The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v1.c21.s1.4

v1.c21.s1.4

Mitra and Varuṇa have twenty-three hymns addressed to them as dual deities: the mythology is practically all borrowed from that of Varuṇa, and the chief point of interest is that the same phenomenon of double invocation can be seen in this case already in the Avesta. The priority of Mitra in the compound name has been argued³ to indicate the superior importance at one time of that god, but the order accords also with the preference of the language for the placing of the shorter word in such a compound in the first place.⁴