The Arctic Home in the Vedas c9.15

c9.15

Let us now see if the Ṛig-Veda contains any direct reference to the long day, the long night, or to the Circum-polar calendar, besides the expressions about long darkness or the difficulty of reaching the other boundary of the endless night noticed above. We have seen before that the Ṛig-Vedic calendar is a calendar of 360 days, with an intercalary month, which can neither be Polar nor Circum-polar. But side by side with it the Ṛig-Veda preserves the descriptions of days and nights, which are not applicable to the cis-Arctic days, unless we put an artificial construction upon the passages containing these descriptions. Day and Night is spoken of as a couple in the Vedic literature, and is denoted by a compound word in the dual number. Thus we have Uṣhâsâ-naktâ (I, 122, 2), Dawn and Night; Naktoṣhâsâ (I, 142, 7), Night and Dawn; or simply Uṣhâsau (I, 188, 6), the two Dawns; all meaning a couple of Day and Night. The word Aho-râtre also means Day and Night; but it does not occur in the Rig-Veda, though Aitareya Brâhmaṇa (II, 4) treats it as synonymous with Uṣhâsâ-naktâ. Sometimes this pair of Day and Night is spoken of as two sisters or twins; but whatever the form in which they are addressed, the reference is usually unambiguous. Now one of the verses which describes this couple of Day and Night is III, 55, 11.¹ The deity of the verse is Aho-râtre, and it is admitted on all hands that it contains a description of Day and Night. It runs thus:—