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

68 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
the autumnal equinox, or the portion of the ecliptic in the
northern hemisphere ; and if we understand the word in this
sense, the statement that the Uttarâyaṇa is a day of the Devas is
at once plain and intelligible. Bhâskarâchârya's reference to older
astronomical Saṁhitâs clearly shows that the tradition was
handed down from the oldest times. It is suggested that in
these passages Gods may mean the apotheosized ancestors of
the human race. But I do not think that we need any such
explanation. If the ancestors of the human race ever lived at
the North Pole, so must have their Gods ; and I shall shew in a
subsequent chapter that the Vedic deities are, as a matter of
fact, clothed with attributes, which are distinctly Polar in
origin. It makes, therefore, no difference for our purpose, if a
striking feature of the primitive home is traditionally preserved
and remembered as a characteristic of the Gods, or of the
apotheosized ancestors of the race. We are concerned with the
tradition itself, and our object is gained if its existence is clearly
established.
The next authority for the statement is Manu I, 67.
While describing the divisions of time it says, "A year
(human) is a day and a night of the Gods ; thus are the
two divided, the northern passage of the sun is the day and
the southern the night."* The day and the night of the
Gods are then taken as a unit for measuring longer periods
of time as the Kalpas and so on, and Yâska's Nirukta,
XIV, 4, probably contains the same reference. Muir, in the
first Volume of his Original Sanskrit Texts, gives some of these
passages so far as they bear on the yuga-system found in the
Purâṇas. But we are not concerned with the later development
of the idea that the day and the night of the Gods each lasted for

• Manu, I, 67,—दैवे रात्र्यहनी वर्ष प्रविभागस्तयोः पुनः । अहस्तत्रोदगयनं
  रात्रिः स्याद्दक्षिणायनम् ॥