The Arctic Home in the Vedas c14.3

Language: English

c14.3.1

IN dealing with the Vedic evidence, both direct and circumstantial, we have by way of comparison quoted or referred to some Avestic legends or myths in the foregoing chapters. But the Avesta contains some important passages directly bearing upon the question of the original Aryan home in the far north, and migrations therefrom to the regions watered by the Oxus, the Jaxartes or the Indus; and it is necessary to discuss these passages in a separate chapter, because they not only confirm and supplement the conclusions we have previously arrived at by the examination of the Vedic evidence, but constitute, what may be called, independent evidence pointing out to the same result. As regards the antiquity of the Avesta, it is superfluous to adduce any proofs in this place; for it is admitted by scholars that the Vedas and the Avesta are but two branches of the same parent stream, though the latter may not be as well preserved as the former. To use a Vedic phrase, the sacred books of the Brâhmans and the Parsis are the twin books of the Aryan race; and they can, therefore, be safely taken to supplement each other whenever it is necessary and possible to do so. This character of the two books is well exhibited with regard to the subject in hand.

c14.3.2

We have seen that while there are a number of passages in the Vedic literature, which speak of long dawns, continuous darkness, or a sacrificial session of ten months, we have no text or legend which directly refers to the home in the far north or to the cause or causes which forced the ancient Aryans to abandon their primeval home and migrate southwards. But fortunately for us, the Avesta, though not generally as well preserved as the Vedas, contains a passage which supplies the omission in a remarkable way; and we mean to discuss this passage at some length in this chapter. The Avestic legends and traditions quoted in the foregoing chapters show that a day and a night of six months each were known to the ancestors of the Iranians, and that the appointed time for the appearance of Tishtrya before the worshipper, after his fight with Apaosha, varied from one to a hundred nights, thus indicating that a long darkness extending over a hundred nights was also known to the forefathers of the worshippers of Mazda. The stoppage of the flow of waters and of the movement of the sun in winter, as described in the Farvardîn Yasht, have also been referred to; and it is shown that the custom of keeping a dead body in the house for two nights, three nights or a month long in winter, until the floods begin to flow, must be ascribed to the absence of sunlight during the period when the floods as well as light were shut up in the nether world by the demons of darkness.

c14.3.3

All these traditions have their counterparts in the Vedic literature. But the Avestic tradition regarding the original home in the far north and its destruction by snow and ice stands by itself, though in the light of the Vedic evidence discussed in the previous chapters, we can now clearly show that it has a historical basis and that it preserves for us a distinct reminiscence, howsoever fragmentary, of the ancient Aryan home. This tradition is contained in the first two Fargards or chapters of the Vendidad, or the law book of the Mazda-yasnians. They have no connection with the subsequent chapters of the book, and appear to be incorporated into it simply as a relic of old historical or traditional literature. These two Fargards have not failed to attract the attention of Zend scholars ever since the discovery of the Avesta by Anquetil; and many attempts have been made not only to identify the places mentioned therein, but to draw historical conclusions therefrom. Thus Heeren, Rhode, Lassen, Pictel, Bunsen, Haug and others have recognized in these accounts of the Vendidad, a half historical, half mythical reminiscence of the primeval home and the countries known to the followers of the Avesta, when these Fargards were composed. Professor Spiegel at first took the same view as Rhode, but has latterly retracted his opinion.

c14.3.4

On the other hand, Kiepert, Breal, Darmesteter and others have shown that no historical conclusion can be drawn from the description contained in the first two chapters of the Vendidad; and this view seems to be now mainly accepted. But it must be borne in mind that this view was formulated at a time when the Vedic evidence in support of the Arctic theory, set forth in the previous chapters, was entirely unknown, and when the existence of an Arctic home in ancient times was not regarded as probable even on geological grounds, man being believed to be post-Glacial and the Arctic regions always unsuited for human habitation. The recent discoveries in Geology and Archæology have, however, thrown a flood of new light on the subject; and if the interpretation of the Vedic traditions noticed in the previous chapters is correct, it will, I think, be readily admitted that a reconsideration of the Avestic tradition from the new standpoint is a necessity and that we should not be deterred from undertaking the task by the recent verdict of Zend scholars against the views of Bunsen and Haug regarding the historical character of the first two Fargards of the Vendidad.