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

206 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
Maṇḍala of 114 hymns in the Ṛig-Veda is dedicated to the
praise of Soma. A careful analysis of the Soma sacrifice may,
therefore, be expected to disclose, at least partially, the nature
of the oldest sacrificial system of the Aryan race; and we,
therefore, proceed to examine the same.
The chief characteristic of the Soma sacrifice, as distin-
guished from other sacrifices, is, as the name indicates, the ex-
traction of the Soma juice and the offering thereof to gods be-
fore drinking it. There are three libations of Soma in a day,
one in the morning, one at mid-day, and the last in the evening,
and all these are accompanied by the chanting of hymns during
the sacrifice. These Soma sacrifices, if classed according to
their duration, fall under three heads; (1) those that are per-
formed in a single day, called Ekâhas, (2) those that are per-
formed in more than one and less than thirteen days, called
Ahînas, and (3) those that take thirteen or more than 13 days
and may last even for one thousand years, called Sattras. Under
the first head we have the Agniṣhṭoma, fully described in the
Aitareya Brâhmaṇa (III, 39-44), as the key or the type of all
the sacrifices that fall under this class. There are six modifica-
tions of Agniṣhṭoma, viz., Ati-agniṣhṭoma, Ukthya, Shoḍashî,
Vâjapeya, Atirâtra and Aptoryâma, which together with Ag-
niṣhṭoma, form the seven parts, kinds or modifications of the
Jyotiṣhṭoma sacrifice, (Ashv. S. S. VI, 11, 1). The modification
chiefly consists in the number of hymns to be recited at the
libations, or the manner of recitation, or the number of the
Grahas or Soma-cups used on the occasion. But with these we
are not at present concerned. Of the second class of Soma sacri-
fices, the Dvâdashâha or twelve days' sacrifice is celebrated both
as Ahîna and Sattra and is considered to be very important.
It is made up of three tryahas (or three days' performances,
called respectively Jyotis, Go, and Ayus), the tenth day and the
two Atirâtras (Ait. Br. IV, 23-4). The nine days' performance

THE COWS' WALK. 207
(three tryahas) is called the Nava-rātra. Side by side with this,
there are, under this head, a number of Soma sacrifices extend-
ing over two nights, three nights, four nights, upto twelve nights,
called dvi-rātra, tri-rātra and so on (Tait. Saṁ. VII; 1, 4,—VII, 3,
2 ; Ashv. Shr. Sut. X and XI ; Tāṇ. Brā. 20, 11,—24, 19). In the
third class we have the annual Sattras and of these the Gavām-
ayanam is the type. Some Sattras which come under this class
are described as extending over 1,000 years, and a discussion is
found in sacrificial works as to whether the phrase one thousand
years signifies 1,000 real years, or whether it stands for 1,000 days.
But we may pass it over as unnecessary for our purpose. The
annual Sattras are the only important Sattras of this class, and
to understand their nature we must see what a shaḷaha means.
The word literally denotes a group of six days (shaṭ + ahan) and
is used to denote six days' performance in the sacrificial litera-
ture. It is employed as a unit to measure a month in the same
way as we now use a week, a month being made up of five
shaḷahas. The shaḷaha, in its turn, consists of the daily sacrifices
called, Jyotis, Go, Āyus, and the same three taken in the
reverse order as Āyus, Go and Jyotis. Every shaḷaha, therefore,
begins and ends with a Jyotiṣhṭoma (Ait. Br. IV, 15). The sha-
ḷaha is further distinguished into Abhiplava and Pṛishṭhya, ac-
cording to the arrangement of the stomas or songs sung at the
Soma libations. An annual Sattra is, in the main, made up of
a number of shaḷahas joined with certain special rites at the be-
ginning, the middle and the close of the Sattra. The central day
of the Sattra is called Viṣhuvān, and stands by itself, dividing
the Sattra into two equal halves like the wings of a house (Tait.
Br. I, 2, 3, 1) ; and the rites in the latter half of the session or
after the Viṣhuvān day are performed in an order which is the
reverse of that followed in performing the ceremonies in the first
half of the sacrifice. The model annual Sattra (the Gavām-
ayanam) thus consists of the following parts :—

208 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
Parts. Days.

1. The introductory Atirâtra............................................ 1
2. The Chaturviṁsha day, otherwise called the Ârambha-
   nîya (Ait. Br. IV. 12), or the Prâyaṇîya (Tâṇḍ. Br.
   IV, 2), the real beginning of the Sattra............... 1
3. Four Abhiplava, followed by one Pṛiṣhṭhya shaḷaha
   each month; continued in this way for five months... 150
4. Three Abhiplava and one Pṛiṣhṭhya shaḷaha............... 24
5. The Abhijit day...................................................... 1
6. The Three Svara-Sâman days.................................... 3
7. The Viṣhuvân or the Central day, which stands by
   itself, i.e., not counted in the total of the Sattra days.
8. The three Svara-Sâman days.................................... 3
9. The Vishvajit day................................................... 1
10. One Pṛiṣhṭhya and three Abhiplava shaḷahas......... 24
11. One Pṛiṣhṭhya and four Abhiplava shaḷahas each month;
    continued in this way for four months.................. 120
12. Three Abhiplava shaḷahas, one Go-ṣhṭoma, one Âyu-
    ṣhṭoma, and one Dasharâtra (the ten days of Dvâda-
    shâha), making up one month.............................. 30
13. The Mahâvrata day, corresponding to the Chaturviṁsha
    day at the beginning............................................ 1
14. The concluding Atirâtra............................................ 1
    Total days.........360.
    It will be seen from the above scheme that there are really
    a few sacrificial rites which are absolutely fixed and unchange-
    able in the yearly Sattra. The two Atirâtras, the introductory
    and the concluding, the Chaturviṁsha and the Mahâvrata
    day, the Abhijit and the Vishvajit, the three Svara-Sâman
    days on either side of Viṣhuvân, the Viṣhuvân itself, and
    the ten days of Dvâdashâha, making up 22 days in all, ex-
    clusive of Viṣhuvân, are the only parts that have any special-
    ity about them. The rest of the days are all made up by
    Abhiplava and Pṛiṣhṭhya shaḷahas, which, therefore, consti-
    tute what may. be called the elastic or the variable part of
    the yearly Sattra. Thus if we want a Gavâm-ayanam of ten
    months, we have only to strike off five shaḷahas from the

THE COWS' WALK 209
parts marked 3 and 11 in the above scheme. The Âdityanâm-
ayanam is another modification of the above scheme in which,
amongst other changes, the shaḷahas are all Abhiplava,
instead of being a combination of Abhiplava and Prishṭhya;
while if all the shaḷahas are Prishṭhya, along with some
other changes, it becomes the Aṅgirasâm-ayanam. All
these modifications do not, however, touch the total number
of 360 days. But there were sacrificers, who adopted the
lunar year of 354 days, and, therefore, omitted 6 days from
the above scheme; and their Sattra is called the Utsar-
giṇâm-ayanam (Tait. Sam. VII, 5, 7, 1; Tâṇḍya Brâh. V, 10).
In short, the object was to make the Sattra correspond with
the year adopted, civil or lunar, as closely as possible. But
these points are not relevant to our purpose. The Brâhmaṇas
and the Shrauta Sûtras give further details about the various
rites to be performed on the Viṣhuvân, the Abhijit and the
Vishvajit or the Svara-sâman day. The Aitareya Âraṇyaka
describes the Mahâvrata ceremony; while the Atirâtra and the
Chaturviṁsha are described in the fourth book of the Aitareya
Brâhmaṇa. The Chaturviṁsha is so called because the stoma
to be chanted on that day is twenty-four-fold. It is the real
beginning of the Sattra as the Mahâvrata is its end. The
Aitareya Brâhmaṇa (IV, 14) says, "The Hotṛi pours forth
the seed. Thus he makes the seed (which is poured forth)
by means of the Mahâvrata day produce off-spring. For seed
if effused every year is productive." This explanation shows
that like the Pravargya ceremony, the Mahâvrata was intended
to preserve the seed of the sacrifice in order that it might ger-
minate or grow at the proper time. It was a sort of link bet-
ween the dying and the coming year, and appropriately con-
cluded the annual Sattra. It will be further seen that every
annual Sattra had an Ati-râtra at each of its ends, and that
the Dvâdashâha, or rather the ten days thereof, formed an
important concluding part of the Sattra.
24

210 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
The above is only a brief description, a mere outline of the
scheme of the annual Sattras mentioned in sacrificial works, but it
is sufficient for our purpose. We can see from it that a civil year
of 360 days formed their basis, and the position of the Viṣhuvân
was of great importance inasmuch as the ceremonies after it
were performed in the reverse order. I have shown elsewhere
what important inferences can be drawn from the position of the
Viṣhuvân regarding the calendar in use at the time when the
scheme was settled. But we have now to consider of times which
preceded the settlement of this scheme, and for that purpose
we must describe another set of Soma sacrifices included under
the general class of Sattras. It has been stated above that side
by side with the Dvâdashâha, there are Ahîna sacrifices of two
nights, three nights, etc. upto twelve nights. But these sacri-
fices do not stop with the twelve nights' performance. There are
thirteen nights', fourteen nights', fifteen nights,' and so on upto one
hundred nights' sacrifice called Trayodasha-râtra, Chaturdasha-
râtra and so on upto Shata-râtra. But since the Ahîna has
been defined to be a sacrifice extending over not more than
twelve or less than thirteen days, all the night-sacrifices extend-
ing over a period longer than twelve nights are included
in the third class, viz., the Sattras. If we, however, dis-
regard this artificial division, it will be found that along
with the Ekâha, the Dvâdashâha and the annual Sattras, there
is a series of, what are termed, the night-sacrifices or sattras
extending over a period of time from two to one hundred
nights, but not further. These night-sacrifices or Râtri-sattras
are mentioned in the Taittirîya Saṁhitâ, the Brâhmaṇas and
the Shrauta Sûtras in clear terms, and there is no ambiguity
about their nature, number, or duration. The Taittirîya Saṁ-
hitâ in describing them often uses the word Râtrîḥ (nights)
in the plural, stating, that so and so was the first to institute or
to perceive 'so many nights' meaning so many nights' sacrifice,

THE COWS' WALK. 211
(vimshatim râtrîh, VII. 3, 9, 1; dvâtrimshatam râtrîh, VII, 4, 4, 1).
According to the principle of division noted above all night-
sacrifices of less than thirteen nights' duration will be called
Ahîna, while those extending over longer time upto one hundred
nights will come under Sattras; but this is, as remarked above,
evidently an artificial division, and one, who reads carefully
the description of these sacrifices, cannot fail to be struck by
the fact that we have here a series of night-sacrifices from two to
a hundred nights, or if we include the Ati-râtra in this series, we
have practically a set of hundred nightly Soma sacrifices, though,
according to the principle of division adopted, some may fall
under the head of Ahîna and some under that of Sattras.
Now an important question in connection with these
Sattras is why they alone should be designated 'night-sacri-
fices,' (râtri-kratus), or 'night-sessions' (râtri-sattras)? and
why their number should be one hundred? or, in other words,
why there are no night-sattras of longer duration than one
hundred nights? The Mîmâmsakas answer the first part of
the question by asking us to believe that the word 'night'
(râtrih) is really used to denote 'a day' in the denomination of
these sacrifices (Shabara on Jaimini VIII, 1, 17). The word
Dvi-râtra, according to this theory, means two days' sacrifice,
and Shata-râtra, a hundred days' sacrifice. This explanation
appears very good at the first sight, and as a matter of fact it
has been accepted by all writers on the sacrificial ceremonies.
In support of it, we may also cite the fact that as the moon was
the measurer of time in ancient days, the night was then natu-
rally more marked than the day, and instead of saying
'so many days' men often spoke of 'so many nights,' much
in the same way as we now use the word 'fort-night.' This
is no doubt good so far as it goes; but the question is
why should there be no Soma sacrifices of a longer duration
than one hundred nights? and why a gap, a serious gap, is left

212 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
in the series of Soma sacrifices after one hundred nights' Sattra
until we come to the annual Sattra of 360 days? Admitting that
'night' means 'day,' we have Soma sacrifices lasting from 1 to
100 days; and if so, where was the harm to complete the series
until the yearly Sattra of 360 days was reached? So far as I
know, no writer on sacrificial ceremonies has attempted to answer
this question satisfactorily. Of course, adopting the speculative
manner of the Brâhmaṇas, we might say that there are no Soma
sacrifices of longer than one hundred nights' duration, because the
life of a man cannot extend beyond a hundred years, (Tait. Br.
III, 8, 16, 2). But such an explanation can never be regarded
as satisfactory, and the Mîmâṁsakas, who got over one difficulty
by interpreting 'night' into 'day,' have practically left this latter
question untouched, and, therefore, unsolved. In short, the
case stands thus :—the sacrificial literature mentions a series
of 99, or practically one hundred Soma sacrifices, called the
'night-sacrifices'; but these do not form a part of any annual
Sattra, like the Gavâm-ayanam, nor is any reason assigned for their
separate existence, nor is their duration, which never exceeds
a hundred nights, accounted for. Neither the authors of the
Brâhmaṇas nor those of the Shrauta Sûtras, much less Sâyaṇa and
Yâska give us any clue to the solution of this question; and the
Mîmâṁsakas, after explaining the word 'night' occurring in the
names of these sacrifices as equal to 'day' have allowed these
night-sacrifices to remain as an isolated group in the organ-
ised system of Soma sacrifices. Under these circumstances
it would, no doubt, appear presumptuous for any one to suggest
an explanation, so many centuries after what may be called
the age of the Sattras. But I feel that the Arctic theory,
which, we have seen, is supported by strong independent evi-
dence, not only explains, but appropriately accounts for the
original existence of this isolated series of a hundred Soma sa-
crifices; and I, therefore, proceed to give my view on the point.

THE COWS' WALK. 213
It seems to me that if the word râtri in Ati-râtra is still
understood to mean 'night,' and that if the Ati-râtra sacrifice
is even now performed during the night, there is no reason why
we should not similarly interpret the same word in Dvi-râtra,
Tri râtra &c. upto Shata-râtra. The objection, that the Soma
juice is not extracted during the night, is more imaginary than
real; for as a matter of fact Soma libations are made in the usual
way, during the Ati-râtra sacrifice. The Ati-râtra sacrifice is
performed at the beginning and the end of every Sattra; and all
the three libations of Soma are always offered during the three
turns, or paryâyas, of the night. The Aitareya Brâhmaṇa (IV, 5),
in explaining the origin of this sacrifice, tells us that the Asuras
had taken shelter with the night, and the Devas, who had taken
shelter with the day, wanted to expel them from the dark region.
But amongst the Devas, Indra alone was found ready and willing
to undertake this task; and entering into darkness, he, with the
assistance of metres, turned the Asuras out of the first part of
the night by the first Soma libation, while by means of the middle
turn (paryâya) of passing the Soma-cup, the Asuras were turned
out of the middle part, and by the third turn out of the third or
the last part of the night. The three Soma libations, here
spoken of, are all made during the night, and the Brâhmaṇa
further observes that there is no other deity save Indra and the
Metres to whom they are offered, (Cf. Âpas. Sh. Su. XIV, 3, 12).
The next section of the Brâhmaṇa (IV, 6) distinctly raises the
question, "How are the Pavamâna Stotras (to be chanted for
the purification of the Soma juice) provided for the night,
whereas such Stotras refer only to the day, but not to the
night?" and answers it by stating that the Stotras are the
same for the day and the night. It is clear from this that
Soma juice was extracted and purified at night during the
Ati-râtra sacrifice, and Indra was the only deity to whom the

214 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
libations were offered in order to help him in his fight with the
Asuras, who had taken shelter with the darkness of the night.
That the Ati-râtra is an ancient sacrifice is further proved by the
occurrence of a similar ceremony in the Parsi scriptures. The
word Ati-râtra does not occur in the Avesta, but in the Vendîdad,
XVIII, 18 (43)–22 (48), we are told that there are three parts of
the night, and that in the first of these parts (thrishvai), Fire, the
son of Ahura Mazda, calls upon the master of the house to arise
and put on his girdle and to fetch clean wood in order that he
may burn bright ; for, says the Fire, “Here comes Azi (Sans. Ahi),
made by the Daêvas (Vedic Asuras), who is about to strive against
me, and wants to put out my life.” And the same request is
made during the second and the third part of the night. The
close resemblance between this and the three paryâyas of the
Ati-râtra sacrifice does not seem to have been yet noticed : but
whether noticed or not, it shows that the Ati-râtra is an ancient
rite performed during the night for the purpose of helping
Indra, or the deity that fought with the powers of darkness,
and that such sacrificial acts as putting on the girdle (kosti) or
squeezing the Soma, were performed during this period of dark-
ness.
Now what applies to the sacrifice of a single night may
well be extended to cases where sacrifices had to be performed
for two, three or more continuous nights. I have already
shown before that the ancient sacrificers completed their sacri-
ficial sessions in ten months, and a long night followed the com-
pletion of these sacrifices. What did the sacrificers do during
this long night ? They could not have slept all the time ; and
as a matter of fact we know that the people in the extreme
north of Europe and Asia do not, even at present, sleep
during the whole of the long night which occurs in their
part of the globe. Paul Du Chaillu, who has recently (1900)
published an account of his travels in The Land of the

THE COWS' WALK. 215
Long-Night, informs us (p. 75) that although the sun went below
the horizon for several days in the Arctic regions, yet during the
period "the Lapps could tell from the stars whether it was night
or day, for they were accustomed to gauge time by the stars
according to their height above the horizon, just as we do at
home with the sun"; and what the Lapps do now, must have
been done by the oldest inhabitants of the circum-polar regions.
It is, therefore, clear that the ancient sacrificers of the Aryan race
could not have gone to sleep after sacrificing for ten months. Did
they then sit idle with their hands folded when Indra was
fighting for them with the powers of darkness? They per-
formed their sacrifices for ten months with a view to help In-
dra in his war with Vala; and just at the time when Indra most
needed the help of invigorating songs and Soma libations, are we
to suppose that these sacrificers sat idle, gave up the sacrifices
and left Indra to fight with Vala alone and single-handed as best
as he could? The whole theory of sacrifices negatives such a
supposition. Therefore, if the Arctic theory is true, and if the
ancestor of the Vedic Ṛiṣhis ever lived in a region where the
darkness of the night lasted for several days, (a day being taken
as a measure of time equal to 24 hours), we naturally expect to
find a series of nightly Soma sacrifices performed during the
period, to help the gods in their struggle with the demons of
darkness; and, as a matter of fact, there are in the Vedic sacri-
ficial literature, a number of sacrifices which, if we include the
Ati-râtra in it, extend from one to a hundred nights. The Mîmâ-
ṁsakas and even the authors of the Brâhmaṇas, who knew little
about the ancient Arctic home, have converted these night-sac-
rifices into day-sacrifices; but the explanation evidently appears
to be invented at a time when the true nature of the Râtri-kratus or
Râtri-sattras was forgotten, and it does not, therefore, preclude us
from interpreting these facts in a different way. I have already

216 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
stated above that if we accept the explanation of the Mîmâmsakas,
we cannot explain why the series of the night-sacrifices should
abruptly end with the Shata-râtra or a hundred nights' sacrifice;
but by the Arctic theory we can explain the fact satisfactorily
by supposing that the duration of the long night in the ancient
home varied from one night (of 24 hours) to a hundred continuous
nights ( of 2400 hours ) according to latitude, and that the
hundred nightly Soma sacrifices corresponded to the different
durations of the night at different places in the ancient home.
Thus where the darkness lasted only for ten nights ( 240 hours ) a
Dasha-râtra sacrifice was performed, while where it lasted for 100
nights ( 2400 hours ) a Shata-râtra sacrifice was necessary. There
are no sacrifices after the Shata-râtra because a hundred con-
tinuous nights marked the maximum duration of darkness ex-
perienced by the ancient sacrificers of the race. We have seen
that the legend of Aditi indicates a period of seven months
sunshine ; join to it the Dawn and the Twilight of 30 days each,
and there are left three months, ( or if we take the year to consist
of 365 days, then 95 days ) , for the duration of the long continuous
night,—a result which remarkably corresponds to the longest
duration of the night-sacrifices known in the Vedic literature.
The Dawn marked the end of the long night, and could not,
therefore, be included in the latter at least for sacrificial pur-
poses. In fact separate sacrifices are enjoined for the Dawn in
sacrificial works ; and we may, therefore, safely exclude the
long Dawn from the province of the nightly sacrifices, and the
same may be said of the period of the long evening twilight.
A hundred nights' sacrifice thus marked the maximum dura-
tion of darkness during which Indra fought with Vala and
was strengthened by the Soma libations offered to him in this
sacrifice. As there is no other theory to account for the exist-
ence of the night-sacrifices, and especially for their number, to
wit, one hundred, these sacrifices may be safely taken to

THE COWS' WALK, 217

indicate the existence of an ancient year approximately divided
into seven months' sunshine, one month's dawn, one month's
evening twilight and three months' long continuous night.
There are other considerations which point out to the same
conclusion. In the post-Vedic literature we have a persistent
tradition that Indra alone of all gods is the master of a hundred
sacrifices (shata-kratu), and that as this attribute formed, so
to say, the very essence of Indraship, he always jealously watch-
ed all possible encroachments against it. But European scholars
relying upon the fact that even Sâyaṇa prefers, except in a few
places (III, 51, 2), to interpret shata-kratu, as applied to Indra in
the Ṛig-Veda, as meaning, not 'the master of a hundred sacri-
fices,' but 'the lord of a hundred mights or powers,' have not
only put aside the Purâṇic tradition, but declined to interpret the
word kratu in the Ṛig-Veda except in the sense of 'power, energy,
skill, wisdom, or, generally speaking, the power of body or mind'.
But if the above explanation of the origin of the night-sacrifices
is correct, we must retrace our steps, and acknowledge that
the Purâṇic tradition or legend is, after all, not built upon a pure
misunderstanding of the original meaning of the epithet shata-
kratu as applied to Indra in the Vedic literature. I am aware of
the fact that traditions in the post-Vedic literature are often found
to have but a slender basis in the Vedas, but in the present case we
have something more reliable and tangible to go upon. We
have a group, an isolated group of a hundred nightly Soma
sacrifices, and as long as it stands unexplained in the Vedic
sacrificial literature it would be unreasonable to decline to con-
nect it with the Purâṇic tradition of Indra's sole mastership of
a hundred sacrifices, especially when in the light of the Arc-
tic theory the two can be so well and intelligibly connected.
The hundred sacrifices, which are regarded as constituting the
essence of Indraship in the Purâṇas, are there said to be the
Ashvamedha sacrifices; and it may, at the outset, be urged

218 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
that the Shata-râtra sacrifice mentioned in the sacrificial works
is not an Ashvamedha sacrifice. But the distinction is neither
important, nor material. The Ashvamedha sacrifice is a Soma
sacrifice and is described in the sacrificial works along with the
night-sacrifices. In the Taittirîya Saṁhitâ (VII, 2, 11,) a hundred
offerings of food to be made in the Ashvamedha sacrifice are
mentioned, and the Taittirîya Brâhmaṇa (III, 8, 15, 1) states that
Prajâpati obtained these offerings "during the night," and con-
sequently they are called Râtri-homas. The duration of the Ashva-
medha sacrifice is again not fixed, inasmuch as it depends upon
the return of the horse, and in the Ṛig-Veda (I, 163, 1) the sacri-
ficial horse is identified with the sun moving in waters. The re-
turn of the sacrificial horse may, therefore, be taken to symbo-
lise the return of the sun after the long night, and a close re-
semblance between the Ashvamedha and the night-sacrifices,
which were performed to enable Indra to fight with Vala and
rescue the dawn and the sun from his clutches, may thus be taken
as established. At any rate, we need not be surprised if the Shata-
râtra Soma sacrifice appears in the form of a hundred Ashva-
medha sacrifices in the Purâṇas. The tradition is substantially
the same in either case, and when it can be so easily and natural-
ly explained on the Arctic theory, it would not be reasonable to
set it aside, and hold that the writers of the Purâṇas created it
by misinterpreting the word shata-kratu occurring in the Vedas.
We have seen that shata-kratu as applied to Indra is in-
terpreted by Western scholars, and in many places even by Sâ-
yaṇa himself, as meaning the lord of a hundred powers. Sâ-
yaṇa now and then (III, 51, 2; X, 103, 7) suggests or gives
an alternative explanation, and makes Indra 'the master of a
hundred sacrifices'; but Western scholars have gone further
and discarded all other explanations except the one noted
above. It is, therefore, necessary to examine the meaning of
this epithet, as used in the Ṛig-Veda, a little more closely in

THE COWS' WALK. 219
this place. If the word kratu in shata-kratu be interpreted to
mean 'might' or 'power,' the numeral shata, which strictly
denotes 'a hundred,' will have to be taken as equivalent to
'many' or numerous,' inasmuch as no definite set of a hundred
powers can be pointed out as specially belonging to Indra. That
the word shata may be so interpreted is evident from the fact
that adjectives like shata-nîtha (I, 100, 12) and shatam-ûtî ( I, 102,
6; 1 30, 8 ), as applied to Indra in the Ṛig-Veda, are found in
other places in the form of sahasra-nîtha (III, 60, 7), and sahas-
ram-ûti (I, 52, 2). Again Indra's arrow is once called shata-bradhna
and also sahasra-parṇa in the same verse (VIII, 77, 7); while Soma
is represented as going in a hundred ways (shata-yâman) in IX,
86, 16, and a few hymns after it is said to be sahasra-yâman or
going in a thousand ways ( IX, 106, 5 ). Even the adjective
shata-manyu, which Sâyaṇa interprets as meaning 'the master
of a hundred sacrifices' in X, 103, 7, has its counterpart, if not
in the Ṛig-Veda, at least in the Sâma-Veda which reads
sahasra-manyu for sahasra-mushka in Ṛig-Veda VI, 46, 3. . This
shows that the Vedic bards considered shata (a hundred) and
sahasra (a thousand) as interchangeable numerals in some places;
and if the numeral shata in shata-kratu had been of the same
character, we should naturally have met with a paraphrase-
of the epithet as sahasra-kratu somewhere in the Vedic litera-
ture. But although the epithet shata-kratu, as applied to
Indra, occurs about sixty times in the Ṛig-Veda and several
times in other Vedic works, nowhere do we find it para-
phrased as sahasra-kratu, which shews that the Vedic bards
did not feel themselves at liberty to alter or paraphrase it
as they liked. The adjective amita-kratu is applied to Indra
in I, 102, 6; but as amita does not necessarily mean more
than 'one hundred,' it does not follow that on this account
we should give up the ordinary meaning of shata in shata-
kratu. If the word kratu had nowhere been used in the Ṛig-Veda

220 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
to denote a sacrifice, we may have been justified in interpreting
shata-kratu in the way suggested by Western scholars. But,
as observed by Dr. Haug, when Vasiṣhṭha prayed to Indra (VII,
32, 26) "Carry, O Indra! our sacrificial performance (kratum)
through, just as a father does to his sons, (by assisting them).
Teach us, O thou, who art invoked by many, that we may, in
this turn (of the night), reach alive the (sphere of) light (jyotis),"*
the prayer in all probability refers to the sacrificial performance
(kratu) held for the purpose of enabling the sacrificers to safely
reach the other end of the night. In fact, it refers to the Ati-râtra
sacrifice and the Aitareya Brâhmaṇa (IV, 10) quotes and inter-
prets it in the same way. Sâyaṇa, in his commentary on the
Aitareya Brâhmaṇa, though not in the Ṛig-Veda Bhâṣhya, also
takes the same view; and as the Ati-râtra sacrifice is referred to
expressly by its name in the Ṛig-Veda (VII, 103, 7) it is not at all
unlikely that a verse referring to this Soma sacrifice should occur
in other hymns. Hence if there are passages where kratu can be
taken to mean 'a sacrifice,' there is no reason why the epithet
shata-kratu be not understood to mean "the master of a hundred
sacrifices" as suggested by the Purâṇic tradition. Another
fact which favours this interpretation, is that in the Ṛig-Veda
Indra is described as destroying 90, 99 or 100 fortresses or
cities (puraḥ) of his enemies (I, 130, 7; II, 19, 6; VI, 31, 4; II,
14, 6). Now deva-puraḥ, which means 'the fortresses of the
gods,' has been † interpreted to mean 'days' in the description
of the dasha-râtra sacrifice in the Taittitrîya Saṁhitâ VII, 2,

• See Dr. Haug's Ait. Br. (IV, 10), Trans. Vol. II, p. 274, and the
  translator's note thereon: Dr. Haug thinks that the verse (Ṛig. VII,
  32, 26) evidently refers to the Ati-râtra feast, for which occasion it
  was in all likelihood composed by Vasiṣhṭha. The verse is :—इंद्र॒ क्रतुं॑ न॒
  आ भ॑र पि॒ता पु॒त्रेभ्यो॒ यथा॑ । शिक्षा॑ णो अ॒स्मिन् पुरुहूत॒ याम॑नि जी॒वा ज्यो-
  ति॑रशीमहि ॥
  † Cf. Bhatta Bhâskara's Com. which says:—'देवपुरा:' देवानाम् पुर-
  स्थानीयानि पुरविवक्षया इतराण्यहानि 'पर्यूहन्ते' सर्वतो दृंहंते आत्मनो
  रक्षार्थम् ।...। 'ते देवा:' देवपुराख्यानि दशरात्रसंबंधीन्यहानि ।

THE COWS' WALK. 221
5, 3-4; and if deva-puraḥ means 'days,' the puraḥ (cities, for-
tresses) of Shambara may well be taken to mean 'nights.'
This view is confirmed by the statement in the Aitareya Brāh-
maṇa, previously quoted, which says that the Asuras found
shelter with the night, or, in other words, the darkness of the
night was, so to say, their fortress. Indra's destroying a hundred
forts of Shambara is, therefore, equivalent to his fighting with
the enemy for a hundred continuous nights, a period during
which the ancient sacrificers offered him Soma libations in
order that he may be better prepared for the struggle with Vala.
The destruction of 99 or 100 forts of the enemy, a group of a
hundred nightly sacrifices, the nine and ninety rivers (sravantīḥ)
which Indra is described as crossing during his fight with Ahi
(I, 32, 14), and a hundred leather straps with which Kutsa is
said to have bound down Indra to his sacrifice in the Tāṇḍya
Brāhmaṇa IX, 2, 22, and from which he is invoked to free
himself in Ṛig. X, 38, 5, are but so many different kaleidoscopic
views of the same idea which makes Indra and Indra alone the
lord of a hundred sacrifices; and if we take all these together
they undoubtedly point out to the existence of a hundred conti-
nuous nights in the ancient home of the ancestors of the Vedic
people. In V, 48, 3, 'a hundred,' moving in the abode of Indra,
are said to turn on and turn off the course of ordinary days when
Indra strikes Vṛitra with his bolt ;* and I think we have here a
distinct allusion either to a hundred sacrifices performed or to
a hundred continuous nights required for securing a complete
victory over the powers of darkness in the nether world, and
which nights (or rather one long night of hundred days) may well
be described as breaking off and bringing back the succession of
ordinary days and nights, inasmuch as the long night immediately
follows and precedes the period of sunshine in the Arctic regions.

• Ṛig. V, 48, 3,—आ ग्रावभिरहन्येभिरर्किभिर्वरिहं वज्रमा जिघर्ति मायिनि ।
  शतं वा यस्य प्रचरन्त्स्वे दमे संवर्तयन्तो वि च वर्तयन्नहा ॥

222 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
But a far more striking corroboration of the above view is
furnished by certain passages in the Avesta which describe the
fight of Tishtrya with the demon of draught called Apaosha or
'the burner' in the Parsi scriptures. In the Ṛig-Veda the fight of
Indra with Vṛitra (Vṛitra-tûrya) is often represented as 'a struggle
for waters' (ap-tûrya), or as 'the striving for cows' (go-
ishṭi), or 'the striving for day' (div-ishṭi), and Indra is said to have
released the cows or waters, and brought on the dawn or the sun
by killing Vṛitra (I, 51, 4; II, 19, 3). Now Indra, as Vṛitra-han,
appears as Verethraghna in the Avesta; but the fight for waters is
therein ascribed not to Verethraghna but to Tishtrya, the star of
rain. It is he, who knocks down Apaosha and liberates the waters
for the benefit of man, "with the assistance of the winds, and the
light that dwells in the waters." In short Tishtrya's conquest
over Apaosha is an exact parallel of Indra's conquest over
Vṛitra as described in the Ṛig-Veda; and as the legends are in-
terpreted at present, they are said to refer to the breaking up of
the clouds and the bringing on of the rains on the earth, Tish-
trya being supposed to be the star of rain. But this theory fails
to account for the fact how the recovery of the dawn and the
rising of the sun, or the bringing on of light, were included
amongst the effects of Indra's victory over Vṛitra. It will be
shown in the next chapter that the struggle for waters has very
little to do with rain, and that the fight for waters and the fight
for light are really synchronous, being two different versions of
the same story. In short, both of these legends really represent
the victory of the powers of light over darkness. Shushṇa or
'the scorcher' is one of the names given to Indra's enemy in
the Ṛig-Veda (I, 51, 11), and the result of the conflict between
Indra and Shushṇa is the release of the waters, as well as the
finding of the morning cows (VIII, 96, 17), and the winning of the
sun (VI, 20, 5). Apaosha is thus Shushṇa under a different garb,

THE COWS' WALK. 223
and the only difference between the two legends is that while Indra
is the chief actor in the one, Tishtrya is the chief hero in the
other. But this difference is immaterial inasmuch as the attributes
of one deity are often transferred, even in Ṛig-Veda, to another.
The Avestic legend of Tishtrya is, therefore, rightly understood
by Zend scholars to be a reproduction of the Vedic legend of
Indra and Vṛitra.* Now, in the Tîr Yasht, Tishtrya is repre-
sented as eventually overcoming Apaosha with the help of the
Haoma sacrifice offered to Tishtrya by Ahura Mazda (Yt. VIII,
15-25). The fight is carried on in the region of the waters, the
sea Vouru-Kasha, from which Tishtrya is described as rising up
victorious after defeating Apaosha (Yt. VIII, 32). Daêva Apao-
sha is again said to have assumed the form of a dark horse,
while Tishtrya is represented as opposing him in the form of a
bright horse, hoof against hoof (Yt. VIII, 28), and eventually com-
ing up victorious from out of the sea Vouru-Kasha, like the sacri-
ficial horse rising from the waters in the Ṛig-Veda (I, 163, 1).
But the passage most important for our purpose is the one in
which Tishtrya informs Ahura Mazda as to what should be done
in order to enable Tishtrya to overcome his enemy and to appear
before the faithful at the appointed time. "If men would wor-
ship me," says Tishtrya to Ahura Mazda, "with a sacrifice in
which I were invoked by my own name, as they worship the
other Yazatas with sacrifices in which they are invoked by their
own names, then I should have come to the faithful at the appoin-
ted time; I should have come in the appointed time of my beauti-
ful immortal life, should it be one night, or two nights, or fifty,
or a hundred nights," (Yt. VIII, 11). As Tishtrya appears before
man after his battle with Apaosha, the phrase "appointed

• See Darmesteter's Trans. of Zend-Avesta Part II, (Vol. XXIII
  S. B. E. Series), p. 92. He remarks that Tishtrya's legend is 'a
  refacimento of the old storm-myths.'

224 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS,
time " signifies the time during which the battle is fought and at
the termination of which Tishtrya comes to the faithful ; and
the passage, therefore, means (1) that the "appointed time," when
Tishtrya was to appear before man after fighting with Apaosha,
varied from one night to a hundred nights, and (2) that Tishtrya
required to be strengthened during the period by Haoma sacri-
fices in which he was to be invoked by his own name. We have
seen above that a hundred nightly Soma sacrifices were offered to
Indra by the ancient Vedic sacrificers to enable him to secure
a victory over Vṛitra, and that Indra was the only deity to whom
the libations were offered in these sacrifices. The legend of
Tishtrya and Apaosha is, therefore, an exact reproduction of
Indra's fight with Vṛitra or Vala ; and with this correspondence
before us, we should feel no hesitation in accepting the view
stated above regarding the origin of the Shata-râtra sacrifice.
Neither Darmesteter nor Spiegel explains why the appointed
time for the appearance of Tishtrya is described as " one night,
or two nights, or fifty, or a hundred nights," though both trans-
late the original in the same way. The legend also forms the
subject of chapter VII of the Bundahish, but there, too, we find no
explanation as to why the appointed time is described as varying
from one to a hundred nights. It is, however, suggested by some
that the appointed time may refer to the season of rains. But
rains cannot be said to come after "one night, two nights, or fifty,
or a hundred nights," and the latter expression would, therefore,
be utterly inappropriate in their case ; nor, as stated above, does
Tishtrya's fight with Apaosha represent only a struggle for rain,
since we know that it is a struggle for light as well. We have also
seen that the existence of night-sacrifices in the Vedic literature,
extending over one, two, three, or ten, or a hundred nights, indi-
cates the long darkness during which Indra fought with Vala ;
and the coincidence between this fact and the 'appointed time,'

THE COWS' WALK. 225
of Tishtrya cannot be regarded as accidental. The legends are
undoubtedly identical in character, and taking the one to illus-
trate the other, the only conclusion deducible from them is that
a hundred nights was regarded to be the maximum duration of
the fight between Indra and Vala, or Tishtrya and Apaosha, so
far as the ancestors of the Indo-Iranian people were concerned,
and that the sea Vouru-Kasha, or the ocean 'encompassed with
darkness,' as the Ṛig-Veda has it (II, 23, 18), was the scene of
this battle between the powers of light and darkness. We also
learn from them that the hero of the battle, whether he was
Indra or Tishtrya, stood in need of help, derived from the per-
formance of the sacrifices specially offered to him during the
period; and that as a matter of fact such sacrifices were performed
in ancient times. The word shata-kratu does not occur in the
Avesta, but in the Ashi Yasht (Yt. XVII, 56) "a.ram of hundred-
fold energy (maeshahe satokarahe) is spoken of; and considering
the fact that in the Bahram Yasht (Yt. XIV, 23) "a beautiful ram,
with horns bent round" is said to be one of the incarnations of
Verethraghna, and that Indra is also described as appearing in
the form of a ram in the Ṛig-Veda (VIII, 2, 40), it is very
probable that the phrase sato-karahe maeshahe refers to Verethra-
ghna in the Ashi Yasht, and like the epithet shata-kratu, the
adjective sato-karahe means not "possessed of hundred powers,"
but "the master of a hundred deeds or sacrifices." There is
thus a very close correspondence between the Vedic and the
Avestic ideas on this subject, and this strengthens the conclusion
that the night sacrifices in the Vedic literature had their origin
in the existence of a long continuous night of varying durations
in the original home of the Vedic people. We can now also
satisfactorily explain why Tishtrya is described (Yt. VIII, 36,
vide Spiegel's Trans.) as 'bringing hither the circling years of
men." It is the Avestic parallel of the Vedic story of the
Dawn setting, in motion "the ages of men, or mânuṣhâ yugâ,"
15