The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v1.c11.s2.27

v1.c11.s2.27

The question of the primitive sacrifice is clearly insoluble, since among certain similarities there are great differences of view. The facts that victims were usually chosen from among edible animals, that other offerings were normally motived by some special end, as in the case of the horse sacrifice, that in choosing the victims efforts were made to assimilate the animal in sex, colour, and other characteristics to the deity, are common to most of the Indo-European peoples, but they are shared with many other peoples as well. Human sacrifices are recorded all over the world, and in some form or other among nearly all Indo-European peoples, but many different elements may have entered into these sacrifices, and any ascription of this form of religion to the early period must be purely conjectural. Offerings of cereals were doubtless made, as they are made by most peoples, but prognostication though widely attested in Europe—partly with clear indications of derivation from Babylon¹—is much less marked in Indian religion, and its separate development in the different nations is possible, although prognostication from the flight of birds has a strong claim to be considered Indo-European.