The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v1.c20.s3.17

v1.c20.s3.17

Of the myths in which Prajāpati figures, the most interesting by far is that of his incest with his daughter Uṣas,¹ who changed herself into a gazelle, whereupon he assumed the form of the male animal corresponding to it. In the version of the Maitrāyaṇī Saṁhitā² Rudra aimed an arrow at him, but was induced to lay it aside by a promise of Prajāpati to make him the lord of beasts, if he did not shoot him. In the Aitareya Brāhmaṇa³ the gods in anger at the incest of Prajāpati make from the most terrible substances the form of Rudra, who shoots Prajāpati in the form of a deer, the myth being transferred to the sky, where the deer, Mṛga, the archer Mṛgavyādha, and the three-pointed arrow, Iṣu Trikāṇḍā, are pointed out. It is apparently a transfer to the god Prajāpati as creator god of a legend which seems in the Rigveda⁴ to be told, though in the most obscure terms of a father, who is probably to be taken as Dyaus with his daughter, presumably meant to be the earth, for an archer is alluded to in that legend. Elsewhere Prajāpati is recorded to have given Uṣas in marriage to Bṛhaspati or Soma,⁵ or to have married all his daughters, the Nakṣatras, to Soma.⁶