The Arctic Home in the Vedas c12.65.4

c12.65.4

and under these circumstances it was naturally considered to be the greatest of Indra’s exploits, when, invigorated by a hundred nightly Soma sacrifices, he slew with ice the watery demon of darkness, shattered his hundred autumnal forts, released the waters or the seven rivers upstream to go along their aerial way and brought out the sun and the dawn, or the cows, from their place of confinement inside the rocky caves, where they had stood still since the date of the war, which, according to a Vedic passage, hitherto misread and misunderstood, commenced in higher latitudes every year on the 40th day of Sharad or autumn and lasted till the end of winter. It is not contended that Indra had never been the god of rain. There are a few passages in the Rig-Veda (IV, 26, 2; VIII, 6, 1), where he is expressly mentioned as sending down rain, or is compared to a rain-god. But as Vritra-han or the killer of Vritra and the releaser of waters and the dawn, it is impossible to identify him with the god of rain. The story of the release of captive waters is an ancient story; for Vritra appears as Orthros in the Greak mythology, and Vritra-han, as Verethragna, is the god of victory in the Parsi scriptures.