to have dwelt in a place in heaven called Breidablik or Broadgleam, the most bless- ed of all lands, where nought unclean or accursed could abide. Upon this Prof. Rhys observes, "It is remarkable that Balder had a dwelling place in the heavens, and this seems to refer to the Arctic summer when the sun pro- longs his stay above the horizon. The pendant to the picture would naturally be his staying as long in the nether world."* This corresponds exactly with the Vedic description of the sun's unyoking his carriage and making a halt in the mid of the heaven, discussed in the sixth chapter. The story of three brothers in the Slavonic literature also points out to the same conclusion. We are told that "Once there was an old couple who had three sons. Two of them had their wits about them, but the third, Ivan, was a simpleton. Now in the land in which Ivan lived, there was never any day but always night. This was a snake's doing. Well, Ivan under- took to kill that snake. Then came a third snake with twelve heads, Ivan killed it and destroyed the heads and

• Rhys' Hibbert Lectures, p. 536.