The Arctic Home in the Vedas c11.60.4

c11.60.4

The word Ati-râtra is thus rationally explained, for the sacrifice was performed at the beginning and the close of the long night and, was therefore, adequately called a trans-nocturnal sacrifice. Between these two Ati-râtras came all the night-sacrifices mentioned above, offered exclusively to Indra. The old Gavâm-ayanam of ten or less than ten months, the Ati-râtra or the trans-nocturnal, the Râtri-kratus and Râtri-sattras, or nightly Soma sacrifices of two, three, &c., up to a hundred continuous nights' duration, and lastly the Ati-râtra, to be again followed by the Gavâm-ayanam, thus formed the complete yearly round of sacrifices performed by the primeval ancestors of the Vedic people; and each of these sacrifices had originally the same place in the yearly round as is indicated by the root-meaning of its name.¹ But when the year of ten months was converted into one of twelve to suit the altered conditions of the new home, the Gavâm-ayanam expanded into a performance of 360 days, and the elastic nature of the greater portion of the performance, as pointed out above, permitted the change to be easily carried out. But though the annual Sattra expanded in this way, encroaching upon the night-sacrifices of the long night, which were no longer needed, the Ati-râtra was retained as an introductory sacrifice and was incorporated in the ceremonies of the Sattra itself.