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.