The Arctic Home in the Vedas c12.52

c12.52

Now *Sharad* is the fourth season of the year, and the fortieth day of *Sharad* would mean seven months and ten days, or 220 days, after the first day of *Vasanta* or the spring, which commenced the year in old times. In short, the passage means that Indra’s fight with Shambara, or the annual conflict between light and darkness, commenced on the tenth day of the eighth month of the year, or on the 10th of October, if we take the year to have then commenced with March, the first month in the old Roman calendar. In I, 155, 6, Viṣṇu, like a rounded wheel, is said to have set in swift motion his ninety racing steeds together with the four, and the reference is evidently to a year of four seasons of ninety days each. If we accept this division, each season would be of three months’ duration, and *Sharad* being the third (cf. X, 90, 6), the fortieth day of *Sharad* would still mean the 10th day of the eighth month of the year. The passage thus gives the very date of Indra’s annual fight with Vṛitra; and if it had been correctly understood, much useless speculation about the nature of Vṛitra’s legend would have been avoided. We have seen previously that the seven Âdityas, or monthly Sun-gods, the sons of Aditi, were presented by her to the gods in a former *yuga*, and that she cast away the eighth, the Mârtâṇḍa, because he was born in an undeveloped state. In other words, the Sun-god of the eighth month is here said to have died soon after he was born, evidently meaning, that the Sun went below the horizon in the beginning of the eighth month; and by fixing the date of the commencement of Indra’s fight with Vṛitra as the fortieth day in *Sharad*, or the 10th day of the eight month, we arrive at the same conclusion. The legend of Aditi and the date of the commencement of Indra's fight with Shambara, as given in II, 12, 11, thus corroborate each other in a remarkable way; and as the current interpretation of the passage does not yield any intelligible sense, there is no course left for us but to accept the only other possible interpretation.