The Arctic Home in the Vedas c11.62

c11.62

We have now reviewed the leading features of the system of Soma sacrifices as described in the Vedic literature, so far as our purpose is concerned, and seen that by the aid of the Arctic theory, some hard facts therein, which have been hitherto incomprehensible, can be easily and naturally explained. A history of the whole sacrificial system from the point of view indicated above is a work quite outside the pale of this book; but so far as we have examined the subject and especially the question about the isolated group of a hundred nightly Soma sacrifices, I think, we have sufficient evidence therein to warrant us in holding that these sacrifices are a relic of the ancient times when the ancestors of the Vedic Ṛiṣhis performed them with the object of helping Indra to fight with the powers of darkness. It has been already shown in the first part of this chapter that the Gavâm-ayanam or the ‘Cows’ walk, like the Roman year, once lasted only for ten months; and a series of suitable night-sacrifices is a natural supplement to such sessions. Both are relics of ancient times, and taken along with the evidence regarding the existence of a long dawn of thirty days and of the long day and night discussed in previous chapters, they conclusively establish the existence of an ancient home of the ancestors of the Vedic people in the circum-polar region. The sacrificial sessions of the Navagvas and the Dashagvas, the legend of Dîrghatamas growing old in the tenth month, the tradition about the ancient year of five seasons, or the yoking of seven or ten horses to the chariot of the sun, all go to strengthen the same view; and the Avestic passages regarding the duration of Tishtrya’s fight with Apaosha, the Purâṇic tradition about Indra’s being the master of a hundred sacrifices or the destroyer of a hundred cities, the existence of a series of one hundred nightly Soma sacrifices, which, though obsolete long since, could not have found place in the sacrificial works as *Râtri-sattras*, unless they were ancient sacrifices performed, as their name indicates, during night,—these and many other minor facts noticed before, further corroborate, if corroboration be needed, our theory regarding the original home of the Aryans near the north Pole. It must, however, be stated here that I do not wish to imply in any way that the numerous sacrificial details found in the later Vedic literature were in vogue or were known in these ancient times. On the contrary I am prepared to believe that in all probability these ancient sacrifices were very simple in character. The ancient priests probably went on sacrificing from day to day, and afterwards from night to night, without any idea that the system was capable of giving rise to various rigid annual *Sattras*. The sacrifice was the only ritual of their religion; and howsoever simple such sacrifices might have been in ancient times, it was almost a matter of duty, at least with the priests, to perform them every day. It was also a means, as remarked by me elsewhere, to keep up the calendar in ancient times, as the yearly round of sacrifices closely followed the course of the sun. It is from this latter point of view that the ancient sacrificial system is important for historical or antiquarian purposes, and I have examined it above in the same light. This examination, it will be seen, has resulted in the discovery of a number of facts which lead us directly to, and can be satisfactorily explained only by the theory of the original Arctic home; and when our conclusions are thus supported by the hymns of the *Rig-Veda* on the one hand, and the sacrificial literature on the other, I think, we need have no doubt about their correctness.